How do I help my 3 month old sleep better through the night?
My 3mo daughter was sleeping pretty well through the night (from 11 PM to 7 AM) for about a week, and now she wakes up every 30 mins to 1 hour wanting her pacifier. I've been running in at the first sign of crying and giving her her pacifier. As of 2 days ago, the behavior started spreading to her day time routine.
We have a routine set up where she wakes up, eats (wife breastfeeds), has her "awake time", and then we put her down awake for her nap when she shows signs of being tired (lather, rinse, repeat). She normally didn't wake up more than once or twice a night or during her naps, where as now it's anywhere from 4-7 times a night and 2-3 times during a nap.
We've asked a few people what they've done and people have suggested:
"gradual extinction" to remove pacifier dependency all together
just deal with it till she can self soothe
remove pacifier during day and deal with her, and then let her have it at night.
add a midnight feeding at 2-3 AM and remove pacifier during day
This is our first child and so we are still new with this whole parenting thing. What is safe for the baby? Will the baby go through "withdrawals" if we deny her something she has grown attached too? How can we help her get better sleep during the night?
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I took the pacifiers away at around 9 month, after that the theory goes that is much harder to take it way. In terms of your 3 month old...taking it away completely during the day is important or you will soon have a child who uses it all the time and this could impede her talking if it lasts to long. In terms of night a few things to try. Let her cry for just a couple of minutes (unless you like the cry it out method) to see if she will sooth herself. If not go in and give it to her. If this doesn't work after a few night try putting lots of pacifiers in her bed so she is sure to find one when she reaches around and lastly be patient, she is very young still.
I suspect that she is waking during the night because she is hungry. Babies have growth spurts at about 2, 3, and 6 weeks, then 3 and 6 months.
A hungry baby will not sleep well.
So I would suggest adding in a night time feed. Try it for a week and see if this gets her to sleep.
We removed the pacifier from our baby at about this time and never went back. She didn't miss it and I didn't miss sleeping propped up against the cot waking up every 15 minutes when the pacifier fell out.
We also had a week of sleeping through the night at about three months. It was another five months before we had our next one!
I am so not an expert but our 3 year old son just gave up his pacifier. He was told he would get a "special" gift at Christmas if he gave it up that night. Prior to that, it was a huge battle to ever get him to go to sleep without it. And if he ever lost it in the middle of the night, we heard about it. In fact, I think the whole neighborhood heard it. The special gift did the trick, and we are successfully 8 days without a pacifier.
I say get your own sleep and worry about it at age 1. Or 2. Or 3. At 3 we could bargain with him.
3 months of age is way too early to completely wean her off the pacifier, especially for the night. I think on average you can expect a child to go without the pacifier at 1½-2 years of age during daytime, and 2-3 years for nighttime.
This is of course assuming that the parents are even pro-pacifier, but you seem to be. If I'm mistaken, please edit your question to explain your plans/ambitions regarding pacifiers.
My wife and just now weaned our 2y3mo old son off the pacifier during the day (except when he's unhappy for whatever reason), but I think it'll be good while yet regarding nighttime. He's going to bed with at least 2 pacifiers. They also help him (and us!) fall back to sleep at night; he only seriously wakes us if he can't find any of them. Frankly I don't mind this at all, as long as it helps him fall asleep. The pacifier falls out when he falls asleep, so I am not worried about dental consequences.
By the way: If your daughter is only 3 months old and already pretty much sleeps through the night, then consider yourself exceptionally lucky.
My baby girl is almost 3 months and she kept waking up almost every hour for her pacifier. I was losing so much sleep and she was becoming very cranky too. At first this was only at night, then she started waking up for her dummy during the day too. I decided to take away her dummy and test how she would do... she is very happy when she is awake with no dummy. When she starts to moan too much I know she needs sleep, so I pick her up and soothe her to sleep. She screams for about 5 mins for her dunmy before she eventually falls asleep. I play soft music in the background which helps a lot too. At first she woke up every few mins for her dummy. But I just patted her bum and she fell asleep again. I suspected the losing dummy thing started getting her in a bad habit of waking up every hour. She slept through the night so beautifully last night and sleeps wonderfully during the day...
Every person has their own opinion on what to do... you gotta do what's best for you and your baby. You have to try things and figure it out yourself...
I also got my baby in a sleep routine and to sleep through the night at 5.5 weeks old. (Which a lot of people say is bad and impossible) She is a very healthy and happy baby. Parents are the worst critics... only you know what's best.
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