Success without sleep training?

I literally let my six month old do whatever she wants to tire herself out before bed, tummy time, books, toys, her shower, etc. She goes to bed late like 9-10 but she sleeps like a champ for 9-11 hours a night only stirring when she’s hungry, sleep feeding, and right back to a deep sleep

It depends what you class as sleep training as there are loads of methods where you’re still being there and offering plenty of comfort but also coaching your baby to feel safe in their sleep space on their own and have them be able to settle themselves. 6 months is a great time to introduce a comforter which can be super helpful to make them feel safe when you’re not in the room. My son is 2 and he is obsessed with muslins and has been since 6 months it’s so sweet! Will be doing the same for my daughter when she’s old enough

My LO gets cuddled and rocked to sleep every night. We co sleep a lot if he wakes up early hours unsettled (when he is teething bad or ill normally). He has slept through for 11 weeks and never had any sort of sleep training. He is now 8 months and sleeps between 10-12 hours at night and has 2 1/1.5 hour naps a day x

We didn’t do any of the traditional sleep training methods (like cry it out or Ferber). Every time he cries we run right to him. But we helped create a strong routine, we build sleep pressure throughout the day with his schedule, and we focus on getting enough day time calories.

The 4m sleep regression almost killed us all. By 5m he got better and by 6m he was sleeping through the night. 7-8m he started waking once to nurse for 10 minutes but would go back to bed immediately. And now around 9m he’s sleeping through again.

There are ways to be responsive to your babies needs. No need to ignore them. There is hope mama. The fact you said sometimes they sleep great is amazing. Keep up the good work. You got this!

Sorry to break it to you, but I think a lot of it is personality. Mine wake around 4 times a night until around 18 months. Though we don’t to any kind of training.

are you able to elaborate on the 'enough day time calories' please? I'm in the trenches 🥹😂

for sure, but to be honest I don’t have a real answer though 😂

I just offered milk more frequently, instead of a timed schedule. And most of the time he would push it away, but sometimes he’d drink. So in the end he was just consuming more milk “on demand” than following an hourly schedule.

I don’t know if you are nursing or bottle feeding of some sort. I exclusively nursed but we started introducing a bottle of mixed BF/formula at night around 6m when his sleep got better. And as of a couple of weeks ago, just straight formula before bed.

As he would drink the whole bottle, I assumed it was more than what he’d get at the breast, formula is a little harder to digest, etc. I think this helped. Formula vs BM has been disproven to help babies sleep better. But I think just offering the bottle with more volume was helpful.

Every baby is different. As someone mention it could come down to temperament too.

What does your babies day time schedule look like sleep wise?

thanks for sharing🥰

My LG is 19mo, she eats a lot & has maybe 2 bottles a day. She naps anytime between 12-2pm for 1-2hrs usually (today she missed her nap completely & I've just put her to bed at 8pm) but she sleeps like 3-4 hours then wakes up wanting milk (bottle milk), I combi fed BM & formula before that. But the frequent wake ups are DRAINING. I'm so exhausted 🥹😭

I think I need to start focusing on increasing day time calories instead of just waiting every x# of hours to feed. I love responding to my babies needs. I’m glad you found success with it 🫶

oh mama, I’m so sorry. It’s so hard. One day at a time. You got this. ❤️
Sorry I’m not much more help. Sometimes it also comes down to temperament. You could be doing everything right and they’ll still do what they want. Hang in there.