Teaching 6.5 month old to self settle

[Josi2015]

Hello, I'd be really grateful for some help with teaching my 6.5 month old to get to sleep independently.

After some really helpful advice in response to an earlier post, we got her into a pretty good daytime routine with 2 x 1.5hr naps and 3hr A times. However, night wakings have continued - up to 7/8 wakings on bad nights (with generally 1 feed and the other times she just needs holding either in or out of the cot to resettle).

We have always rocked her to sleep and are guessing that her being unable to self settle is causing a lot of the night wakings. We've set aside this weekend/next week when my husband has some time off work to start teaching her to self settle.

We're planning to do an adapted version of shush pat, where we will initially rock her until she is drowsy and then put her in the cot drowsy but awake and keep a hand on her tummy/hold her hand until she (hopefully!) falls asleep (we've had some success getting her back to sleep at night doing this).

We've got a few questions on this method and it would be great to use people's experience to give us the best chance of success.

- First, once she's learnt to get to sleep doing the above we know that we will need to gradually reduce the amount we do both to get her drowsy before putting her in the cot and then the amount of contact we have with her once she is in the cot - is it better to tackle either one of these first or is it just a case of personal preference?

- How quickly should we work at reducing the amount we do to help her get to sleep? Should we reduce our involvement as soon as she has learnt one way or is it better to give her time to adjust and do it more slowly?

- When we rock her to sleep, it generally takes about 5-10 mins for her to settle so we usually start to settle her about 10 minutes before the end of her A time. I'm assuming it will take longer for her to get to sleep when we are not rocking her - should we still start trying to get her to sleep at the same time, even though by the time she gets to sleep she will probably have had more A time than she can handle?

- Once we've put her in the cot, our plan is to try to keep her there until she falls asleep so we won't pick her up unless she is really upset. I think I've read that with PUPD the amount of time you should hold a 6 month old before putting them down again is limited, but as we're trying a gentler shush pat type approach initially, if she does cry, is it ok to hold her until she is calm again and then put her down?

- Finally, are there any tweaks we should make to her routine to give us the best chance of success? Her day yesterday was as follows:

WU 6:40. Lay in cot happily until got her up at 7:10

A 6:40 - 10:00
(I've read in the forums somewhere that you can treat time in the cot in the dark before starting the day as half A time so this is what I did yesterday, making the first A time equivalent to 3hrs5)

S 10:00 - 12:00 (1hr50 total - woke after 34min but I resettled her)
A 12 - 3:05 (3hrs5)
S 3:05 - 4:40 (1hr25 - woke after 34min again but I resettled her)
A 4:40 - 7:45pm (3hrs5)

NF 4:40am

We actually only had one waking last night for a feed, which was great but unusual!

For the past few days she has woken at around 30 mins into a nap, although I have been able to resettle her to get a decent total nap length.

Any tips/advice you can give would be very much appreciated! Thank you

[jessmum46]

- First, once she's learnt to get to sleep doing the above we know that we will need to gradually reduce the amount we do both to get her drowsy before putting her in the cot and then the amount of contact we have with her once she is in the cot - is it better to tackle either one of these first or is it just a case of personal preference?

I would work on putting her down more awake in the cot - the aim eventually is to put her down fully awake and have her get to that nice calm drowsy state on her own. 

- How quickly should we work at reducing the amount we do to help her get to sleep? Should we reduce our involvement as soon as she has learnt one way or is it better to give her time to adjust and do it more slowly?

Yes I would keep moving forwards - what you are describing is a kind of gradual withdrawal approach.  It may help you to write a plan out so (1) rock until very drowsy, put down.  (2) rock until just starting to get drowsy, put down etc etc and plan to move forward a step every 1-2 days.  You can alway move back again if she is really upset by it but it's easy to get stuck at one stage if you don't actively plan to keep it moving.  Have the end goal in mind at all times and 'do the minimum' - she may just surprise you

- When we rock her to sleep, it generally takes about 5-10 mins for her to settle so we usually start to settle her about 10 minutes before the end of her A time. I'm assuming it will take longer for her to get to sleep when we are not rocking her - should we still start trying to get her to sleep at the same time, even though by the time she gets to sleep she will probably have had more A time than she can handle?

This depends on your LOs personality.  For a textbook/angel baby I would say start slightly early, 10 mins or so, but if she's spirited and not yet tired I expect she will fight you even harder if you start too early.  You do need to expect some OT, it's inevitable when sleep training but it does come right in the end   You can always throw in a quick AP catnap if needed at the end of the day to prevent too much OT disaster, but don't use the props you are trying to break - try a quick car or pram nap instead.

- Once we've put her in the cot, our plan is to try to keep her there until she falls asleep so we won't pick her up unless she is really upset. I think I've read that with PUPD the amount of time you should hold a 6 month old before putting them down again is limited, but as we're trying a gentler shush pat type approach initially, if she does cry, is it ok to hold her until she is calm again and then put her down?

I think as you are doing a gradual withdrawal method where you are weaning the holding, this is ok.  If she starts to fight you though I would put her down and allow her the space.

- Finally, are there any tweaks we should make to her routine to give us the best chance of success? Her day yesterday was as follows:

Routine looks good to me - I'd stick with that for now, around 3h A times and once she is settling herself (and getting a better night) you may find she can handle an increase

Good luck!

[Josi2015]

Thanks so much for your reply - it's really helpful.

Just one question...

It may help you to write a plan out so (1) rock until very drowsy, put down.  (2) rock until just starting to get drowsy, put down etc etc and plan to move forward a step every 1-2 days.

I was expecting it to take longer than 1-2 days for her to learn to fall asleep at each step, although like you say, she might surprise us! If it does take longer, would you recommend we still move forward a step every 1-2 days, even if she hasn't yet mastered the previous step?

Thanks again for your help

[jessmum46]

Yes of course - if you feel she needs a bit longer then by all means do take that time.  It's more just having the mindset of not getting 'stuck' at one stage - she doesn't need to be settling perfectly with no fuss at all before you move things on a bit x

[Josi2015]

Thanks Katherine, that makes sense. Frustratingly she seems to have woken up with a tummy bug this morning and is all out of sorts so it looks like we're going to have to delay the sleep training until she's better. Hoping it doesn't last long! Thank you again.

[jessmum46]

Oh no!  Is she any better now?

[Josi2015]

Yes, she's much better now thanks. She was ill for a couple of days last weekend so we had to delay the sleep training for a few days but since then we've made great progress - we're now able to put her down only slightly drowsy and she'll go to sleep in the cot with a bit of hand holding and patting from us. She's also either sleeping through the night or just needing one night feed which is a massive improvement. I can't believe how far we've come in less than a week - thanks so much for your help in guiding us to this point!

The only thing that is not going so well is naps. She wakes up at about 33 or 34 minutes at pretty much every nap. She will usually go back to sleep for at least another 45 minutes but only with our help to get her back to sleep (if we leave her she will lie there quite happily for about 10 minutes and then start to fuss then cry). Do you have any thoughts as to what is causing her to wake up at this point and how we can change it? Thank you.

[Palmira78]

Hi Josi.
I am experiencing a very similar problem than yours. My DS is waking 6 or 7 times a night. Instead of rocking we are using the pacifier but it is also not good and he still wakes up.
I would like to find out, from your experience, how do you determine during the night if you will feed your baby or if you will calm her by rocking? Have you chosen a particular time for feeding? I do it like the last resource... but sometimes I have to do it twice...
I am also experimenting and trying to sooth my son by holding his hand, but when he is very awake or unsettle that backfires and the only thing that works is breastfeeding. What do you do in those cases? I would like to learn from you since you have already experienced some success with the feedings.

[jessmum46]

That's amazing!  Well done   I wonder if she needs a touch more A time before her nap?  It sound like she is just not quite tired enough to stay asleep, but can get there with a bit of help.  Perhaps another 5-10 mins before putting her down and she may sleep more soundly?  It may now she's having a better night she can handle a bit longer x

Hi nluno   Sorry to hear you are having similar troubles?  How old is your DS?  Perhaps you may like to start a new thread including your EASY for some extra help?

[Josi2015]

Thanks Katherine, I'll give that a try.

Hi Nluno - With my lo it's usually quite clear within a couple of minutes whether she's hungry and won't go back to sleep until she's fed or if she just needs help getting back to sleep. If she just needs help getting back to sleep she will put her head on my shoulder and relax into my arms if I pick her up, or now that we're soothing her in the cot, she tends to calm down pretty quickly as soon as I hold her hands or put a hand on her chest. If she's hungry, she'll be a lot more frantic and won't calm down. If soothing in the cot doesn't work but she doesn't seem hungry, I hold her until she is calm and then put her down and try again. Sometimes I have to do this a few times before she will settle.

I don't have a set time that I feed her, although it tends not to be before 3am and I don't feed her more than once in a night (apart from the dream feed). It helps that she only ever seems to want to feed once overnight and any other wakings she just needs help getting back to sleep. I guess because rocking was the prop we used rather than feeding, I haven't had to use feeding to get her to sleep and only need to feed her when she's genuinely hungry.

Hope that helps - good luck!