Author Topic: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out and trouble self settling  (Read 3204 times)

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Offline ameliebob

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Hi everyone! My daughter is one month old and she keeps waking up when the pacifier falls out of her mouth while she's trying to fall asleep for naps. I would love if she could fall asleep without it as I always put her down without it but she rarely does (once or twice a week  :( )

every time it happens I let her fuss to see if she will self settle but it always ends with a full blown cry, so I put it back in, she sucks and gets sleepy, spit it out, and wakes up again. and it goes on like this for a long time. Right now it's been almost an hour she's trying to fall asleep..! I'm afraid she will become totally dependent of the dummy but she's too young to wean it cold turkey.

Any advice?
« Last Edit: March 21, 2016, 14:54:30 pm by ameliebob »


Offline jessmum46

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Re: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out
« Reply #1 on: March 11, 2016, 13:09:40 pm »
Personally speaking (disclaimer - I'm not a dummy fan!) I'd just get rid!  At her age she's actually so young that she won't really have any hard and fast habits yet so it may be a few wonky naps, but it won't be days and days of struggling to get her to settle.  If it's causing more issues than it is solving then from my perspective it's not worth it :). But equally it's worth being aware that many babies of a month of age will be way off falling asleep alone, and taking the dummy away may mean for a short time she needs more help in terms of shh pat, or 'APOP' (accidental parenting on purpose) ie rocking, cuddles etc before she will settle.  I think really the bottom line is there are big challenges with settling for sleep at this age whether you use a dummy or not, so if your long term plan is to keep the dummy you may just need to ride it out until she gets a little older :). Also I believe recent SIDS guidance does recommend dummies for young babies so you may also want to consider that aspect of things x

Offline ameliebob

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Re: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out
« Reply #2 on: March 12, 2016, 13:51:03 pm »
I'm not a dummy fan either but my DH is so we try to make compromises  ;)
What I did yesterday is let her suck until very drowsy, then I removed the paci, wake her a little so she open her eyes, then stroke her forehead until she closed her eyes again. And it worked! It took 15 min only! She didn't ask for the paci and took 2x1.5 and 1x3 hour naps!
I tried to do the same this morning but it took over half an hour for her to fall asleep. Don't know if it's due to her brother making loud noises or over tiredness. I hope she will eventually be able to fall asleep entirely without it.


Offline jessmum46

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Re: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out
« Reply #3 on: March 13, 2016, 12:44:43 pm »
Sounds good! Keep patient and persisting and you'll get there x

Offline ameliebob

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Re: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out
« Reply #4 on: March 21, 2016, 14:07:22 pm »
we started last week to let her fuss a bit before going to sleep for her first nap (which seems to be the easiest and longest of the day so far!) and she surprised us by self settling very well in less than 5 min! We used to put her down with her paci but she doesn't sleep well with it AT ALL. every time she spits it out or loses it she wakes up and cries, we put it in again and it goes like it the entire time of the nap. The gentle removal technique I was using finally ended up with her getting frustrated.

My question is; she managed to self settle in a minute this morning but she seems to no be able to STAY asleep. She's been awake only an hour so I don't think it's overtiredness... Any idea? It's the first time she does this in a week and I'm very confused. She fusses every 20 min but go back to sleep  :-\

I'm also wondering about what to do for the other naps. If I put her down she won't settle (even with ssh-pat in fact it seems to get her more cranky and mad!!) so we end up with her napping in the sling or in the car, or with the dummy with us so we can plug it back in easily...
The wind down is pretty efficient as she's fully relaxed and drowsy but the moment she hits the mattress she goes wide awake. Our awake time is always between 45 min to an hour and as soon we see her yawns we start the wind down.

Damn! I have a big love/hate relationship with this pacifier lol  ;)


Offline ameliebob

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Re: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out
« Reply #5 on: March 21, 2016, 14:53:59 pm »
Argh *sigh*

Ended up rocking her so she can have a bit of sleep. She was sleeping 5 minutes here and there from 9 to 11 even in her swing, yawning all the time but wide awake! Am I confusing her by holding her sometimes and sometimes not??


Offline trimbler

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Hey there, first, I just want to say try not to put yourself under too much pressure with teaching independent sleep right now - any consistent steps you make will be worth it, but especially with an older LO to look after, you'll probably need to do some naps in sling/pram etc and that's pretty normal at her age :-* Personally, with DD i just decided to concentrate on getting one nap in the cot each day, using shh pat, and APOPed the rest, as I didn't want to leave DS for too long. If the first nap seems the easiest, then perhaps go with that? If you can get another cot nap in then that's a bonus, but otherwise try not to worry too much, she's still so young and will likely your help much of the time - it's great to know that she can self settle at times, but perhaps at other times she's a little more OT or OS or something, so if you see she's struggling to self settle then go ahead and use as much shh pat as she needs. I personally tried to avoid switching to holding unless she was really upset, as I didn't want to confuse her, but I did use the sling a LOT from the start of naps, and sometimes to try and resettle for another sleep cycle if she short napped. I guess I'm just trying to say go ahead and lay whatever good foundations for sleep you're able, but don't feel bad about using props at this age, whether to spend some time with DS or to help prevent DD from getting really OT - after all, if she gets really OT she'll be less able to learn independent sleep.

Other thoughts - could she be OS? Really hard to avoid with an older sibling around! But do take whatever steps you can to keep things calm before nap time, easier said than done, I realise. Also it's possible she may be getting distracted by noises/sights around her by this age - mine certainly did, so a quiet space with white noise and blackout really helped us. From your description, it sounds like she's fairly content, not screaming, just looking around wide awake and dozing off from time to time but not always for very long? What's her A time?



Offline ameliebob

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She's not really screaming but won't stay asleep for long either. (15-20 min then her eyes pop wide open! Like she's trying to say "what? No I didn't slept! Have I missed something?")
Her days are very inconsistent! Last week-end we had to wake her from a 4hour nap and today we barely got a total of 2.5 hours of napping - even if I try sooo hard to get her to sleep within an hour of awake time! She drives me nuts! If we let her do her own thing she stays awake until she starts crying from being overtired! I was searching for posts on APOP this afternoon as I finally got her to sleep by rocking+sushing+paci+patting  :P

I may be stressing too much... DS was the same and has ALWAYS been a short napper until he dropped to one nap around 11 months. Those crappy 45 min naps... She seemed to be a good napper at first but since she turned 6 weeks it's all gone to trash.


Offline trimbler

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Sounds like she's drifting off into light sleep but unable to transition into deep sleep, which tends to happen around 20mins in. Sometimes this can be due to discomfort - do you think she might be uncomfortable due to gas or reflux or something like that? Does she bring wind up readily after a feed? Any other signs of reflux, whether actually bringing feeds back up or silent reflux? Is she swaddled? She may just be jolting at that transition into deep sleep (most LOs do at that age) and you may find that a swaddled stops this from happening. Or you could stay with her and maintain physical contact and/or shhing during that 15-20min period and see if you can help her stay asleep that way.



Offline ameliebob

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Yes has silent reflux but is not medication. The doctor said that we have to wait until she's 3 months as it's not so severe cuz she's gaining weight. And yes she sleeps swaddled, although she fights it so much I had to get a woombie style swaddle - She wants her hands up by her face but ends up frustrated that she can't keep them in her mouth  ::)

I'm so confused about her unpredictability! Today we got a 3 hour morning nap IN THE COT and she fell asleep by herself (She smiled at me and closed her eyes  :o ) and a 3 hour afternoon nap in the car seat doing errands, and in bed at 18:30. But she is SO noisy! Grunting all the time...! I'm wondering if it's due to reflux or not. But if she won't sleep for long due to reflux, wouldn't it be the same every day? We got both bad and good days (+/- 2 per week).


Offline jessmum46

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Re: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out and trouble self settling
« Reply #10 on: March 25, 2016, 07:32:54 am »
The thing with silent reflux is the only symptom really is pain and discomfort.....weight gain isn't typically an issue as they aren't actually bringing any feeds back up, unless of course they are in too much pain to feed well.  I think this comes down to your instinct - is she unsettled and seeming  in pain, or is she just short-napping on and off but pretty happy in herself?  If the latter I'd say this is just one of the things you kind of have to expect in young babies.  The books make it sound easy to have a predictable routine, with nice long regular naps, but my experience is that for most that doesn't really happen until quite a bit later on. If she's happy in herself most of the time (unless OT) then just try to relax and go with it for now. You are laying some great foundations. Predictability will come with time x

Offline ~*Nicole*~

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Re: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out and trouble self settling
« Reply #11 on: March 25, 2016, 17:58:11 pm »
I'm wondering if it's due to reflux or not. But if she won't sleep for long due to reflux, wouldn't it be the same every day? We got both bad and good days (+/- 2 per week).


I might have missed this info, but is she formula or breast fed?

Also, I agree with that love/hate relationship with pacifiers, until they get to the age they can find them and put them back in themselves! Then I love them....until I need to get them to drop them completely. Then it's back to hating. :)







Offline ameliebob

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Re: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out and trouble self settling
« Reply #12 on: March 26, 2016, 14:30:25 pm »
Formula. She drinks plenty (around 25 oz a day)


Offline ~*Nicole*~

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Re: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out and trouble self settling
« Reply #13 on: March 26, 2016, 14:47:31 pm »
I only wondered because if BF the changes in mom's diet could cause differences in behavior related to reflux. I don't have much experience with formulas and reflux outside of prescription formula that DS was on and even with that we had changes with regard to reflux but less than when I was BFing. Illnesses, teething, and other things did cause him to have differences in sleep and behavior but when I was nursing that added element of my diet changing daily had a big impact as well. So, I guess after all is said and done, it might not be the same every day! LOL







Offline ameliebob

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Re: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out and trouble self settling
« Reply #14 on: March 27, 2016, 00:07:48 am »
Argh! Today it took her nearly two hours to fall asleep at BT!  :-X I'm typing and I gave in and let her fuss because I'm exhausted of shushing and patting and she is still not sleeping!

She is so tired but can't seem to be able to stay asleep. She settles and close her eyes, but wakes up 5 to 20 minutes later. She is not hungry and I think she may be using her bottle as a paci as it takes her 30-45 min to drink only 3.5 oz of formula.


Offline trimbler

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Re: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out and trouble self settling
« Reply #15 on: March 27, 2016, 20:58:02 pm »
Sorry of course I knew about the reflux from your other thread :-[ I wonder if you might bring it up with the doc again? Not sure where you are, but in the UK we have a post-natal check up around 6-8 weeks, so if you have one, why not bring it up then? Sorry, can't remember and it's not jumping out at me, looking back - does she ever nap in a sling, in a more upright position? That worked so well for my DD, I should have done it more for DS in hindsight. At least if you can get a really good long nap or two like that, then he'll be less OT overall and hopefully have a better chance of settling when he does go down in his crib. Btw 6-8 weeks or so is apparently a peak crying time for most LOs :-\ but the good news is that things do tend to (slowly) improve after that, so hang on in there :-* Oh and I'm not saying definitely reflux, but there's no harm in taking some measures to make him more comfortable in case it is that, do bring it up with your doc again, I really regretted not having done that with my DS (several people on here advised me to, but I just didn't have the confidence after being told it probably wasn't reflux because his weight gain was really good - as Katherine says, not true!). I'm just saying this as DD was medicated, after a lactation consultant recommended it, suspecting silent reflux - and it made such a big difference to her :)

Btw try not to worry about a little fussing if she's doing it to settle herself - but equally if she's clearly upset, then try not to worry about independent sleep, by all means have a go for a while, but if it's just making her more upset then I'd honestly just do whatever you need to do to help calm her down for sleep, especially since you don't really know at this stage whether she's in discomfort from reflux or anything else. Sorry can't remember if I already gave you this link elsewhere, but in case not:

Reflux 101 - General reflux information
Sleep and the reflux baby.
« Last Edit: March 27, 2016, 21:01:30 pm by trimbler »



Offline ameliebob

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Re: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out and trouble self settling
« Reply #16 on: March 30, 2016, 18:59:12 pm »
How long do you try to ssh-pat for naps before giving up? Do you skip the nap or you try to do whatever works to get her to sleep?


Offline jessmum46

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Re: 1 month old wakes up when pacifier falls out and trouble self settling
« Reply #17 on: March 30, 2016, 20:36:24 pm »
At this age I'd have tried 10-15 mins max and then done whatever worked to prevent too much OT x