crying but still half asleep

[Stefka]

I have noticed that sometimes when my DS who is 5 months cries in the night he looks like he is still asleep. I pick him up and feed him back to sleep but wonder if I should be doing something else if he is not fully awake.

He just did it just now with a nap and because he was in his pram I was able to rock him back to sleep without picking him up but obviously can't do that at night.

Is there a way to help him to drift back to sleep without waking him fully to feed him? Or is boob still the easiest solution?

I would just leave them to cry a little especially if they still look asleep. They could just be settling back afetr a period of light sleep. My 18 month old sometimes cries a bit in the night but if I leave him a few minutes he settles back off to sleep again by himself.

yes, i've VERY anti 'leaving them to cry' but sometimes ds (5 months) sort of whines/crys in his sleep and if you leave him for a minute he stops - and is still asllep. I think it's a bit of wind going round a corner or something. Why not just wait a minute and see if he stops of his own accord?

The bum pat works quite well for this sometimes, as does the back rub. If you think it's a nightmare (sometimes DS does this and I'm sure he's dreaming, probably about breasts being withdrawn, or being made to sleep in his cot or something equally ghastly) then try giving him a gentle shoogle to stir him out of it and then soothing him back to sleep with a rub.

Sometimes I've been able to leave DS to get himself back to sleep but other times he cries and wakes himself up so if I think that's going to happen I try to settle him again. Having said that he's hell to get to sleep so once he's down I move heaven and earth to keep it that way

I'll try giving him a wee shoogle and shush tonight - if he wakes up totally I can just boob him like normal! I think he had a nightmare tonight as he screamed in his sleep - probably a no boob dream like you say! Poor little muppet.

is he teething? DD has just started doing this (17 weeks) just after going to sleep and i have found calgel and giving her little gums a rub settles her back to sleep. only when it happens far outside when she would normally be hungry, though IYSWIM

My dd does this quite often, usually caused by wind I think, usually a wee back rub settles her back down without waking her up. Its incredible to me that she can scream so loud and stay asleep...sureshe wakes up the restof the street.

Do your babies not sleep on their backs? How do you rub their backs?

Mine sleeps on his front mostly and has done since around 6 months. He'd only ever sleep on his back if fed to sleep that way (killed my back, the things you do when you're a paranoid new mum!), but I started putting him down propped on his side and he started rolling onto his front and settling quite well then. So we just started putting him down on his front. He's always had great head control though, I wouldn't have done it with a floppy newborn.

Having said all that, he's started to settle on his back when in bed with us recently .

Ah - he's only just started rolling so maybe he will start to roll onto his tummy soon.

I tried it tonight - he started crying about five minutes after I put him down and I was able to shh him back to sleep without picking him up.