Will not Sleep unless is rocked

[PaulaP]

Hi all,

Was wondering if you could give me some advice.  My lo is 18 weeks old and will not sleep during the day unless I rock him.

I know that this is a bad habit, but he just does not go to sleep and I can tell he is tired, but if I put him in his cot he just screams (it is not like this at night).

My other problem is that he does not sleep for more that 30 - 40 minutes, and was wondering how I could get him to sleep longer during the day.

He sleeps perfectly at night from 7:30pm to 7am.

Looking forward to hearing your replies.

Paula - Mum to Thomas

[Taylor's Mommy]

Hi Paula,

When you say you rock him, do yuo rock him to sleep?  Or do you do it just to relax him adn then put him in awake?  If you are rocking him to sleep, I would encourage Thomas to learn to fall asleep at nap time without the rocking.

Have you read the sticky at the top of this board titled teaching sleep to young infants as well as tracy's sleep interview?  Both of these will go into detail as to get your little one to learn how to fall asleep independently without the use of a prop (the rocking).

Second, what is his routine?  Perhaps he is getting too overtired before you put him down so makes him very hard to settle.  Are his cues really easy or hard to read?  At this age it can be difficult to read their sleepy cues so a combination of watching the clock and reading the cues is sometimes necessary.

Please post his routine and we'll go from there.

[Hunter & Sithia's mom]

I agree with Andrea.

Just a note though.  I had the same problem with Hunter, though for all sleep times and night wakings and not just naps.  PU/PD did not work for him, and just worked to stimulate him.  What worked for me was to sit in his rocking chair, and pat/rub his back but not rock.  I gently weaned him from the rocking, then again with the patting/rubbing.  Finally he took to pu/pd, and we are great now.  It was a LOOOOOONG process though.

HTH

[PaulaP]

Hi Ladies,

Thank you both for your replies.

Thomas does not have much of a routine when it comes to sleeping except when he goes down for his night time sleep which he does not problem and without a fuss.

It is very difficult to read his signs and the only time I know that he is really tired is when he gets ratty and I guess by that time he is over tired. 

His routine is as follows

7:00am - bottle - I usually put him back in his cot and go back to bed myslef and sometimes he will sleep for another hour, sometimes longer.

11:00 - bottle

12:00 - he is usually ratty and I have to rock him to sleep - If I do not rock him and put him in his cot, he just wakes up and carries on playing or shouting

3:00 - bottle

4:30 - starts getting ratty again, and I try to get him to sleep - yesterday I was on the PC and he was in his cot with his mobile on and amazingly he fell asleep, but not for very long - he woke up screaming and I could not settle him again.

7:00pm - bottle

7:30 - bed - usually asleep before 8:00pm.

His naps usually last no longer that about 30 minutes or so.

Hope to hear your views.

Thanks again for your help.

Paula