Put into bed awake, but how awake

We are very gradually training DD to settle herself to sleep. I thought this was going to be a painful process, but overnight she seems to have decided that going to sleep is OK. At night she is (touch wood), starting to happily roll over and go to sleep after a feed, cuddle or pat. During the day I sit with her and sing to her, rock a little if she is tired and when she is nearly asleep I pop her in stroke her forehead or stand there and sing, then she shuts her eyes and goes to sleep.

It takes a while sometimes and a bit of crying while I hold her to get her calm enough to go into the cot.

Beleive me this is huge progress from the 20 mins of rocking and another 20 mins of holding her I was doing.

I'm keen to know how awake others put their older babies into bed (DD is 8 1/2 Months)? Is really drowsy with eyes shut, then open again for a few seconds enough?

I understand the need for her to be confident to put herself to sleep, but we are a few steps away from that yet (but hopefully getting there) and not sure what the end goal should be.

My wee man is quite a bit younger but we are also trying to get him to settle himself. I watch for tired signs - he jerks his arms and legs and grizzles. He doesnt look what i would think as drowsy, and sometimes it takes alot longer for him to sleep. He often protests for a few minutes then nods off.

You are doing so well! It took us a few weeks to progress from having to fall asleep in someones arms to the cot but we are getting there.

I'm just re-teaching DD how to self settle she has always gone down fine at night but during the day had turned to custard. We were rocking to sleep to minimise crying and feeding if that didn't work. During this she'd often be crying and once calm and asleep it'd then take just as long to transfer her into the cot without her protesting.

She is a little bit younger but this is what I'm doing.
As soon as I spot tired signs I start her nap routine. This is nappy change, into room and close curtains, wrapped up (backwards to normal so she can get at her hands but can't scratch as she has ezcema) and into cot, I kiss her on the head and leave.

She sometimes goes straight to sleep but can protest as well. I leave her for 15 minutes to give her a chance to settle. If she sounds like she is calming down I leave her a bit longer. Sometimes it sounds like she is being tourtured but she is just mad that I've put her to bed. I never used to be able to leave her to cry but now I just imagine her saying "I DON'T WANT TO GO TO BED"

First day I started this she cried for 35 minutes, if I go in she gets more worked up so I just checked on her every 5 visually occassionally verbally reassuring. The next sleep it took 15 minutes. We are now down to nothing or just a couple of minutes crying but occassionally it is longer but the crying is intermittent. We have been doing this since Monday.

Her sleeps are much better we were lucky to get 45 mins before now she is doing 1 1/2 -2 hours consistantly and sleeping better at night (YAY).

You need to decide what your goal is and how you want to get there. But the key is what ever you decide to do be consistant day and night! We won't be going back to rocking or feeding to sleep as much as I loved her going to sleep in my arms I could see that in a few months she would be too heavy to do that and at 12, 2, 4, 6.. at night it was getting too much!

ETA we have a much happier baby now that she is getting the sleep she needs, I am happier too as I am getting more sleep

Edited by EsmesMum

I put Nathan down to bed awake. Sometimes he's drowsy, sometimes awake - but I know he's tired.

Daniel is 11 months old & we put him to bed wide awake. Sometimes he's smiling at me & I get confused that maybe I've put him in too early but then he mucks around playing with his dummy for a little while & then goes to sleep.
I agree that the end goal is whatever you are happy with & also what works best to keep your baby happy.

We're at the same stage as you trying to switch from rocking or feeding to sleep and I was wondering the same thing about how close to sleep is drowsy. Sometimes he's like you said with eyes shut and they flick open and closed again and I pretty much count that as asleep. I think I count drowsy when he's got that half shut look going on. That's the stage we're at anyway, hopefully we'll progress to the wide awake stage eventually but it definitely feels like progress to walk out the door when his eyes aren't properly shut and for him to not wake up again as before half shut wasn't good enough

Cory gets put down wide awake...and he settles himself...sometimes he goes to sleep straight away and other times he plays for 10mins before going to sleep.

Cory is a lot like Rhiannon and we have never been able to pick up the tired signs until too later( and by then they are both rubbing their eyes and over tired).

So he pretty much has a set window for when i put him down

Awesome stuff!! Hopefully you slept for most of that time and didn't keep waking up

Yes good night indeed. Early days but good start. Of course, I kept waking amazed that she was still asleep, it will take me a while to get used to.