Can't settle himself in his cot.

Not sure what to do about this.

Junior sometimes goes to sleep quite happily in his pushchair, or in his car seat; just nods off, by himself because he's tired, BUT he can't apparently do the same thing in his cot.

At night, I feed him to sleep, then transfer him into his cot gently, without (really) waking him. I put him down slightly on his side, balancing on his right arm, and usually after a while he relaxes onto his back and keeps on sleeping. The problem is that sometimes, falling onto his back wakes him up, at which point I have to feed him to sleep again. Also, if he wakes in the night, he'll sometimes roll onto his front and start complaining (he's perfectly able to roll back again). I was watching him last night after I put him down when he was asleep (having woken up for a feed). Seems if he isn't deeply enough asleep, he'll squirm around until he's awake and I need to pick him up again and get him to sleep again, which gets a bit tiring when it happens repeatedly between 5 and 6am.

He's about 7.5 months old and has never yet managed to sleep all through the night, but frustratingly he will go through phases of sleeping from about 9pm to 3am, and then again from 3.30 until 7ish, which isn't bad, until he goes back to waking up at 11, 2 and 5.

Any ideas? He only has a total of about 2 hours sleep in the day - usually 3 lots of 40 mins. The cot's in our room atm, would it possibly help to sleep in a different room so he can't wake me as easily, or is it more likely he'd just be more awake (and distressed) by the time I got to him?

Sounds like normal baby behavior to me Leon sometimes does this and sometimes not. you could try in his own room and see what happens, could always swap back if need be

Yep, mine have never self settled in a cot. They onlt do it wheb moving

Try stop feeding him to sleep always. Maybe rocking or singing to sleep. Its a long slow process, but thetes no rush

Try stop feeding him to sleep always. Maybe rocking or singing to sleep. Its a long slow process, but thetes no rush

He went to sleep just lying on my lap last night (one of the times I got him back to sleep). I can understand why he'd prefer to sleep on nice warm, soft mummy rather than in his perfectly adequate cot, but it doesn't really work for me at 3am.

The secret to getting him to sleep in the day, of course, is to plan to go out and feed him beforehand, so as to be sure he's not hungry. Result: sleeping baby, and I can't get out as planned.

oh oh just had a thought, have you tried putting him down on his belly? Leon likes that better x

You know what? When I first read your post, I'd NEVER seen him sleep on his tummy, then the next night I saw him asleep on his front. And it scared the bejesus out of me (like this stuff is rational).

And actually, now I have a better idea of what's going on, since we just stayed a couple of nights in a Days Inn, where he couldn't settle in the travel cot / playpen thing they provided. So, he had half the double bed, well fenced in with me on the other half (OK, I got about 18 inches), while OH slept in the single (good thing we had it). Result? 7 hours sleep, 8.30-3.30, then settled again after feeding, and was still lightly dozing by 8.30 when we had to get up for breakfast (typical!)

Seems he needs to be able to roll from back to front and then over again in the same direction to settle himself back to sleep. Not poss in a cot though, since he's rolling up against the bars... Had some success last night putting him down cross-wise, but not ideal and he only just fits that way.

It's not improving, in fact it's getting worse... As far as I can tell, this is what's happening:

Unless he's really tired, Junior does not sleep well on his front. Obviously I don't put him on his front, but he rolls over while he's asleep (I've seen it happen once or twice), he then wriggles around, pushes up on his hands, starts crawling / rolling about to try to get comfortable again, fails and starts crying.

On a bad night this happens every hour or two. He goes to sleep again pretty quickly when I feed him (I don't think he's hungry / thirsty, but if I pick him up that's what he wants, and it does get him to sleep), but he has to be asleep before I put him down, and then I need to get back to sleep again.

Suggestions?

Would you consider co-sleeping just so that you can get some decent sleep? TBH it just sounds like normal baby behaviour. Noah was a great sleeper as a newborn but when he got to about 7 months his sleep pattern became awful and he only wanted to be fed to sleep. I tried everything I could think of and it didn't make any difference. Now if he wakes and doesn't settle easily he comes in with us where he can feed whilst I am still resting/sleeping.