How to Get 6 Month Old to STAY Asleep ;)

Most parents are the same way. Especially with the first child. But a very important thing that a baby needs to learn eventually to self soothe. That means that he needs to learn that he is just fine on his own. It creates independence. Some babies take longer to learn it, others much quicker. So don't feel too upset that he has to have you right now to sleep. Slowly and gradually let him learn how to calm himself down. I wouldn't necessarily just jump into the cio method, but a slow start might be what he needs. Let him cry for a little while at bedtime, and then soothe him to let him know it is ok. Every night increase the amount of time you let him be by himself, by minutes, 1 more 2 more etc. Once I did this with all three of mine, they slept through the entire night just fine.
GOod luck and don't forget, you are the mom and you know best!

Why in such a hurry to move your little guy outof your bed? There is an old book you should find and read "The Family Bed". You are not doing irreperable harm to your 6 month old by lettinng him sleep with you.

Check out Dr. Sear's page on Co-sleeping. http://www.askdrsears.com/html/7/T071000.asp
He spent years studying it and found that babies breath better in bed with their moms, causing less waking. And that babies stay on their sides with they co-sleep.

We kind of fell into co-sleeping, and we are not die-hards, but we all sleep better, and now we believe it is a good thing physically for the kids. It is practiced all over the world, a completely natural reaction to taking care of baby unless you have been rasied in a culture that promotes separateness.

Your child won't be spoiled sleeping with you and he won't learn to manipulate you, and he WILL learn to sleep alone before college. Don't believe the anti hype. I am on my 7th, and the only one in our bed is the 1yr old.

I am currently co-sleeping with my 8 month old. I started putting her in her car seat to sleep for naps at about 5 months old. She had started to wake up 5 minutes after laying down flat. She will sleep for 3 hours in her car seat. She starts the night out there too and then joins us for the rest of the night. We have co-slept with all 4 of our kids and she is the first who will not lay down flat to sleep on her own. I highly recommend Dr. Sears website and books for support and ideas. Babies change and develop so much the first year and any time they are working on a new developmental task it seems to change how they sleep. Good luck!

Hi J. ;)

First of all, ladies...she's NOT wanting to do cio...so try to respect that and give her advice she can actually use.

I just read this today and I'm not sure if it applies to your baby or not, but usually around 5-7 months of age babies develop seperation anxiety which can cause them to wake up frequently during the night even though they had previously been sleeping well. I know that his rolling around isn't helping, but maybe he's experiencing a little seperation anxiety? It might just be manifesting itself at night when he sleeps..since you said he's ok when you bring him back into bed with you. I don't see anything wrong with co-sleeping or bringing him into your bed in the middle of the night if that's what comforts him right now. If it's not an issue for you or your husband to have him in your bed then I say just keep doing that since he sleeps through the night that way. Who decided a baby HAS to sleep in their crib anyways? If it works for you, let him sleep where he sleeps best... which is snuggled next to you. This will let you sleep best too :)

I'm right there with you. My son is almost 6 months, and he's doing the same exact thing. He is regularly waking up 30 minutes into his naps. He used to nap 4 hours straight. I've given up stressing about it, since he almost always wakes up happy, and is sleeping pretty well at night too (we cosleep too). The past couple days he has napped for almost 2 hours in the afternoon, so I'm hoping it will get better again. They go through phases all the time - sleeping better... sleeping worse... it always changes.

Don't let anybody talk you into crying it out. Trust your instincts on that one. My babe is number three - I have a 7 year old son and a 5 year old daughter as well. We have never done CIO and my kids are fantastic sleepers now. Didn't start out that way though - my first son was a *terrible* sleeper from day one. That's why we started co-sleeping - he wouldn't sleep at all on his own. So we brought him into bed with us, and he slept with us for two years, until our daughter was born. He had no problem transitioning out of our bed. Then our daughter coslept too, and she is now in her own bed.

I guess I don't have any specific advice, except for maybe to roll up some blankets and put them up alongside your baby, to prevent him from rolling over and waking himself up. That seemed to help our babe a bit.

Let us know how it goes with your son. Hopefully he's napping better by now!

My 5 month old is the same way. The No=Cry sleep solution didn't work well for us at all - I can't even get her to NAP! My kid wakes every hour and a half. I can't let her cio either because she shriek-screams (very blood curdling), gags on her spit up and has spit up coming out her nose when she gets upset! So, I am now reading (as suggested by other Mamasource moms) "sleepless in America" and am getting some ideas about that! I don't have much advice yet, just sympathy, and I want to re-assure you that you are NOT ALONE in your problem, and that he won't do this forever! Keep chuggin' the coffee and press on Mama!

I understand not wanting your child to cry...but really it works! The first night is the worst and each additional night you stick to it gets shorter and shorter. I also nursed but made a conscious decision to keep him out of our bed. Sure, the first few months there were nights I was just too tired to sit up with him, but I forced myself into the wonderful chair we bought for his room. I would say that if you want to avoid crying, start staying awake at night and put him back in his crib as a first step. You want to nurture good habits in your child...and it starts now. The longer you prolong this the longer it will impact both of your lives.

I also co slept with our son for the longest time. He would refuse to sleep anywhere else and still doesn't like to sleep alone. If I lay him in his crib to nap and he wakes up and doesn't have someone in the room with him when we wakes he gets very upset. That is the only downfall I've found to co-sleeping/nursing. What worked for us to get him into his crib was to move the crib into our bedroom. He still sleeps in our room, but now he sleeps almost all the way through the night and if he does wake up he gets fed and put back to bed in his crib and will go back to sleep. I do suggest allowing him to cry it out a little bit. Victor has begun to wake for a short period of time and will now sooth himself back to sleep if I don't go to him right away. It doesn't always work and I only allow him to cry if he really isn't to upset and just grumpy from waking when he's really tired. It's worked out well for us and allowed me to get so much more sleep which for me is desperately needed being a sahm with a 5 month old and a hubby half way across the world. I don't know when we will move the boy out of our room, but I know that I won't do it until I feel he is ready. He truly loves staying in the room with us. He'll go to sleep in time and if nothing else if you think that it has to do with the rolling aspect try swaddling him before you lay him down and hopefully that could help too.

Hi J.-I went through this 3 times thus far and I can totally relate. I too never wanted to do cio and so I didn't. All my girls started off in the crib but always ended up in our bed for the convenience of nursing. First I should tell you that none of my girls slept through the night in their cribs until they were weaned from breast-feeding. I weaned them all about 9/10 months. At 9 months I started a bed-time routine with them, it pretty much consisted of milk (1st breast-feeding, then formula) and then I would read a couple of short books then I would give them a kiss and lay them down. The first week or so I would have to sit in the rocking chair in their room and then one day I just didn't have to anymore. The whole process took about a month but to this day I have never made any of my kids cry-it-out and they all sleep just fine...nobody wakes up except for the occasional bad dream or potty break now and then but then they just go right back to bed no problem. Good luck.

He is old enough to sleep through the night without a feeding. He is also old enough to develop his own calming techniques. First, get him out of your bed. Now is the time to teach him to be OK alone. If you don't do it now, you will have a lot of trouble later when he figures out how to manipulate you. At this age, he will adjust most easily.

If he does wake up and you know that he is not ready to be up, don't rush in to take care of him. He will learn on his own ways to settle himself back down and go back to sleep. If he fusses, make yourself wait a few extra minutes before going to him.

Ask your husband to keep you accountable for not bringing the baby to bed at night. I am guessing that he will agree that it is time to let the baby sleep on his own.

Ahhh, if only babies would sleep we'd all feel better.... but they don't ever sleep as much as we would want. Sometimes it's teething, sometimes it's just not feeling well... sometimes they are too busy to sleep :o)

Check to make sure you have all of his "warm" issues covered. Put a cap on his head and swaddle him in a blanket so he is warm. We have the tendency to believe that babies run hot, but the reason they want to sleep with us is because it is warmer.

A nice hot water bottle wrapped in a blanket next to him will mimic the warm body he is missing.

He may also be missing noise. If you are using a music player that shuts off at the
end, consider putting it on repeat. You can go in an turn it down or off later once he is fully asleep.