I need advice on how to (if it’s possible) avoid bad sleeping habits from forming. I have a 9 week old who can only do day naps and being put down for bedtime in the evening with a lot of time and support (rocking, feeding, bouncing, walking around with him) even when he is showing signs of tiredness / exhaustion. This is regardless of if we try a contact nap or a sleep in the bassinet. During the day his wake windows are anywhere from 45 mins - 2 hours, but I generally notice around 45 mins he is constantly yawning and struggling to keep “happy”.
During the night he feeds and goes down easier afterwards as he tends to fall asleep on us before we transfer him back to his bassinet. He wakes between 1-3 hours.
We won’t do any sleep “training” until he is old enough and able, but I would like to ensure the consistent rocking and bouncing we do not doesn’t mean that later on he can’t be put down without help. Do the habits starts to form now already, or is it only as they get a bit older? Is there any advice on how to help a newborn his age fall asleep without the insistent moving and bouncing? Happy to continue to do so for as long as it gets him the sleep he needs, but open to suggestions (we would never leave him to cry to sleep)
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I don’t believe you are forming any bad habits. I did nearly all the same things with my son until about 5 months old when I decided to start some light nap sleep training.. when I decided to do that, I started with my hand on him and gently rocking him and eventually moved to not doing that, to putting him wide awake in his crib! … I had a nurse in the hospital on day 1 tell me to not rock him ever because it was a bad habit and it nearly broke me because all I wanted to do was hold my son for forever — I will never forget her comment. Your baby is only little for such a short time so enjoy these precious moments!

No such thing as bad habits.. every child who was rocked to sleep grows out of it naturally x