Self settling

Here is my Catherine Zeta Jones story on teaching Misaki to self settle and some manual handling advice on some of the more hands on methods.

Picture Catherine Zeta Jones in Entrapment where she is stealthily and sexily climbing over and under hidden laser beams to steal the cash. That is who I feel like (minus the sexy) when I am trying to get out of Misaki’s room after settling her to sleep!

Teaching your baby how to self settle themselves to sleep is probably one of the hardest parental challenges and one of the biggest achievements. 

The way parents choose to settle their baby to sleep is a personal choice. I am not going to even enter the world of advice for self settling and am definitely not the best at it by a very long way. As infuriating as it is to not hear the best way to do it, it is true that every baby and parent is an individual and you have to work out the best way as a team.

There seem to be strong views either way so DO WHAT WORKS FOR YOU. I am only going to offer manual handling advice for some of these more hands on methods.

If you choose to try rocking the baby to sleep in the bassinet or pram, make sure that you are pushing with your legs- incidental lunge style.  The old mantra still applies; core on, back straight, bend the knees. Make sure you rock the pram on a hard floor surface to reduce the resistance.

Rocking over a bump does often work a treat but brace your core as you do this. If you are lying down (half comatosed with sleep deprivation) and pushing with your arms, tighten your core and have your hand at hip height to not hurt your shoulder. If you are just rocking them gently in the calm stages of settling then arms without the core actively on will suffice.

If you are rocking your baby in your arms, make sure she is being held close to you and is held symmetrically, either horizontally or vertically (see picture right). Misaki found it quite soothing when I held her high on my chest and nuzzled my face in to hers.

This however requires good neural flexibility to bend your head forward so if you feel any tension down your neck or back do not do this.

Bending your arms as much as you can to bring your baby high and as close to you is good manual handling but it is best for your neck to look straight ahead with good head on shoulders posture (see picture) but perhaps this is not as comforting as nuzzling your head in to hers. The higher she is the less you have to bend your head down though.

I also found sitting on a Swiss/ gym ball and bouncing was great at soothing her. I tried combining this with some pelvic circles for an incidental core workout but the bouncing was more effective at calming her. You should have your core activated while bouncing so you get a slight core work out this way.

Some choose to use baby carriers to settle as well as for carrying their babies. Please see my blog on Baby Carriers for best ergonomic advice on these.

“blacken the area and take away distraction... tried putting the muslin wrap over her head and my shoulder...”

We didn’t wish for Misaki to compromise our social life. Whenever I commented that we were mastering that goal to my husband, Misaki would proceed to do a “poonami/ pooplosion” on our decadent restaurant chairs/clothes) as discussed in the blog Doing the dirty! Anyway I digress. You have probably read that to help a baby go to sleep you should darken the area. This is because darkness releases melatonin which stimulates sleepiness (https://sleepfoundation.org/sleep-topics/melatonin-and-sleep). 

So as we are often out, to blacken the area and take away distraction I instinctively tried putting the muslin wrap over her head and my shoulder. This seemed to work and then became our thing that I used in the home as well. This is something perhaps for the earlier stages of settling a baby as self settling really is something you should try to master as soon as you feel is right. No judgement here. I just felt my baby was used to being part of me in utero so I wanted to gently move to self settling, plus I didn’t want my nice food to go cold! Solid parenting 101.

So I decided when we were back from our travels at 4 months and then retrained at 6 months I should ease her in to self settling.

I was reading constantly during my pregnancy about pregnancy, childbirth and child rearing and since she has been born, right or wrong I have been using a lot of instinct.

So after a quick bounce on the ball with a wrap over her head and a “twinkle twinkle little star/ baa baa black sheep/ alphabet” medley (have you noticed they have the same tune?) I put her down in the bed calm but awake. I then felt that lying down on the floor with my hand through the bars of the cot to hold her hand was the right thing to do. It has worked really well for us (most of the time) in that she knows I am there so can go to sleep when she is ready.

I have found it so cute and relaxing that I haven’t progressed my initial plan of working my way further to the door. She has developed this routine of doing these ‘bridge jumps’ which get her circumnavigating the cot and eventually she nods off to sleep. I thought this was burning off excess energy but apparently that is an adult thing (like my restless legs). However it is apparently the opposite in babies; that your baby Is overtired and goes in to hyperactive mode. Thus I have mistimed putting her to bed too tired. Anyway just thought that could be helpful to some. Putting them to bed as soon as they show signs of tiredness seems to be key. Again I digress.

The main reason I wanted to let you know of this method I have been using is because this settling technique is extremely easy on the manual handling and energy scale- lying down on the floor! Especially initially there can be quite a bit of time involved waiting for them to go to sleep.

So that you are not getting frustrated with this time wasting (I reckon they can sense this, thus take even longer to settle), use this time for incidental exercise. Sure sometimes you may just want to rest as you are so buggered, but if you are awake enough, try the exercises in the next blog Exercise routine while your baby is settling to sleep.

“getting frustrated with this time wasting... they can sense this, thus take even longer to settle.”

I am currently writing this blog while she is successfully self settling herself to sleep and I write on the nursery floor. If she is the right amount of tired (which I think is the key to judge) she wants to skip our initial cover, bounce and sing routine and head straight to bed. Maybe an additional non- physiotherapy message here, is to let them know you love them and will be there when they need, which instils the confidence for them to fall asleep.

On another note; I went to this sleep expert talk recently and learnt many things, the most important being that you need to time putting your baby to bed with their circadian rhythm. Before 4 months their biological clock and circadian rhythm has not developed so you have to just follow their cues and routine before then.

After 4 months though, apparently they are tired between 9-10 am, 12-2pm and 6-7pm so since knowing that and putting her down between these times there is much less settling required! I tried to find evidence of this but I couldn't (very possibly it is out there) but it really worked for us and some of my Mummy friends so definitely worth a shot! Also feeding protein at lunch time and darkening the room so that there is no blue light has also made a big difference.

It has been some time since I wrote this blog, and looking back to the time of Misaki learning to self settle was a hard time, so I feel for each and every one of you that is going through the process at the moment. As everyone will tell you, it will get easier, and you will be so proud of your baby and yourself when they finally self settle. Our self settling story ended when at about 1, Misaki was getting restless with me lying on the floor as she went to sleep. She didn't want me there anymore. Now what? It now seemed like the right time to brave the "controlled crying". I am sure you have heard that this when you leave the room to let them fall asleep on their own, leaving them to cry for periods of time, depending on their age. Thankfully this process worked extremely well for us, only taking 2 sleeps with 2 sets of 10 minute cries for her to fall asleep and bingo she was a legit self settler. 

I know this takes longer for some children, much longer- some of my Mummy friends are still trying to get their 2 year olds to self settle. For us though, Misaki mastered it at one and has slept through the night ever since! Do what feels right for you but feel confidence and strength in that your baby can learn the skills to self settle.

Summary

Getting your baby to sleep seems to be quite individual to the baby and the parent so try different ways to see what works for you.

Use good manual handling what ever method and especially be careful if you are repeatedly lifting your baby up and down from the bassinet/ cot.

Try using circadian rhythms of the baby above to time when you put them to sleep and make sure the environment is dark to stimulate the sleep hormone melatonin.

Melli Tilbrook is a Physiotherapist based at Adelaide Physiotherapy and Pilates Studio, Beulah Park.