Sleep training an 11 month old!
Hi mummas I need some advice on how to sleep train my 11 month old. Since he was a newborn we have struggled with his sleep during the day. It took me a while but I finally found that feeding him to sleep was the only way I could get him to sleep.
I have to give him a 1 teat (so it's slow flowing and he has to work for it) and cover his eyes with a face washer and usually by the end of it he is asleep. It takes him a good 15/20mins to finish his bottle. During the day he sleeps on my lap. If I try to get up or move he wakes up and thats it, he is awake until next bottle/nap time. Night time is similar- has to have a bottle to sleep but once he is asleep I'm able to move him to his bed (which is right next to my bed-he will be going into his cot as soon as I implement some sort of routine). He sleeps pretty good at night only waking once, I give him a bottle and he is straight back to sleep.
He can't seem to whined down on his own. If he doesn't happen to go to sleep with a bottle if I try to rock/pat him to sleep once he realizes What I'm trying to do he kicks,bucks, squirms and scratches his face all while I'm attempting to get him to sleep. For the most part I was happy with how our routine is for now but I've just found out I'm pregnant so I need to change things soon.
My problem is I don't know where to start. I've bought sleep programs, joined FB groups, read books, watched YouTube videos. But I still don't know where to start.
All the programs and videos I've watched everyone starts to sleep train form 3-4 months.
Is it to late to sleep train him?
But I am open to all suggestions please.
2 Replies
Sleep training is an ongoing process and can be started at any age from 3-4 months old up to 24 years old!!!!
Often kids need to be retrained multiple times in there lives as they can regress after illness, times of upheaval etc.
You could try putting him on the bed lying next to you, you still holding the bottle as your first step in him gaining more independence. It really doesn't matter if he needs to feed to sleep for now but he could gradually learn to hold his own bottle.
No advice on sleep training specifically but I have a few suggestions just incase you haven't tried them. Have you tried block out curtains for darkness? I also had a cheap CD player and some lullaby CD's. The sound of the lullaby is a step in the winding down process and let's them know that sleep time is here :-) it is the best thing I ever bought and my daughter loved the cuddle/music before nap time. I would just put the album on repeat and she would get such a peaceful sleep.