Hello there,
Over the last 6 -7 weeks, bedtime for my LO has become hell on earth!
My DS is 5 months old and prior to this development, would sleep relatively easily. However, I admit that we never taught him how to sleep by himself. We've always rocked him, sung to him, carried him or nursed (or bottle fed) him to sleep and then put him down after he was asleep. I realise now that we were the definition of accidental parents... but those methods worked very well at the time. Now, absolutely nothing works apart from nursing which is a vicious circle as after he always wakes up howling 2-5 times afterwards needing to be winded... and then has to be resettled etc.
Basically, my LO starts yawning from 6.15ish onwards. I then give him a small bottle, then he has a bath, then he changes into his PJs while he listens to lullabies in a darkened room. He has his last feed at 7pm. I then burp him and read him a short story so he can digest during it. At this point, I can tell he's exhausted because he's yawning and rubbing his eyes continuously and keeps crumpling into me. But when I hold him or rock him or sing gently to him, he cries inconsolably. When I try to lay him down, he cries even more as he's not used to being put to bed when awake. If I leave him alone, he goes nuts. I can tell that he's fighting the onset of sleep with every breath in his body! This deeply distressing crying can go on until 9pm although I usually cave in and BF him to sleep before that.
The other important point is that we co-slept together until about 2 weeks ago. He slept in a double futon with me in his bedroom. I've now managed to make the transition back to my marital bed relatively calmly - he didn't seem too bothered by my absence! And once asleep, he will sleep through the night without waking. But when we tried to move him into his cot in his bedroom, he wasn't having any of it. I'm now very worried about the fact that he now sleeps in a big double bed by himself! Of course, he's buttressed by cushions on all side but he's just started moving, so I'm concerned he might fall out of the bed. It's ridiculous to see a small baby in such a large bed!
My problems is that there are so many things wrong with our scenario that I don't know where to start to put things right.
Any advice on whether we should start the PU/PD method immediately to teach him how to self-soothe? Or should we get him used to the cot first? If so, how? He's happy to play in the cot by day but when he gets tired before a nap, he cries as if to say, 'this isn't the place where I sleep'... Poor thing.
