Gentle sleep training - September 2023 Babies | Forums | What to Expect (2024)

So my second baby was colicky, not a great sleeper, and i nursed him to sleep/rocked him to sleep for every bedtime and nap. He is now putting himself to sleep for every bedtime, and sleeping through the night some night, which waking up once other nights (so major progress for us).

Here’s what’s worked for us:

- locking down a schedule that avoided being overtired. Putting baby to bed before he is overtired is key. For us, it’s a nap at 8:30/9am, a nap at 12:30/1pm, and then bedtime at 6:30/7pm.

- switching to a bottle at bedtime (not nursing) and stopping the feed before he fell asleep.

- laying him down a wake and giving him time to roll around and try to fall asleep. Not sobbing. Sometimes fussing for a couple minutes but not crying really. If he started crying, I picked him up and rocked some more. But doing this over and over have him the opportunity to figure out how to go to sleep himself.

I think the key is putting baby to bed with a full belly and before they are overtired, and then giving them repeated opportunities to put themself to sleep.

This will be long. ��My baby slept by me from day 1. We didn’t want to honestly, but it started out me holding her because of reflux and it evolved into that. Her bedside bassinet and crib was in our room at the time and she would just wail anytime we tried to get her to sleep in it. At 9 months my husband and I decided

it was time to train her. I honestly thought she would fail 100% because she only slept with me and did contact naps with me. Sometimes I would lay her on our bed for a nap after she fell asleep but she would sleep 30 minutes max and of course I had to stay there with her in case she woke up and rolled off. So we ended up putting her crib in a separate room with a loud fan and blackout curtains. The first night I let her cry 3 minutes, went in and comforted her, then 5 minutes, went in and comforted, and then the next was supposed to be 10 minutes but she didn’t even make it a minute and she was out like a light. She slept all night for the first time. I was shocked �� She has slept all night since then and it’s been weeks now so I don’t think it was a fluke. I genuinely thought she was just getting hungry at night because she would nurse once or twice when she was in our bed. But she hasn’t woke up to eat once. So it must have just been a comfort thing. I am so happy we tried this and in my opinion is was pretty “gentle”. I thought we had an awful sleeper, but I realized I just wasn’t putting her in the right conditions. And I was amazed at how quickly she learned to self comfort because I will watch her toss and turn on the monitor and stay asleep or grab her paci and go back to sleep. In our bed if she moved at all it was usually immediately awake and crying. Part of this method working for us could also just be due to her age and getting older too…either way I’m happy �� Also I always try and put her down sleepy but even when she isn’t completely sleepy yet as soon as I put her in the crib she realizes okay it’s sleep time and she might sit up for a couple of minutes but then will lay right down and go to sleep. Because of this I no longer let her play in her crib or put her there when I need to get things done like I used to. I want her to associate the crib with sleeping.