How/when did you swaddle wean?

By Mrs. Pinata May 26, 2015

Sweet P is now 5 months old and sti totally swaddled. We are using SwaddleMes and they're working pretty well (she doesn't bust out of them until the end of her naps and rarely at night). She is STTN and taking 3 good naps a day so I hate to mess with that, but I know we will eventually need to swaddle wean.
She is big on putting her hands in her mouth when she's awake, but when we've tried to do just one arm in the swaddle her hands at SO distracting to her we just end up swaddling her again so she will fall asleep.

Did anyone else have a baby totally distracted by their hands? How did you swaddle wean, when did you do it and how long did it take?

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Tags: swaddle , Infant sleep

14 comments

Happygal
pomelo / 5000 posts

May 26, 2015

I didn't wean. Cold turkey at pediatrician's suggestion. We talked about it at her 3 month appointment, so I guess around that time. She is rolling on her side and I saw flipping in our near future, so I was motivated by safety concerns. She also loves her hands and I wanted her to have access to them for self soothing.

I would say we had 3-4 rough nights (one night I cried uncle and grabbed a swaddle). She still gets distracted by hands and flipping all around, but I consider it part of the sleep learning process!
Mrs. Coral
clementine / 812 posts

May 26, 2015

Cold turkey at 12 weeks because she was rolling and also loves her hands. It went fine. Maybe a night or two of waking herself up, but she self soothed back to sleep.
Mrs. Pinata
blogger / pear / 1563 posts

May 26, 2015

@Happygal: @Mrs. Coral: So, how long did it take your LOs to fall asleep when going down for bedtime or a nap? She now falls asleep on her own within a few minutes, and I'd hate for her to lay there crying for a long time.
Madison43
persimmon / 1483 posts

May 26, 2015

Cold turkey at 5 months when she started rolling. It was rough for a week I think before it got back to normal. We didn't let her cry but I remember a lot of rocking and shushing during that time.
msplatypus
cherry / 229 posts

May 26, 2015

Cold turkey at 4 months one night because she screamed when we put the swaddle on her. We had 3 bad nights, naps were already short so they stayed short until 5 months. We switched to the zippidee, which she like to suck on. She moves a lot in bed. It used to take her about 5 minutes to fall asleep now we have 10 to 15 minutes of wiggling.
psw27
pomelo / 5220 posts

May 26, 2015

We switched to Magic Merlin. I don't really remember when - maybe at 5 months or so? LO was a little late on that stuff cause he was a preemie but the Magic Merlin worked super well for us.
Mrs. Coral
clementine / 812 posts

May 26, 2015

@Mrs. Pinata: This probably isn't a popular decision, but I cuddle DD and rock her with a pacifier until she is asleep about 50% of the time, since I WOH and my time with her is limited. The other 50% of the time I put her down drowsy but awake because I have crap I need to get done. Both ways she does fine and goes straight to sleep.

We've never swaddled for naps, but our naptime routine is the same as bedtime, above.

Honestly, if it didn't go as smooth as it did, I probably would have tried the Zipadeezip. Swaddleme has a similar product I was considering, that one you can zip off one arm at a time to wean.

ETA: Sorry, it's not a SwaddleMe product...but Love to Dream

http://www.amazon.com/Love-Dream-Swaddle-Stripe-Medium/dp/B0081GIZ52
Mae
papaya / 10343 posts

May 26, 2015

We took LO out of the swaddle cold turkey at 5 mo because she learned to roll in it.
Meridian
pomegranate / 3716 posts

May 26, 2015

We transitioned LO from swaddle to a Merlin magic suit around 5 or 5.5 months. It was a gradual transition, starting with naps around 5 months, and then 2 weeks later, moved on to nights. He was a bad sleeper anyways, so it wasn't a huge difference.

We just had to transition him out of the Merlin suit 2 weeks ago (at 7 months) because he was able to roll both ways. We had a bad few days, but then all of a sudden, LO realized that he loved sleeping on his side and tummy. His sleep has improved 100% since then!! (knock on wood)
Mamaof2
squash / 13208 posts

May 26, 2015

@Mrs. Pinata: my DS was that way - we weaned around 4 or 5 months?

I had to take it slow!

We started bedtime totally swaddled and then after his 1st wake up I would swaddle with just 1 arm - we did that for a week maybe

Then once that became the new norm I would swaddle at bedtime with 1 arm out. then after that became normal we swaddled both arms out after 1st wake

then ditched the swaddle - took a few weeks but he was obsessed with the swaddle!
Mrs. Pinata
blogger / pear / 1563 posts

May 26, 2015

Thanks everyone! This is helpful! If she was just fussy or wiggly with one arm out I would do that, but she literally screams for some reason.

I will try again with one arm out and if that doesn't work will try the zipadezip and then the Merlin. I just hate messing with her (finally) good sleep!
miramira
apricot / 411 posts

May 27, 2015

I think we stopped swaddling around 3 months or so, but I can't really remember why. Possibly because he was rolling onto his side and liked to suck his fingers.

We moved him into his sleeping bag and for a week or so, he would wake himself up by flopping onto his back whenever he tried to sleep on his side, but I think that was the only setback. We rock to him to sleep, so we didn't have any issues with things distracting him while trying to fall sleep.

Continuous sleep wasn't so much of an issue for us since DS has always awoken multiple times a night. He's now nearly 8 months and loves sleeping on his side.

You may have to suffer a few nights of interrupted sleep for your LO to adapt to the change, but she will eventually!
LAZB
pomegranate / 3904 posts

May 28, 2015

@Mrs. Pinata: I have no suggestions, but L is the exact same way, and I'm not looking forward to weaning from the swaddle.
gracecat
clementine / 878 posts

May 28, 2015

We swaddled her arms until she was 16 months old. She was a good sleeper except for a few sleep regressions so we didn't want to ruin a good thing! We only really used it to help her fall asleep since she could get out of the miracle blanket pretty quickly and it was totally off her after an hour or two. She has always been very strong...

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How/when did you swaddle wean?

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