K is a master at rolling. So much, in fact, that she rolls in the middle of the night and then wakes herself up so much that she can't go back to sleep without swaddling her back up. If I go into her in the middle of the night, she screams. I have always thought that it's because she thinks she's going to get food and then doesn't but now writing this out, I'm not quite sure if that's it or not. I just may be the last person she wants to see when she's woken herself up.
However the case, Mike lovingly jumps out of bed and is willing to swaddle her back up. She does the same thing for naps too. If we leave her arms out of a swaddle for naps, she'll roll and play in her crib until she's either so tired and frustrated that she cries or until I go in to get her out of her crib.
Even being swaddled, she'll frequently pull her arms out of the swaddle and then roll. This morning her arm was actually out of her long sleeve sticking out of the top of her shirt where her neck goes. I guess she really wanted her arm out of her swaddle.
But it's getting ridiculous. This is almost worse than having to get up to put a pacifier back in her mouth. I'm so glad we're over the pacifier. I try just letting her cry it out but she gets so frustrated that I can't let her do it ... especially not in the middle of the night when everyone's trying to sleep.
So I need a solution.
I've read that there are wedges you can buy to keep them from rolling but ideally, I'd prefer her to just learn to sleep on her stomach.
So far I've read that other moms just let the baby cry it out and after a week, it works but they also mention that their babies don't cry for more than 15 minutes or so. K's known to cry for over an hour and a half, especially if we go into her room to try to calm her down during any time that she's crying. Not sure why that is.
So please, any suggestions would be appreciated!
Well we haven't gotten to this stage yet (rolling everywhere), so I can't really give any advice from experience. This might be a really stupid suggestion, but have you tried not swaddling her at all? Will she even go to sleep like that? Harper hardly ever sleeps swaddled (never at night) and she is typically only up once a night to eat (4 months old). Maybe this isn't even a plausible solution, but I thought I'd throw it out there. Good luck!
ReplyDeleteHi Kim! This is Miranda,
ReplyDeleteIt's completely normal for babies to disrupt their sleep schedule when they hit major milestones (like rolling, crawling, walking). So it's probably not just because she gets out of her swaddling.
I would definitely recommend not swaddling her anymore...sounds like she's outgrown the need. Plus with her rolling around it is more of a strangulation hazard.
We have found with Oliver that the best way to wean him off night time feedings and to encourage self soothing when he wakes is to give him a couple of minutes after he wakes up to see if he will go back to sleep. If that doesn't work we will try to soothe him by patting his back and "shushing" him. If that doesn't work we will try picking him up and soothing him. As a last effort we will give him a bottle. Most nights he sleeps really well (at least 11+ hours). He does occasionally wake but he can usually put himself back to sleep. Right now he is teething so it's kind of hit and miss. Last night he was up twice and needed a bottle ... but for 3 days before that he slept all night.
I've been told that most babies don't get into a really "set" sleep pattern until almost 2 years old. Whenever they are developing new skills they just seem to want to be up practicing them instead of sleeping. :)
We also put a couple of crib safe toys in Oliver's crib so that when he does wake up he can distract himself with a toy. This has helped a lot when he wakes up at 5:30am...it usually gives us at least another 1/2 hour of sleep while he plays.
Good luck! I know it's tough...we've been there too! But hang in there and it will get better :)