Independant sleep for Touchy/Spirited Baby

[Mrs Pickers]

Hi, I am a new mum to Beth, aged 3 months. I have had her on EASY since about two weeks but am worried now that my shush/pat and use of dummy will become a prop to get her to sleep.

She takes a lot of calming down/transition to sleep time even though she is obviously tired. We have been getting her to stage 3 of sleep ie. eyes drooping, laying on a pillow on our laps, using dummy and shush pat, and then putting her into her cot and shush patting if necessary until she sleeps.

I tried a week of putting her directly into her cot after 2-5 mins of swaddle and singing but as soon as she hits the cot she seems to be wide awake and fidgets until she gets into a frustrated rage. She sleeps on her front and currently lifts her head and legs at the same time like a see-saw and takes a full 20 mins of shush/pat and crying to get her calm. Should I leave her to fidget and get comfortable and trust her that she can get herself to sleep?

Once asleep she takes 2 hour naps during the day and sleeps from 7pm thru to 6am with a DF - is it a case of 'don't change what's not broken"?

Appreciate any advice...

Thanks
Rosie

[Jaime]

hi Rosie,

my ds was also a touchy and teaching him to sleep took a lot out of me.

i too was doing the shh/pat for what seemed like forever!  and he suffered from those 45-min naps on top of it!  :roll:

what i think seemed to help the most was time & consistency.  i put him down the same way every time & rolled through the 20 minute mark with him until he was really down.

he started to get it around 4 months  - and i could finally start to back off a bit on the shh/pat.  by around 5 months i was practically laying him down & saying good night.

think it just takes the touchy ones a little longer.  good luck & HTH 

[Mrs Pickers]

Hi Jaime

Thanks so much for your advice, I'll stick with it. Glad to know they do get it eventually!

Thanks
Rosie

[khaytock]

hi rosie,

just wanted to add my two cents as well.

we did the shush-pat forever as well- up to three hours a day at times!!!  i cannot believe that those days are over.  now we are working with the pu/pd now that he is 6.5 months but not as much as the shush-pat.

for me, i have to stick to the routine that works for ds in winding him down, and it took a bit to find one that worked for both of us.  some days are touchier than others and it is easy to get frustrated and upset.  though it seems like it, these days won't last forever.  God has already taught me so much about patience and perserverance through him.

Kim