Bedtime problems :(

[Starlight32]

We are having bedtime problems. I've been rocking her to the point where she's almost asleep then putting her in crib. This still works well for naps; she'll nod off in a few minutes. Bedtime is becoming an hour+ ordeal. She starts to squirm, doesn't want to be held, but then cries after a bit of being in her crib a bit. Bedtime was usually 7/730 but it's been 830 before she's fallen asleep the past two days. She's been taking longer afternoon naps so I may try pushing bedtime back a bit?! I like bedtime being before 8 though 😝

Any advice? I'm worried to do sleep training because she tends to bump her head on the crib rolling around.

She's 10 months.

 

[mara16jade]

How long between the end of her nap and beginning of bedtime does she have? I'd try getting her up from her nap 30mins earlier, or push naptime up.

My son, 2.5y.o., had a terrible time falling alseep in the beginning of sleep training. It could easily take an hour+. Now it takes anywhere from 5-30mins. Usually depends on how late he napped or if we did anything really exciting that has him wired.

 

[caz_hills]

We were rocking to sleep until six months and the health visitor strongly advised me to stop. She said the older they get the longer it takes. So we have been sssshhhing and patting her chest to sleep since. It's been tough (probably more on me) as she cries but actually she cries less than when I was rocking her. She falls asleep quicker but it is tough. I am with her when she is going to sleep and I known now need to move away and maybe just sssshhhh and drop the patting. Now a few times she self settles which is awesome!

My back was killing me with the rocking I have to say x

 

[MindUtopia]

This is really normal around that age. Their brains are just doing so much developing that it's hard to quiet down at night. I didn't find there were any magic tricks to making it stop. We just did it in shifts so each of us still had a chance to sit down and eat dinner and get a break. Then one day around 11 months it just stopped. We didn't do anything (we've never sleep trained). But she just started going to bed really easily. If you were to do anything I'd be inclined to probably wake her up from her nap a bit earlier and see if that helps any.

Also I wouldn't be too concerned with how you're putting her to sleep. We always fed and rocked to sleep and eventually it just transitioned to her going in her cot sleepy but awake and she'd go to sleep on her own (this was around 11-12 months). There have been a few more rough periods with teething or illness. But otherwise bedtime takes 10 minutes or so and it's pretty easy, but it just takes time and patience to get through these rough patches.