why is it she is getting even harder to put down to sleep? :(

I put this post up several months ago:

https://www.bellybelly.com.au/forums...either-158432/

and things are still just terrible.

Day care is fine, they get her to sleep at day care. She even puts herself to sleep at day care. WTF???

But at home, NO WAY.
At first I thought we were making progress, and she did put herself to sleep a few times, but then she worked out what was going on, and would begin fighting if she thought we were even heading for a nap, just beginning the first stage of the getting ready. She just arches and rolls and thrashes and screams. I have tried patting her, but although it worked the first time, now it doesn't - I can't physically hold her still as she fights and resists me.

DH can rock her to sleep - his arms are bigger and stronger than mine. sometimes I struggle to hold her squirming so much I am concerned I will drop her.

why T F won't she have a sleep? She did not have a nap at all today :(

Oh, and the only way I can get her to sleep is to BF her. She is almost 12 months old. I feel like I have completely stuffed up and created a baby who won't sleep unless in mums arms on mum's boob. Even when we co-sleep she needs to suck to sleep, I cant even just pat her, where as before at least I could pat her if we were co-sleeping. This is getting RIDICULOUS!!!!!

sorry for the rant.

Hi Milly,

I don't think you have completely stuffed up at all! She sounds much like my DS. I have stopped trying to put him to sleep in the day time as I felt I was wasting so much time rocking him, bouncing him in his hammock or trying to feed him to sleep with no success. Now I just wear him on my back when he gets tired, sometimes he has a nap sometimes he doesn't.. when he doesn't though at least he is having quiet restful time on me, which I think is the next best thing to a nap. It is very frustrating though, my mum can rock him to sleep in five minutes without even a grumble from him. He has been having one, sometimes two naps a day anywhere between half - 1.5 hours. I just try to remember that he is growing quickly and his sleeping will continue to change as he grows.

I was going out of my mind when I was focussing on his sleep, but now I just go with it.. I don't think about how much sleep he 'should' be having, I don't notice the time so much, and I'm feeling sooo much more relaxed and happy.

:hug: you're not doing anything wrong! Babies naturally suck to sleep, and breastfeeding is natures way of helping our babies off to sleep. I'm guessing your bub has figured out boobs and mum are waaaay better than being rocked to sleep. It makes sense other people can settle bub faster when you're not there...there's no choice!

I know how tedious it is to have a baby suckling allllllll night, but I promise it won't last forever!

You're doing a great job!!!

You haven't done anything wrong. It's normal and it will get better I promise. My DD1 was exactly the same. She started improving around 14 months, that's not far away! DD2 is going the same way *sigh*

There is nothing wrong you are doing! I still boob my baby to sleep...I have never been able to do it any other way. Sucking is the most natural way for babies to go to sleep of all ages. I was thinking about this today and I now believe that there is nothing wrong or right in parenting methods, as long as what you do doesn't cause your child distress. So if your child is genuinely distressed by not having boob, bottle, dummy, rocking, singing or whatever you use to get them to sleep, then it is a need and we parents provide our bubbas with what they need. If we do that then NOTHING we do is wrong. Keep up the good work!! It will get better and you need to do what is easier for you and if boob is the way then there is nothing wrong, backward, regressive or whatever the 'baby trainers' would have us think, about it.

Yep- you have described my DS!!!! He was booby sleeped til I weaned at about 15 months!! And even before weaning and after weaning he fought sleep!! We tried to do a routine and he would just cry and scream and I would be trying to hold him down or I would keep laying him down and it was SUCH a battle!!!

By the time DD was about to come along (he was 23 months when she was born and we fought for him to go to sleep that whole time!!!!!) I was too pregnant to be lifting him up and laying him down again twenty times a night- so about a month before DD was born I gave up. We got a pillow and blanket and put it on the couch. when he was tired he layed down for a "rest" and eventually he started putting himself to sleep- but only on the couch- only if we were there. After a while a few times he did take himself off to his bed for a nap. And now he is three, this is still what we do. He knows bed time he goes and lays down either on the couch or on his little couch with his blanket and pillow- he isnt allowed to get up and muck around, and within minutes he is asleep. One day I am sure this will progress to his own bed!!! :) But for now I am enjoying no fight!!!!

Jim fights going to sleep. He cries but they are intermittent cries if that makes sense. I am always in the same room as him as I live in a small flat. I have kind of done controlled crying but not really, it's just we are both exhausted and so I either put him in his rocker or bassinette and then we both have a rest.

My brother gave me a good tip and that was to sometimes remove things to look at, get them to look at a blank wall lol.

The thing that jumps out at me in your post is the day care thing. She sounds like a clever little cookie - when you are not there (day care, when dad has her, when your mum has her) she can go to sleep fine. Rocking, being put down at day care, she can do it - when you are not there.

It sounds like she is doing what my little DS is doing, who is around the same age - he's 13mths. When I am there, he just wants me, and most days he will feed to sleep, day and night. When I am not there, he is happy with other methods - the nanny puts him down and he self-settles, DH cuddles on the couch, MIL rocks him to sleep.

I think she is a smart one and has worked out the difference - she knows you have the booby, she wants the booby, she wants mum close. I don't think there is anything wrong with that. She self-settles at day care, that's great!!! That means that one day, when she trusts that you are there and you will still be there and she is ok with it, she will self-settle at home, when you are there. She will. Trust me.

:hug: It is so tough, I know. But if she goes to sleep happily and peacefully during/after a feed, is that such a bad thing? I am just going with it, with my DS. If that gives us peace in the house, that's ok with me.

You'll get there.

oh milly :hug:

FWIW, we still feed to sleep on pretty much EVERY sleep. it is her comfort and gets her off to the land of zzzz without fuss and without stress so i figure that i am just going to keep coasting like this until she chooses to do it differently. And TBH i am noticing some changes of late. for example, for the night feed she now will pop off during a feed and look towards her cot. so sometimes i put her in after she does that and sometimes she falls asleep awake, and other times she cries and i pick her up and i pop her back on the boob and she falls asleep.

i did this with DD1 as well, and i remember being really stressed about what would happen if she weans, and suprisingly once she had self weaned we were able to just do all the other pre bed routine and pop her into her cot (at 15 months).

my honest advice would be to just go the easiest, less stress free way for her and boob her to bed. it will pass and you have not made any bad habits...she is perfectly normal :hug: i get the frustration though, but trust me, there are even frustrations for parents that dont boob to bed (ie standing outside a door hearing baby cry, or rocking to sleep until you arms fall off, or in the case of my friends bouncing so much on the bed to get them rocked to sleep that the springs busted :rofl:).

It'll pass :hug:

P.S. we also get only one nap during the day. DD1 was such a champion snoozer during the day and well, DD2 has taken some getting used to as she just seems to cope well with only one 1.5 hour nap for the whole day. has been like that since she was a very small baby :dunno:

thanks ladies for your replies.
I really needed the reassurance - I was feeling like a complete failure after our "no-nap" Tuesday (which ended with Dad putting her to bed - of course).

Then, just now, she was fighting me - every time I took the boob out she would cry and fight, so we went into her room, and had a cuddle, and 3 times I tried to put her in the cot, and she would arch and kick. But then I heard DH come home, so I was just going to put her down and get him to put her to sleep, but instead she looked up at me, said a word or two, then shut her eyes and went to sleep, just like that! Boy am I confused!!! I saw one of my friends today who had just been to Karitane, and I was almost thinking of the same, and then this! go figure!

Anyway, I do try not to worry about how much/ how long etc, but it's more that I KNOW she is tired, but she just keeps fighting it, and that's what I find the hardest to deal with, when I know that she needs to have a sleep, I can see/hear/feel it, but she just WONT. It is reassuring to know that others bubs of similar age are only having one boob-induced nap too.

thanks ladies!

Your night sounds just like mine! I wanted DS to sleep in his hammock instead of the Ergo (so I could have a shower), but it took a few attempts at feeding him to sleep, putting him down, getting him back up again then trying again. Only difference is I didn't have anyone coming to help out if it didn't work. Glad she went to sleep for you, things will get better.

That's what was frustrating me so much too, DS would show all the tired signs, I knew he needed a sleep, but was fighting sleep. I was spending so much time trying to get him to sleep that it was frustrating me so much I would get angry and upset. That's why I took the baby wearing approach.

I do think it's an age thing.. gotta go he is awake again :)