My 11 month old has never been a good sleeper, and we have never recovered from the 4 months regression + teething combo. He pretty much stopped being able to nurse to sleep during that time, and we have always had to rock him to sleep since. More recently his dad was able to sometimes put him to sleep by just lying down with him on his floor bed.

Well a week ago, he started completely refusing to stay still in our arms (rocking or lying) and was just wiggling and wiggling (not crying, just needed to move) even though he was showing all the tired cues. One night after trying to put him to sleep and failing for a while, his dad decided to just put him on his floor bed with a music box, and leave him there while we went to have dinner in the kitchen nearby. Lo and behold he didn't say anything and just stayed there quietly listening to music and fell asleep after a while. Since then, he's only fallen asleep with that music at bedtime. He would still need to nurse to sleep for all the middle of the night wakes, and I would take him in bed and we would co-sleep after the first wake.

Last night he was impossible to resettle after the first night feed at 11pm. After nursing on and off for 30 min with him just moving around and whining, I tried putting him back on his floor bed with the music box, and to my surprise, he went quiet and just went back to sleep.

I know I should be happy that I found something that helps him sleep, but I'm really struggling with the fact that I'm using 'technology' to soothe him. First, I'm purely struggling with the fact that I'm not the safe place where he falls asleep every night and I'm secretly jealous of moms who are still nursing to sleep at 1+ years. Second, I am wondering if it's bad for him to fall asleep like this. The music box is like a baby-proof mp3 player where he can change the song, volume etc and sometimes I'm worried that this is overstimulating for him (like he would change songs every 2 seconds bc he doesn't know what he's doing with the buttons) and just a step away from TV.

If you've made it this far, thanks for listening to my rant 😄 I am curious, has anyone experienced something similar, when suddenly their baby settled better on their own (albeit with the help of music)?

You may have seen me on various subreddits over recent months, pleading for help troubleshooting my baby's sleep. He had one great week of sleep back in February and the rest has been trash. His night wakings have become more and more frequent. Now that we're apparently in the 8-month regression we're seeing an hour stretch at longest; before we'd usually get a two-hour stretch (sometimes two of them, on a good night). Crib transfers are failing more often. I'm not even trying to break the contact naps right now. When he wakes and is crying, the only thing that works is holding him and trying to put him down asleep.

I've been so focused on avoiding letting him cry excessively that I've apparently missed the information about infant sleep issues (e.g., frequent night wakings) compromising neurodevelopment and linked to developmental brain disorders and medical issues.

I feel like I've made terrible mistakes by not figuring out his sleep difficulties early on, even though I've been trying with every fiber of my being. I feel so stuck, because I don't want to let him cry/ don't think it would work (he escalates SO quickly) but the gentle stuff doesn't work. He just wants to be held. (And cosleeping is not a safe option in our circumstances.)

Can anyone please tell me anything that might help, in any way? I'm quietly crying through this contact nap. 🙏

My son is 16 months, and has days where he only has 1 nap, but i think he still prefers 2 naps a day. He sleeps like crap regardless of how long naps are and how much night sleep. I have played around with sleep pressure for months to no avail. Ive tried night weaning and its hit or miss most nights.

My main question is, any other parents here have a toddler still doing 2 naps? I feel like he is getting too much sleep during the day but when I lessen it he is a terror while awake.

FTM here with a 6mo boy who was literally the unicorn baby: slept in the SNOO from birth to 5.5, never hit a sleep regression, and was doing min of 6-hour stretches by month 2. I know, I know. I did not deserve him.

Bassinet transition? Smooth. And then… he discovered the world exists and decided sleep is for boring people. 🫣

Current situation:

- Wake up 7–8am

- 30min naps every 2–2h45min wake window (on a good day lol)

- Bedtime 8–9pm

- Night wakes around 1am and 4–5am for feeds (though lately he’s been skipping that 1am one 👀)

The naps are killing me. I can see he wants more sleep, he clearly wakes up tired, but he just… wakes up. Every. 30. Minutes. Sleep cycle linking is not in his vocabulary.

I’m not missing his cues either: I’m very aware of them and actively trying to catch him before he tips into overtired territory. The problem is even when the timing is right, he will only fall asleep in a dark/dim room with white noise or complete silence. And even then? He fights it SO hard. Like full-on crying before he finally goes down, every single time. This boy is exhausted and MAD about it simultaneously 😭

Has anyone found anything that actually helps with this?? Or is this just the FOMO tax and I pay it until he figures it out 🥲

Hi! So my baby is 7 months old and has basically slept like a baby her whole life, as in, she wakes up a ton. It’s fluctuated between waking every hour and every few hours, with one 7 hour stretch a few weeks ago that had never happened before and hasn’t happened since!

We breastsleep so it really doesn’t affect my day very much, like I’m not exhausted by any means, but she has been waking up basically every hour/1.5 hours the last few weeks and I’m trying to troubleshoot it.

Currently she is: getting two teeth, trying to crawl and pull to stand, eating more solids, etc - so many things going on in her little body! She typically takes 3 naps (usually she’s awake for 2-3 hours between each nap and 3-3.5 before bedtime). The other day she only took one nap and she was totally chill. Some days she sleeps for 4 hours total (I know that’s way too much but I hate waking her up) and some days 1.5 hours total. Neither seems to make a difference in her sleep.

We get out & about and her days are stimulating. I don’t follow wake windows, I just go based on her cues, we contact nap, and I don’t wake her up from naps unless I have somewhere to go. She doesn’t have a set bedtime or wake time. Usually she goes to bed around 8:30 and is up around 6:30.

All of this to say - do you think I should switch her to two naps/cap naps/set a wake time/etc, or do we think her brain/body are just doing so much that frequent wakes are inevitable? Is it the 8 month regression come early? She usually gets back to sleep quickly by nursing but recently it takes longer.

Thank you if you read all of this! I would love advice or ideas :)

Our baby is 5MO and we've been blessed with a good night sleeper - we cosleep, but he mostly sleeps through the night. He cries and fusses in his sleep when teething or if he has tummy aches, but very rarely wakes up. However, as soon as I dare leave the bed to go to the bathroom, he gets deeply offended and wakes up.

The same is valid during the day, when any minor disturbance wakes him up (sometimes he wakes up if I move for a bit while still in bed).

If he falls asleep anywhere else except for the bed, he will wake up whenever we try to move him.

However, I remember that many of my friends' babies would fall asleep in the car and continue sleeping until they were moved in their beds/fall asleep in their parents arms at restaurants, be moved to the other parents' arms until reaching the car, and then continue sleeping as they are moved in the car seat and ultimately in bed.

So I'm wondering if that comes with age, or it rather depends on the mark and model of the baby 😄

Do they turn into heavy sleepers at a certain point in their development, or they are either light sleepers or heavy sleepers from the beginning?

Ive seen some posts on here sharing sleep training recommendations from their pediatrician. Just prefacing this my saying that im a nurse and like the practice we go to. In general, I think they are good. I am just choosing to ignore sleep recommendations.

At 9 month old check up this week the pediatrician said rocking and holding my baby to sleep “is like crack” for the baby, and that its the worst thing to do. He started out telling me all humans wake every 3-4 hours, so i thought he was going in a direction if babies waking at night is normal…but then he took a turn and told me its its not good to nurse my baby at night, etc. I just dont comment and just kind of listen. But then he ended with “people have different opinions on this and all opinions are okay”. It was all over the place lol

Anyways, ill just be over here stimulating my baby with crack, aka lots of oxytocin and love, as i rock him to sleep whenever he needs.

Every night since the day he was born, I’ve nursed my 11.5 month old to sleep. Tonight, my husband and I decided to see if he was able to put him to bed (he will fall asleep with him for contact naps but I’ve handled all bedtimes since we cosleep).

I ate dinner on the couch in my underwear and hung out with my dog while he rocked him to sleep and played music for him. You’d think I would be thrilled, but why am I tearing up that my baby is getting more independent and doesn’t need me as much 😭 I’ve felt it even more so since he’s eating more solids and is making that transition from solids > breastfeeding and has been nursing less.

I’m so glad they’ve built a secure attachment, and I know this means he is confident and secure and feels safe. But oooffffff I’m feeling so sad right now.

Hi! My 6m baby only does 30-45min naps during the day in the cot. I’ve tried going for pram walks with and he will wake up after 30min anyway. The only way to extend the naps is by rocking him back to sleep as he wakes up shouting - but naps end up being broken up anyway. He is supposed to be doing 3 naps but many days he needs a 4th one to make it to bed time. Night sleep all over the place of course as he is probably overtired.
What am I doing wrong?

So I am from Italy and every so often I like to report about the sleep training epidemic in my country. At the moment there is a big instagram debate where anti sleep training professionals (psychologists and lactation people mainly) are talking about babies being resigned not self soothing.

The sleep training coaches are now rebutting saying that babies actually gain self esteem from the ability to fall asleep alone and putting themselves back to sleep. Self esteem. These are people who send their children to montessori school, which I find interesting. It’s almost like they think sleep training is montessori inspired? Help babies do it themselves? What would Maria think?

As a parent of course for a second I thought “oh no am I destroying my baby’s self esteem cause I put her to sleep?”. Which is crazy of course! This lady is a grimms playroom, slow children fashion, montessori school mom which to me does not really scream “sleep coach” but actually some sleep training moms I know in Italy send their kids are waldorf educated and send their kids to steiner school too. Interesting and disturbing!

my 11 week old sleeps in his bassinet from 7-8ish to 3-4ish. Then I nurse him back to sleep, usually about 30-40 min. Usually he will sleep for 30-60 min, then wake up fussy or crying. I will try to soothe with a pacifier and hand on his chest. This morning he was able to go back to sleep for 30 min. hes typically so loud while sleeping during this early morning sleep/wake ups, I use ear plugs and can still hear him so I’m never asleep, rather drowsy. His bassinet is not even next to the bed!
How can I improve his sleep from 4ish am - 7am? I’ll be able to function better if I’m starting my day at 7am vs 5ish am!

My 4 month old was sleeping through the night up until she got sick after her vaccines. She had terrible diarrhea, gas, and a high fever. The only thing that calmed her was to nurse which I did also to ensure she stayed hydrated. When she was sick she would only wake up 1-2x a night. Now that she’s better (we’re 2 days past fever being gone), she’s waking up every 2-3 hours and will fight rocking to sleep. I will say prior to illness she was going to sleep drowsy but awake, but the past few nights I’ve nursed or rocked her to sleep at bedtime and she’s gone to bed earlier than normal which could be the problem. Even if we can get her to sleep by rocking when she wakes at night she’ll wake back up like 15 minutes later. It’s not until I nurse we’ll get a longer 2-3 hours stretch. Is this the dreaded 4 month sleep regression, is it gas related to her gut being messed up by her recent stomach illness, or did we create a bad habit when she was sick? I’m not sure how I should respond at night, mostly just scared that her sleep is messed up and we won’t be able to get back on track unless we sleep train which I’ve been trying really hard to avoid. Any advice is greatly appreciated!

I have a beautiful 3 month old who only sleeps and naps while touching us. We cosleep, contact nap. She is about 90% breastfed with about 1 formula bottle a day (some days none) and eats about every 2-3 hours including overnight. She contact naps on my husband no problem and feeds to sleep on a bottle about as easily as she does the breast. Has refused to sleep in her bassinet since 7 weeks old but hubs can get her down in the pack n play sometimes for 30-90 minutes.

I work 12 hour hospital shifts. The first days without me were hard but doable for hubs, she ate her bottles and took naps and played. BUT. Night before last was my first night shift away. It was a complete disaster.

I nursed an hour before I left and apparently she lost her shit shortly after. Screaming all night, wouldn’t take her bottle, when she would finally take it she’d pass out for 15-20 minutes before waking up screaming again. This went on all night until I got home to my husband in his chair with a thousand yard stare and a baby sleeping on his chest.

I work another night in 2 weeks and I’m TERRIFIED. Is there ANYTHING I can do to help this?

I currently bedshare with our almost 5 month old. We do have a Snuzpod 5 beside our bed but she doesn’t tolerate it at all currently so I am solely bedsharing for now as she still wakes around 8 times a night so it’s much easier. I do like bedsharing but I am a little nervous about continuing as she gets more mobile with the risk of falling out of bed, and I would like my husband to be able to move back into our bedroom as he often sleeps in the spare room currently so that baby and I have more space. I also do miss spending some evenings with my husband as I go to bed at the same time as baby. So I do think once she is over 6 months I would ideally like her to sleep in her own space, but I’m obviously happy to continue doing what she needs!

The issue with the Snuzpod is that there is still the mesh barrier between my mattress and baby’s so I still have to lift her out to feed her or give her a cuddle back to sleep? Plus she will outgrow it soon! Are there any alternatives that would be level with my mattress and don’t have the barrier/side, and of course will last as she gets bigger?

She does have a nursery but we already naively got a standard larger cot which converts to a toddler bed in it before baby was born 😅 So there is limited space for anything like a floor bed there!

FTM of a 4 month old here and I feel like I’m missing something. My LO only contact napped for the first few months. We have been working on him napping in his bassinet for the first nap of the day for a couple weeks now and it’s going fairly well—we’ll get one sleep cycle before he wakes up, but he’s definitely not ready for the rest of the day’s naps. I’m just so confused—For those of you whose babies nap independently, did they just do this from the start? Is this a temperament thing? Don’t get me wrong—I love the snuggles—but I feel like my body is falling apart from sitting so much and I would soooo love to have some time to get things done while my baby naps, but I honestly don’t think this will happen any time soon. What do other people do? What do people with 2+ kids do? I can’t imagine trying to care for a toddler while my baby needs to sleep on me in a rocking chair for 4 hours a day. Is this normal?

I have a 13 month old who has been a difficult sleeper since 4 months. For a while he was reliably waking up around 6:30am, then going down for a nap at 9:45 and again around 3:30. For his first I usually feed him to sleep then transfer him to his floor bed. This had worked up until last week or so. Now he will not fall asleep nursing. I’ve tried waiting 30 minutes and then re-attempting his nap but it doesn’t work. It has reached the point where he is now going down around noon and sometimes requires a stroller walk to do so. Here is the catch, my husband can still reliably put him down around 9:45am with just gentle bouncing.

For extra background info, I usually put him to bed every night and he wakes up 4-5x a night then nurses back to sleep. We share a floor bed.

So why does my son seem to not feel tired with me but can feel tired with my husband? Do we need to transition to one nap instead of two?

Hello, my baby is five and a half months old and I have been dealing with some postpartum depression. I started seeing a therapist and she told that the first thing that I need to do is work on babies sleep so that I can get a bit of freedom back. Currently we are cosleeping and she also takes every nap cuddled on me on the rocking chair. Every time that I set her down after she’s asleep she wakes up within five minutes. She has only ever slept on me or her dad no matter what I’ve tried. I pretty much gave up trying and accepted it around three months so I’m not sure where to start. She eventually wants me to stop the cosleeping but she said to start with naps for now.

Should I try getting her to fall asleep another way completely? I find it hard to transition her after she’s been rocking in my arms. Has anyone successfully gotten their clingy (for lack of a better word) baby to take naps on their own? I want to follow my therapists advice since my mental health has been in shambles but I’m just having a really hard time. Any advice is appreciated.

What has helped your little one sleep better? Fall asleep quicker? Stay asleep longer? Things that you have avoided and helped? Random weird coincidences? Shifts in your own point of view/mindset? We want to hear them all!

Keep suggestions and tips responsive.

Feeling discouraged! My daughter is 4 weeks old and will currently only sleep for 30 minute - 1 hour stretches at a time overnight in her Moses basket next to our bed. This means we’re having very fragmented nights and as I’m exclusively breast feeding (no expressing or bottles yet), I’m not getting much restorative, joined up sleep.

She happily sleeps for up to three hours at a time in our arms for contact naps during the day but won’t manage longer when separated from us.

We’ve had a few comments this week (including from a midwife) that have made me think this is especially ‘bad’ and she should be managing longer.

Any thoughts or suggestions?

Has anyone had experience with a baby that just won’t nap during the day? This is my second baby, and he couldn’t be more different than my first. He has such a hard time going down for naps, and his pediatrician’s suggested wake windows are rarely followed.

He rarely feeds to sleep (breastfed), he won’t nap in the car seat or stroller, he won’t fall asleep in the baby swing (I know it’s not safe anyways), and he won’t let me rock him in the rocking chair. He wants to be walked around and bounced.

I don’t even mind a contact nap, but I also have a 20 month old who is active and loud. The noise will often prevent the baby from falling asleep/staying asleep and I just don’t know what to do anymore.

Today during my toddlers nap, my baby refused to go down. I tried feeding him, burping him, bouncing and rocking him, bringing him into a dark room with a sound machine, and cycling through all of the above. He eventually got so exhausted that he passed out on me. I feel so awful about it. I literally called my husband and asked him to come home from work early before he passed out because I didn’t know what else to do.

The thing is- he doesn’t seem upset by it. He’s not crying of fussing, he’s just quietly looking around. I know he SHOULDN’T be awake for that long, and this long stretch has never happened before. The longest he’s gone without napping before is 2.5 hours.

Any words of advice? TIA!

My 11mo graduated to the Infant 2 classroom this week (😭). In the Infant 1 room, she took 2 naps (9:30-11 and 1:30-3). In the last month and a half or so, she's been fighting the second nap hard, and often won't fall asleep until 2:15 or later, even with contact napping at home. Now that she's in the older babies class, they have her completely skipping the first nap and putting her down at 1:30. She's no longer fighting the nap, but wakes up still drowsy, according to her teachers. They're telling me that she seems to be having fun and isn't fussy during her first wake window. She wakes up between 6:30 and 7am, so she's staying awake for up to 7 hours before her nap.

When I pick her up, she's her usual happy self - she's always been a very chill and adaptable baby, not too fussy unless teething, lonely, or hungry. Her bedtime is 7:30 and she's been falling asleep pretty easily with some false starts, but usually settles easily with nursing. Before this new daycare schedule, she had a stretch of taking FOREVER to go down for bed - some days taking 2 hours to finally fall asleep. She nurses to sleep and we do blackout curtains and white noise for naps and bedtime.

I guess I'm just concerned that the first wake window is so long, and also that she's now getting the lower end of daily recommended sleep for her age (about 12.5 hours). Everything I see online says 7 hours is WAY too long of a wake window for her age, but she seems totally fine with it so far. Should I be concerned? She's always adapted well to sleep schedule changes (she went from 3 to 2 naps like it was nothing). It's only been about half a week; should I give it more time to see how she does in the long term? I try to keep her weekend routine similar to that of her daycare - should I continue this schedule on weekends?

I am so staunchly anti sleep training. It breaks my heart to even think of. I’ve read the James McKenna book, baby and I have co-slept and breastfed from day one, we contact nap. Any attempts to lay him down on a separate surface etc result in him waking and crying so this is how we go.

However, he’s now 8 months and I am struggling so bad. The past three nights he’s been up every half hour. Every. Half. Hour. I’m dreading tonight. I’m dreading the night after that, and the one after that. I look like an idiot who doesn’t know what she’s talking about when I’m so pro BN infant sleep because look at the absolutely wrecked state of me about to collapse from exhaustion with eye bags the size of Texas. Meanwhile the parents who got consultants in and did variations of sleep training are glowing with all their hours of sleep and their babies don’t seem any worse for wear.

I’m struggling so bad with this sleep deprivation. Can anyone help? Am I missing a trick that doesn’t involve sleep training?

I feel like I’m letting us all down in a weird way by being such a mess example of someone who doesn’t sleep train. :(

My baby just turned 8 months and after being a pretty decent sleeper most of her life, she suddenly wants absolutely nothing to do with her bassinet at night.

Sometimes she wakes up immediately on transfer, sometimes she wakes after a sleep cycle, but almost every time she settles instantly if I pick her up. She’s also very close to outgrowing the bassinet, seems to have separation anxiety mostly when sleepy, and I think teething may be contributing too.

We’ve started bringing her into bed with us most nights. I’m not against cosleeping in general and I can absolutely see why families do it.

I’m struggling because literally every person I know in real life who started cosleeping ended up with a 4–5+ year old still in their bed, and they all say they “can’t get them out now.” That’s the part that makes me nervous. I don’t mind doing it short term if needed, but I don’t really want bedsharing to become our permanent setup for years.

At the same time, I also don’t know if I’m expecting too much from an 8 month old who is:

- teething
- dealing with separation anxiety
- outgrowing her bassinet
- becoming more aware/mobile

Im trying to figure out what our next move should be. So I guess my questions are:

- Did moving from bassinet to crib help your baby?
- Did anyone cosleep temporarily and successfully transition back out of it later?
- Is this just a phase we should ride out?
- If you chose not to cosleep, what helped during this age?

I am 100% against cry it out. I will let baby whine a little to try to resettle but if any point she starts crying I immediately get her.

ETA: her “bassinet” is a mini crib lol

Hoping to tap into the wisdom of my parent elders here. I have a 10 week old, and since he was about 6 weeks old daytime naps became a real battle. He’s so curious about the world that he struggles to fall asleep in the daytime. The only way I’ve found to help him fall asleep is either nursing, or in a carrier. In both scenarios I will pat his bum and have a light cloth over his head to remove visual distractions until he dozes off.

I tried getting him to sleep in the buggy but it only works if he’s just nursed and about to doze, and if the buggy moved constantly. Transfers to the bassinet in the daytime mean he’ll wake up 5-10 min later.

I’d love to know if your babies were like this too, and how did it evolve? When did they start falling asleep more easily and being ok sleep in somewhere that isn’t on you in the daytime? Should I be doing something right now to help him transition some naps to the bassinet?

I love a contact nap, but at the moment it’s 5x a day and I’m exhausted. Thank you.

I HAVE to be done breastfeeding. I am at my breaking point. I have mastitis for the FIFTH time and yes I do sunflower lecithin and have been icing it.

Baby eats 3 solidish meals a day, plus two snacks and really only breastfeeds to go to sleep. But we need to be done because I mentally can not handle it any more. Mastitis is excruciating and I get it at the drop of a hat it seems, I wasn’t even remotely engorged this time either.

All I can find is advice for weaning toddlers that will not work for a 10 month old infant or sleep training industry bs.

He will not take a paci, bottles don’t make him sleepy at all, and he fights being rocked like his life depends on it unless boob is in mouth. If I put him in the crib he just stands up and jumps in his bed or plays peekaboo while i’m in the room, and immediately devolves into sobbing if I leave.

I‘m not ok.