Help! Transitioning from swaddle not working!

[Manhattan]

Hi All

So for the last 3 weeks I have been trying to slowly transition DD from her Kiddopotamus Swaddle into a Sleeping Bag. The steps I have taken so far are to swaddle her and then put her in the sleeping bag so she gets it is a sleeping aid, which has worked. Then I took one arm out of the wrap, but have left it inside the sleeping bag. This worked ok for about a week, until she figured out how to get her arm out through the hole.

Once she has her arm out, she just waves it around like a crazy person, hitting herself in the head, and pulling out her dummy and throwing it out of the cot. And she cannot go to sleep this way, so I have to go to her, put her arm back in the sleeping bag and put her dummy in.

This morning at about 4 I caved, and wrapped both arms We both really needed some sleep. Any tips or suggestions on what I should do??? Do you think I should just keep swaddling her a bit longer and try again in a month or so?

Any help would be much appreciated

[butterfly_warrior]

If she needs to be wrapped, I say keep wrapping. When Sam was young he needed it for the security factor. Now that he's older, he goes to bed at night with no issues, but he's such a live-wire during the day and when he gets tired he often gets really hyped up... I still at nearly 20 months need to wrap him for day sleeps. It's the only way we can keep him still enough to fall asleep!

BW

[Manhattan]

Thanks for the reply BW. I think we will keep wrapping for the time being. For both her morning and arvo nap I have wrapped both arms in, and havent had a problem with her. Can I ask you, at what age did you stop wrapping him for his night sleeps, and also, what do you wrap him in?

Many thanks x

[Oorki Galoorki]

why do you want her out of the wrap?

its ok to wait until she doesnt want it.. rather then being worried about how others may perceive you and her if she likes to be wrapped..

[Just Me]

If you are worried, I wrapped all three of my kids until they were at least 8 months old, and I still wrap DD2 two thirds of the time now. I give her a chance to sleep without it, but she makes it pretty apparent that she still likes being wrapped. DD1 and DS stopped needing to be wrapped eventually and sleep fine without it now so it will work out okay.

A couple of things - if you are finding your wraps are getting too small, you can use cot sheets to wrap bub up in - saves money on buying more wraps. Also have you tried angel wrapping? If you haven't and are interested, I will PM you the link to the instruction sheet. It is a looser kind of wrap where their arms are up next to their head and they can move them about a bit. I have only been angel wrapping DD2 for about 6 weeks - before that she just wanted her arms wrapped up like she was in a straight jacket and couldn't move. Angel wrapping is a good transitional wrap if you don't already know about it.

[MummaSue]

I say keep wrapping.
My little one isn't keen, but like yours, her hands and arms flap around all over the shop and she just can't settle to sleep when she's not wrapped. I try sometimes to give her the benefit of the doubt but we always end up wrapped! She sleeps so much better.
My friend is still wrapping her 19 month old little man - with a cot sheet. He sleeps really well.

I say keep at it, she's obviously not really ready yet to have her arms free.
Sue x

[onthefly]

You'll know when she needs out of the wrap - it's probably easiest to just wait till then.
We stopped wrapping earlier, but that's what DS wanted.

[Manhattan]

why do you want her out of the wrap?

its ok to wait until she doesnt want it.. rather then being worried about how others may perceive you and her if she likes to be wrapped..

Good question, firstly she is the only bubba still wrapped in my mothers group of which there are 10 bubbas, and secondly, I thought you had to once they started to roll??? I guess I just feel like she is behind in some way as all the other babies have 'graduated' to sleeping bags (and some were never even wrapped!) and I also worry that if she rolls over, how will she push herself up?

Thanks for the instructions JM, might give that a go tomorrow, need to have a bit of a practice on a doll first I think

MS - lol at the benefit of the doubt, have tried that too!

Marcellus, dumb question alert...how will I know???

x

[onthefly]

Dumb answer alert - you just will. I can't remember what it was at the time, but it was obvious. We tried when he first rolled and it just did not work.

[Manhattan]

Dumb answer alert - you just will. I can't remember what it was at the time, but it was obvious. We tried when he first rolled and it just did not work.

Hehe, thanks Marcellus. So for now I will just roll with DD, until she gives me a sign.

x

[butterfly_warrior]

I think Sam was around 10 or so months old when we started being able to get him down at night without wrapping. We still had the odd night where he needed it to settle, though. I can pretty comfortably say that from 13 months onwards he wasn't wrapped at night at all.

For his day sleeps - we use large pieces of cheesecloth fabric (given to us by SIL who also had a child who liked the extended wrap) or cot sheets.

One thing we noticed - Sam could roll, but wouldn't when he was wrapped up in the cot. He didn't start to roll around and move around his cot until he could get himself out of the wrap first. It's never been an issue for us - but we also had a strangely stationary sleeper compared to most babies.

BW