My youngest is about to be 6 months old, and he's a great kid but a terrible sleeper. The swaddle was really important for him, but then about a month ago he started to be able to squirm out of it and he started sleeping in 45 minute increments. Which makes me pretty non-functional.
A week ago, I got the bright idea to put him in the big puffy baby Merlin sleepsuit thing (which made no difference on its own), and THEN swaddle him, and it was AWESOME. He couldn't escape at all, and he was down to two night wakings! It was fantastic.
Then I saw our pediatrician on Friday and she was really disturbed that we were still swaddling and said that after 4 months, swaddling becomes a risk factor for crib death. I could see that if my kid were rolling over, but a.) he has never rolled over in his life (I know he's late on that and it's weird, but I'm not terribly worried about it, and he's been able to sit unassisted for about 6 weeks so he's not uniformly delayed on motor skills), and b.) I actually don't think he COULD roll himself over in the baby merlin suit even if he wanted to... especially since he's still in the co-sleeper half the night (we start him in his crib and move him after his first waking). I think if he tried to roll in the co-sleeper he'd just end up on his side and wake up pissed since there's not enough room to make it all the way over. I don't want to take unnecessary risks, but it's been pretty devastating to go from decent sleep while swaddling last week back to terrible sleep the past few nights. I don't need him to sleep through the night, but I'd kill for at least one good 3 or 4 hour increment.
Any thoughts? Anyone else's pediatrician give an opinion on swaddling an older infant? Anything besides the Merlin suit that can safely approximate the swaddling sensation?
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We stopped at 4 months because he had learned to roll. My pediatrician said it was a risk to keep swaddling when he could roll so we stopped pretty much cold turkey.
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We weaned from the swaddle around 4 months cause she was breaking out and was starting to roll over.
Have you tried the Halo Swaddle sack? That is how we weaned. Arms were out but she still got the tightness on her chest. Then we slowly loosen it every couple nights till she just was in a sleep sack.
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We swaddle-weaned at 4 months. LO wasn't rolling yet, but I was concerned with the risks involved and "what if" she rolls for the first time while swaddled. She started rolling over about a month later. I also worried about hip dysplasia.
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3 weeks for both girls. They just didn't care for it though.
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We stopped shortly before LO turned 3.5m old (after weaning for 2w). Since then he's in a sleep sack.
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About 6 weeks for DS and 10 weeks for DD. They both broke out of it.
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She never took to it. Literally escaped every swaddle/swaddle device we tried. So we gave up early.
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We stopped at 5 months. The zipadee zip was our miracle product.
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Is it possible that your LO has reflux? We had the same issue- granted we stopped a bit earlier at 3 months, when LO rolled herself over in the swaddle when fighting it one AM (she needed it to sleep but in the AM would fight it when she was ready to start her day.) The merlin worked for us to transition but something else that my pediatrician said when she saw her around 4 1/2 months was that a baby sitting up that early is often a sign of reflux, because babies with reflux hate laying down and would rather sit up to relieve the reflux. Once we got LO on reflux meds it made an AMAZING difference in her sleep. I still have issues with her sleeping longer (some nights LONG stretches then other nights 4 hour stretches, and her naps generally cap at a crappy 30 minutes) but it's better than before, and she seems more comfortable. Not saying that's the case, but I felt pretty crappy when he said that about her sitting up, and I wished I had thought of it/ realized sooner, so thought I would pass it along to reevaluate!
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Just about 4 months for LO when he started to roll. I found that he was a big side sleeper. It changed our lives once we decided to stop swaddling and he found his hands to comfort himself and was able to roll onto his side and comfortably sleep that way.
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@kjpugs: I honestly never considered that. He almost never fusses at all during the day, but he's always upright, and when he's home with us on weekends he usually sleeps semi-upright in the carseat or the stroller or the Ergo anyhow.
What reflux meds is your LO on?
We're going back for a regular checkup in a week- this is going to the top of my list of questions to ask! Thanks!
(Also, if you're nursing, did you alter your diet at all in response to the reflux? Should I try eliminating milk or something like that?) -
@Lozza: Always good to check! I feel better even ruling out stuff. I did not expect parenting to be such a guessing game!!!! We had the same thing- she napped somewhat upright in the swing, and otherwise was almost never laying down except sleep. HATED tummy time. Like her 3 month photos the photog was like WHOA... she hates this (and she had a meltdown when we tried to get one pic.) So it took a while to figure out. She's on Zantac now (or a generic of it) and it took a change in dosing (was 1.2 ml 2x a day, now 1 ml 3x a day) and she's doing SO much better. She also spit up a lot- does your LO spit up more than "normal?" (I hate that term.) I don't know if breastmilk vs formula makes a difference, LO didn't show signs until after I stopped pumping (I had a low supply so the most I got was 9 oz a day, she probably got 1/3 or 1/4 of her bottles as breast milk) They didn't say if that impacted it but I did have to try a few formulas before finding what worked for her. (Got a lot of samples from our ped, which helped!) They suggested the added rice formula for spit up, but it didn't sit well with LO and REALLY constipated her. Plus we aren't super on board with using rice due to many reasons. So we finally found that the sensitive formula (orange containers- we buy generic from walmart/cvs/target) worked best for her, and we add a littttle bit of baby oatmeal cereal in there to help the spit up. We initially thought that it was a dairy issue and switched to alimentum but that was even worse- that's when the ped suggested the reflux meds. Trial and error! Sorry for the novel
Hope this helps! Wall me if you need anything!!!!
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We started swaddle weaning when she first rolled at 11 weeks. It was a nightmare and took a good 4/5 weeks to get her sleeping with her arms out. For the record, she then stopped rolling and didn't start again until almost 8 months! Little madam!
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We weaned both DS and DD at about 4 months because that's when I started getting nervous about the risks of them rolling over in the swaddle plus I figured that they can't be in the swaddle forever and the earlier they're weaned the easier it'll be. It was rough though!
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Til 5 months, when we swaddle weaned and introduced a lovey, and also started sleep training.
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Weaned DS1 at 3.5 months when he started to roll, and DS2 never took to the swaddle.
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We swaddled for about 3 hours after birth
after that lo always got her arms out so we decided to stop swaddling since she preferred to have her hands by her face.
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I think we quit around 2 months - maybe sooner.
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both of my kids weren't swaddle fans. DD was swaddled for a few days. DS maybe 3 weeks tops.
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4 months for both!
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Like everyone else, we stopped around 3ish months. Didn't want to risk him learning to roll over while I was asleep.
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We just stopped cold turkey at 5.5 months. She was a swaddle addict, but was finally ready to stop. She's done great.
I think Dr. Karp (happiest baby on the block) mentions on his website that some babies need to be swaddled much longer than others. I've never looked but maybe he discusses how to safely swaddle older babies on his website or in one of his books?
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5 months because DS started breaking out of the swaddle and it was more trouble than it was worth. He didn't started rolling over until almost 7 months, so that never was an issue for us.
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5 1/2 months. She had never rolled while awake and then one day just I put her down she rolled over while swaddled. Totally freaked me out!
We had to sleep train in order to swaddle wean - she had already been waking up every 45 minutes in the swaddle and losing the swaddle was the last straw. On the plus side - it only took two nights and once she was able to roll herself over on her own and sleep on her tummy (we put her down on her back but the pediatrician said if she got herself on her tummy we were fine to leave her there) her sleep improved dramatically.
Hope this helps! Wall me if you need anything!!!!
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