how to get baby to sleep unswaddled

[Anonymous]

I thought my daughter would go to college swaddled, but she finally just grew out of it. She was 6 1/2 months. We had stopped swaddling her legs because she would kick out of the swaddle, and finally I noticed that she was stretching enough during the night that her arms were almost coming loose. I left one arm out at one nap and then left her completely unswaddled that night and it was fine. She also stopped using a pacifier at the same time, because once her hands were free, she would take the pacifier out and throw it out of the crib. I just stopped retrieving it. It was a natural progression. I think if your child isn't rolling over yet and still seems to need it, just go with it.

[Anonymous]

No the OP, but I'm going through the same time - and DS is 6 months! I tried both weaning and cold-turkey approaches - neither works right now. When his arms are out, it's like he doesn't know what to do with them. He'll start playing with his fingers, pulling the pacifier out and getting upset when it's gone, etc. I guess I should try again in another week and see huh??

[Anonymous]

I'm a cold turkey advocate. We had two horrible nights with my son and then he seemed to figure things out. As an added bonus, once we unswaddled him (at around 4 months), he immediately began flipping over to his tummy to sleep. He sleeps much better now.

FWIW, the reason I wanted to unswaddle him is I didn't feel good about doing any kind of CIO while he was still swaddled. Our son was having multiple night wakings and I wanted to see if letting him fuss for 10 minutes or less would help him figure things out on his own and learn to self soothe. But I didn't feel good about doing that while he was still swaddled. He wouldn't have access to his hands and he wouldn't really be able to move around to try to soothe himself. Plus, if it didn't work, then he'd just bust out of the swaddle and we'd be in there several times a night re-swaddling him, which is obviously very disruptive for him and for us. Once we had him unswaddled and we let him cry for a few minutes, he began to settle himself back to sleep for the majority of his night wakings.

[Anonymous]

I am also still swaddling at 5 months... but I also worry about the safety of it. She is definitely strong enough to bring her arms up, even in the swaddle, which can raise the fabric (we use a halo sleep sack swaddler) over her face... does anyone else worry about this? Is it a potential problem?

[Anonymous]

I am currently struggling with this too. I stopped doing a full body swaddle about a week ago and am just wrapping his arms- putting the blanket over his arms and under his back. This has worked, but I'm weary. He is 5.5 months and still wakes up alot at night. I see him trying to stretch and resposition and I think this wakes him up. I'm trying the sleep sack and it works okay for naps, but I'm scared to try it at night!

[Anonymous]

My son is two and a half months old and I had to stop the swaddle because he could roll onto his tummy while fully swaddled. I have read a lot of these posts and no one has mentioned that once they flip over in the swaddling blanket then you can no longer swaddled them. The way I got my son to sleep is by holding him while he falls asleep and I keep moving his arms and rubbing his back to keep the movement of his body so he doesn't even notice when I lay him down in his crib. I don't let his little limbs get stiff and stuck in one position while he's nodding off to sleep.

[Anonymous]

Does anyone believe the claim that swaddling babies (with hands by their side) can stunt motor development? We had a developmental specialist tell us this and now I'm somewhat paranoid. I have noticed my baby isn't using his hands much (3 months old) but it's also very early to expect him to. I'm not a crazy "milestone obsessed" parent but I also would never want to do anything to hinder development.