Every parent knows that the most reliable way To calm your baby down is to rock him in your arms. Feeling the mother's closeness and warmth, the baby falls asleep faster and experiences painful colic in the stomach or teething more calmly.

Over time, the habit of falling asleep in your arms becomes so ingrained that it becomes increasingly difficult to wean your baby off of it. Meanwhile, it becomes increasingly difficult for the mother to calm the child in this way, since the baby is actively gaining weight, and the process of falling asleep sometimes stretches for hours.

If you feel that your child is old enough to try to fall asleep on his own, then it’s time to introduce new rules into your family’s lifestyle. But first, a few important points that parents should consider.

What do you need to know before starting weaning?

Most likely, it will not be possible to wean the baby quickly

The process of weaning off motion sickness in a baby can take up to two weeks. Monitor your child’s behavior during this period. If every day the procedure for going to bed without motion sickness becomes easier and easier, then you are doing everything right.

If the baby continues to fall asleep with tears, demanding the attention of his parents, then most likely he is not yet ready for change. It will be possible to continue weaning him off pumping after a month.

Be prepared for resistance

Children are clearly aware that their mother is reacting to their cry, so they will desperately resist when trying to make them more independent and teach them to fall asleep without pumping. It will be important for parents to show resilience and not give in to provocations.

It is impossible to wean during illness

If during the period of weaning from motion sickness the baby gets sick, you will need to postpone what was planned and wait until he recovers.

Be consistent and firm in your intention to wean your baby from motion sickness, but do not forget that the most important thing for him is your love and care.

At what age to start?

In each family, the time suitable for weaning a baby from motion sickness is purely individual and depends both on the child and on the parents’ readiness for change.

The simplest option is not to accustom your baby to rocking in your arms before bed from birth. But, if it is not possible to calm and put the child to sleep in any other way and the habit of motion sickness has already been developed, then you can try to influence the situation no earlier than 6-8 months.

Experts believe that weaning off motion sickness earlier will be too stressful for both the child and the parents and is unlikely to bring the expected results.

For parents who are not ready to go to radical measures and do not want to “torture” the child, pediatricians recommend not stopping motion sickness until 1.5 years. At this age, babies are able to refuse rocking before bed on their own.

Weaning your baby off your hands before falling asleep

If you don’t know how to wean your child from motion sickness, then conditionally dividing the process into two stages will simplify your task. Start by weaning yourself off your hands. You can replace “manual” motion sickness with a pendulum-type crib, which will help you move from one stage to another. Before going to bed, gently place your baby in the bassinet, rocking it.

Even at a very early age, children understand perfectly well that a cozy cradle is not their mother. Many babies experience fear, resentment, anxiety, not feeling their mother’s usual warmth, which they rush to tell the world about with a desperate cry.

In such cases, do not pick up the baby at the first signal. Leave your hand in the crib, stroking the baby with it, sing a lullaby, massage the back and legs. Feeling the presence of his mother nearby, rocking in the crib, the baby will be able to fall asleep, although he may need more time for this.

Practice hands-free rocking in the bassinet for at least a week until your baby gets used to no longer being rocked in your arms before bed and begins to perceive the place to sleep as something familiar and safe.

How to wean your baby from motion sickness in the crib?

The next step on the way to the goal should be to wean the baby from rocking in the crib and falling asleep independently. It won’t be so difficult here, since the baby is no longer so attached to his mother’s arms and is subconsciously ready to fall asleep on his own.

Simulate the presence of a mother in the baby's crib, for example, put it there soft thing with its own scent. This could be a small pillow, a soft sweater or a towel. If the baby is sucking on a pacifier, you can give him a pacifier, turn him towards his mother’s thing and try to sing a song without rocking him.

Most likely, at first you will have to sit next to the baby, without physically contacting him, but calming him with your voice for a while until he gets used to the new rules.

As soon as the child begins to fall asleep on his own without contact with his mother, you can try to go out immediately after going to bed. Musical toys with soothing songs, a projector on the ceiling or walls with cartoon characters and the dim light of the night light will help the baby fall asleep independently with a feeling of complete safety.

What to do if a child does not accept the new rules?

There are children who easily accept new rules and get used to a new way of life. And there are babies who are stubborn or too attached to their mother to refuse the prospect of falling asleep in her arms or at least in the crib, but in her presence.

The following will help to wean such children from motion sickness:

• active and eventful walks before bedtime;
• soothing baths before dinner;
• a hearty lunch or dinner;
• mother's voice, recorded on tape, and subsequently reproduced on a tape recorder;
• body massage.

If this does not help, the baby cries, does not sleep, the daily routine is disrupted and all family members feel exhausted and weak, then you need to abandon the idea of ​​weaning the child from motion sickness for a while. Perhaps your baby is not ready and all you need to do is wait until his psyche is ripe for change.

Remember that by the age of two, most children happily fall asleep soft pillow and they themselves refuse motion sickness in favor of their own crib. The main thing is to be patient and not miss the right moment.

Arguments for and against motion sickness

And in conclusion, a little about the pros and cons of motion sickness for a child.

Negative points

1. Motion sickness makes the baby's sleep shallow and restless, and deprives the child of independence.
2. The process of motion sickness is unnatural and disrupts the functioning of the vestibular apparatus in a child. Enjoying slight dizziness, the baby gets used to this feeling and it becomes difficult for him to fall asleep in the usual way.
3. Children who were rocked for a long time in childhood may, as adults, look for ways to get a dose of adrenaline by trying themselves extreme sports sports

Positive points

1. The baby's vestibular apparatus develops in the womb and continues to develop during motion sickness, if a certain rhythm is observed.
2. Calm rocking calms not only the baby, but also the mother, strengthening the bond between them.
3. Rocking a baby helps him fall asleep faster anywhere, including on the street or at a party.
4. Motion sickness makes it easier to cope with difficult periods in a child’s life when he is sick or especially capricious.

Whether or not to rock your baby to sleep before bed and when it’s time to start weaning him off this habit is up to the parents to decide. We can only note that if both mother and child like this method of falling asleep, without instilling any fears in at this stage, then there is no point in changing anything until a certain time.

Every mother will definitely be able to feel on an intuitive level when the time comes to teach the baby to live according to new rules.

A child who always pleases his parents with sound sleep does not occur as often as we would like. Usually, even a calm and balanced baby turns into a little tyrant or crybaby when it’s time to go to bed. If mom and dad teach the baby to sleep according to the rules, and do not let this delicate process take its course, then the child will not have any problems with sleep. Accordingly, his parents and other family members will not have problems with lack of sleep and fatigue.

Authoritative pediatrician and author of numerous articles and books for parents about children's health Evgeny Komarovsky knows how to properly teach a child to go to bed. And he always willingly shares this knowledge with parents who cannot establish a rest routine for their baby.

Children's sleep

Be puzzled by organizational issues baby sleep parents should immediately after returning from the maternity hospital. And even though a newborn baby sleeps up to 20 hours a day, this is the most the right time for establishing and first “running in” the sleep and wakefulness regime. If this is done, then rarely will the baby have problems falling asleep at an older age.

But if the baby was not helped to live according to a certain regime from the very beginning, then the situation may worsen later.

Dr. Komarovsky will tell you the rules of children's sleep in the next video.

Night and daytime sleep are very interconnected. If a child does not sleep well during the day, then most likely he will have difficulty resting at night, which means that the whole family will not get enough sleep.

Of course, all children are different, as are the families in which they grow up, but doctors tried to calculate daily requirement in a dream for children of different ages. In their opinion, a child can develop normally only when The duration of his sleep is at least approximately close to these rather average standards:

• Newborns and children up to one month old 9 hours of daytime sleep and 11-12 hours of night sleep are allotted (with breaks for snacks).
• Up to 2 months The child usually has 4 daytime dream episodes and 10 hours of nighttime rest.
• By six months The baby can sleep 2-3 times during the day, and at night he sleeps at least 9-10 hours. It is no longer necessary to feed him at night.
• For two naps the baby reaches 7-9 months, The duration of the night's rest remains the same. 10 hours at night and 1-2 daytime sleeps of 2 hours each are needed for a baby aged one year and a little older.

Let me note once again that these standards are quite general, and children are not at all obliged to comply with these numbers and recommended values ​​with pharmaceutical precision.

Children sleep differently than adults. They, according to research by scientists from the UK, have a completely different sleep structure, a different rate of alternation of slow and fast phases.

Children under 6-7 years old do not dream as often as adults think, but more often they suffer from parasomnias (these are the same sleep pathologies that so greatly complicate the process of normal rest for the whole family). Most often, parosomnia is expressed by nightmares, sleep talking, involuntary movements of the limbs during sleep, and sleepwalking. All this is typical and perfect healthy children, speeches about diseases nervous system doesn't work.

But any parasomnia that the baby encountered the day before can increase the fear of falling asleep, and it will not be so easy to put the baby to sleep.

Rules by Evgeny Komarovsky

A well-known pediatrician notes that the importance of sleep should never be underestimated. The child needs it no less than good nutrition, vitamins, fresh air And parental love and attention.

Evgeniy Olegovich names ten main components of normal sleep:

• Everyone's sleep is important! This means that the child should not sleep due to the insomnia of the mother, who rocks him to sleep all night, or the father, who has to go to work in the morning. We must strive to ensure that all family members sleep at the same time and get enough sleep.
• You need to sleep according to your schedule! The baby should sleep when it is most convenient for mom and dad. Parents determine bedtime based on many factors - work schedule, family rules. But it is important, once you choose it, to adhere to this particular regime constantly.
• Sleeping place. Practiced now co-sleeping parents and their child have little in common, according to Komarovsky, with healthy child sleep; in any case, sleeping together does not in any way affect the soundness of sleep of the youngest family member. In this matter, it is also better to decide for reasons of convenience for the parents - if you want to sleep with the child - please. But Evgeniy Olegovich still recommends giving the baby his own crib. If living space allows, it should be in the children's room, if not, in the parents' bedroom.
• Wake up without regrets! If a child sleeps well during the day, and then cannot lie down in the evening, then Komarovsky advises not to be afraid to wake up the baby if he has exhausted the entire daily dream limit. This will make it easier to put your baby to bed when it's time to go to bed in the evening.
• Nutrition. Some children want to play after eating and actively enjoy being full, while others (and the majority of them) begin to fall asleep after eating. Komarovsky recommends optimizing the baby’s feeding regimen so that before bedtime (evening or daytime) feeding is more satisfying and dense. This will help the baby fall asleep easier precisely when the routine is set to quiet time or night sleep. And if the child wants to play after eating, then it is better to feed him in advance, an hour and a half before the expected “H” time.
• Microclimate. It will be much easier to put the baby to bed if parents remember that it is difficult to fall asleep in a hot and stuffy room, and it is disgusting to sleep. The doctor names the optimal microclimate parameters as follows: air temperature not less than 18 and not more than 20 degrees, and air humidity - 50-70%. Don't forget to ventilate your bedroom or children's room before each bedtime.
• Bathing. It is quite possible to put your baby to bed in literally 5 minutes, says Komarovsky, if you give him a bath before bedtime. cool water, and then put her to bed and cover her with a warm blanket. The baby will warm up and begin to fall asleep without motion sickness, which grandparents so insist on.
• The bed must be right! No downy feather beds or soft blankets, warns Evgeniy Olegovich. Only an even and hard mattress, preferably a special children’s orthopedic one, so that it does not “sink” or sag. A child under two years old does not need a pillow at all. After this age, you can sleep on a pillow, but it should not be too big or too soft. And no feathers! They can cause severe allergies.
• Delicate problems shouldn't bother! Komarovsky advises parents to be very careful when choosing a diaper for their baby. The better quality it is, the better the child will sleep. And if the child already goes to the potty, then before going to bed you should definitely take him to the toilet. Gradually, this will become part of a ritual, which in itself will remind the child about going to bed soon and mentally prepare him for this.

Motion sickness

There is no benefit to a child’s health in motion sickness, but there is no harm either, says Dr. Komarovsky. If the child refuses to fall asleep without this, then parents need to know that the child wants and demands with a heart-rending scream not the motion sickness itself. He has a need (due to nature) for a sense of security. Naturally, in your arms the baby feels protected.

This instinctive need goes away on its own with age; the child “outgrows” it as he grows up. Thus, by rocking the baby to sleep, parents only prolong the “life” of an instinct that is destined to become a thing of the past anyway.

If you want to download - please, says Evgeniy Olegovich. But remember that this is harmful to the health of parents, who can spend this time on something more useful than motion sickness.

It is not so difficult to wean yourself from motion sickness before bed, Komarovsky believes. It is enough to eliminate the cause of concern, because what prevents the little one from falling asleep is not the lack of motion sickness, but, as a rule, more real problems - he is wet, hungry, something hurts.

If the baby cries until he is picked up and starts crying again as soon as he is put back in the crib, then we're talking about O bad habit, which was formed from wrong attitude mothers and fathers to the needs of the baby.

In this situation, families face difficult choice- let the child scream and then enjoy the silence, since he will fall asleep anyway, or still take it and rock it. If it’s easier to pump and then do it every day, or even several times a day, then you should choose the second one.

Evgeny Komarovsky emphasizes that parents who decide to endure the screaming and remove the issue of motion sickness once and for all are in no way heartless or bad. In addition, the target is quite clearly visible over the horizon - children's cries of protest generally last only a few evenings, and then the whole family's sleep will become calm, strong and healthy.

All newborn babies love it when loving parents They carry them in their arms and rock them at the same time. Children develop a love for such dependence from the very moment they are conceived. In the womb, the fetus is in a rocking state most of the time.

This happens when a pregnant woman is on the move or leading a normal lifestyle. Thus, while still in the womb, the child already gets used to the state of motion sickness. Therefore, children get used to this, and subsequently fall asleep and calm down only during motion sickness. If you pamper a baby in this way, long time, then it will turn out that he will need to be rocked to sleep constantly. But the baby is gaining weight and it is quite difficult to carry him in your arms. To prevent addiction in a newborn, it is necessary to gradually wean him off this.

How to rock a baby

It is very important for a newborn baby to feel the touch of the mother's warm and gentle hands. The first time after birth, the baby will feel uncomfortable in the new world, so a mother’s hug is something that can calm him down. To properly pick up your baby in your arms, you need to fold them at your elbows in front of you and take the baby. The baby's head should be on the bend of the elbow joint (there is a soft and comfortable place for the head). The baby is grasped with both hands under the back, and in this state, forward movements of the arms are made in one and then the other direction. These movements are done smoothly, it is best to walk around the house or in the fresh air.

Is it possible to rock a baby in your arms?

Most parents rock their babies to sleep at a fast pace. This occurs on a subconscious level; if you rock the child slowly and he does not fall asleep, then the parents begin to put more effort and increase the pace. Is this kind of rocking beneficial for a baby?

Sometimes parents ask themselves this question, but not finding an answer, they continue to lull them to sleep in the same fast rhythm. The answer to this question is obvious - this cannot be done. Newborn children have a weak vestibular apparatus, which determines the coordination of movements in space. When parents, in the hope of putting the child to sleep faster or calming him down, begin to increasingly increase the pace and depth of motion sickness. In it time is running lack of coordination and dizziness occurs, which leads to pain. Often parents observe this situation themselves, as the baby, from strong rocking, will begin to cry and scream even more. Screaming is a sign of discomfort in your baby associated with a lack of coordination. Pediatricians say that severe motion sickness can harm not only the vestibular system, but also harm fragile and delicate vertebrae cervical spine and lead to concussions.

To develop a slow movement when rocking, it is recommended to purchase a large ball (fitball). This ball can withstand weight up to 150 kg. Therefore, you can safely take the baby in your arms and sit on the ball. By slowly bouncing, you will create a cozy state of motion sickness, in which the baby will fall asleep quickly and sweetly.

How to wean a child from motion sickness before bed before one year old?

This question is most often asked by parents whose baby falls asleep only when rocked to sleep. It is possible to wean a baby, you just need to have patience and nerves. It is much easier to wean a baby before one year old than to do it after one year.

When a baby is breastfeeding, this situation is simpler, because in this case, he falls asleep on his own during feeding. You just need to put him in his crib after he falls asleep. The main thing is not to carry it in your arms during the entire sleep period, because this is how children get used to motion sickness.

WITH artificial feeding the situation is more complicated. After all, the formula runs out quickly, and the baby does not have time to fall asleep in such a short period. When the mixture is finished, transfer him to his crib and rock him. If the crib doesn't rock, put him in the stroller. The baby will whine for a while, but eventually fall asleep. The main thing is to be patient and not disturb the rhythm of rocking before bed.

Most children are fed from their mother's breast; its warmth and heartbeat help the newborn to quickly calm down and fall asleep. But situations arise when the baby is fast asleep, and when he is transferred to the crib, he suddenly wakes up. What to do in such situations, because not all children are able to sleep soundly? In such a situation, the following recommendations must be followed:

• To prevent your baby from waking up from any rustle, sing lullabies to him while rocking him to sleep. The lullaby helps to completely relax the child’s body, as a result of which he will get a healthy, sound sleep.
• Do gymnastics, bathing and relaxing massages before bed; they help not only calm the body, but also its fatigue. And a tired baby will always sleep soundly
• Walk on outdoors as often as possible. The baby's body will be saturated with oxygen, the eyes will see environment in different colors and patterns, and all this will cause a healthy, sound sleep in the newborn.

How to wean an older child from motion sickness

If a situation arose that during the entire first year you were babysitting a baby, rocking him all the time both before bed and while sleeping in your arms. And a problem arose: the baby is already walking, but he still needs to be rocked in his arms, and rocked all the time. Is there a solution to such problems? Let’s take a closer look.

So, in order to wean an older child, you need to gather your courage and stock up on endurance and patience. According to the method of American pediatrician Benjamin Spock, it is necessary to rock children over 8 months not in your arms, but in a crib or stroller. This will make it possible to wean them from being put to sleep in their arms, and thereby ease the burden for mothers. After all, pumping up a child weighing 8 kg is not at all easy, and at the same time you still need to carry him around the room. Therefore, you need to rock him in the crib, while you can sing a lullaby, and when he falls asleep, let him go and leave the room. Perhaps when you stop making pendulum movements of the crib, the baby will wake up and begin to moan and cry. Show restraint and stand outside the door for five minutes, if he does not calm down on his own, then go in, calm him down and continue repeating in the same spirit. According to an American pediatrician, this is the only way to try to wean children over a year old from motion sickness in your arms.

Weaning off motion sickness before bed

There are several tips you can use to wean your child from motion sickness:

1. Lull him to sleep in his crib with soft toy. This way he will get used to sleeping when this toy is nearby.
2. Use of aroma oils. These oils contain herbs that calm the body, and the baby will slowly go to sleep.
3. Read a bedtime story; if you repeat this procedure every day, a reflex will develop, and the baby will fall asleep on its own when you close your eyes.
4. Swimming before bed. It will also work when producing conditioned reflex. After bathing, a deep and healthy sleep always follows.

Comfortable place to sleep

If you want to wean your child from motion sickness before bed, you need to make sure that the bed where he will fall asleep creates coziness and comfort for sleep. To do this you need:

• so that the crib is soft and comfortable;
• so that the crib is not located near a window, where there is a possibility of a draft, and the temperature in the room is not lower than 19 degrees;
• bedding should not irritate the child’s skin, thereby causing allergies;
• the crib should be covered with toys so that attention is paid to them, and not to the parents.

When should you wean your baby off motion sickness?

There are times when it is necessary to delay weaning yourself from lulls. These include various kinds diseases, colic and bloating, elevated temperature or when teeth are being cut. When a baby has noticeable symptoms of an illness, you should not impose your idea of ​​weaning from motion sickness during this period. All the same, he will be capricious, moan and cry, and at this time he can only be calmed by lulling him to sleep. Therefore, wean your baby only if he is healthy.

The desire to be near mom all the time is a natural need for a baby. However, this sometimes leads to some difficulties for mothers. One of them is that the baby always wants to be held, and before going to bed he has to be rocked for a long time. Let's consider effective ways weaning the child from holding hands and rocking him to sleep before bed.

Why does the baby want to be held?

It is difficult for a newborn to adapt to new conditions outside the mother's womb.

Experts say that globally, a newborn baby requires maximum physical contact with his mother only in the first 40 days from the moment of birth.

Staying with mom in daytime day gives the opportunity little man feel safe, be in an atmosphere of calm and begin to take the first steps in adapting to life in the big world.

A child older than 3 months no longer experiences this constant need V physical contact with mom. However, he can still ask to be held by his mother, because he needs to feel his mother’s love through hugs, kisses, and caresses. But the need for love is not the only reason, by which children can ask to be held.

A baby may ask to be held for the following reasons:
1. Hunger . Because the infant unable to say that he wants to eat, then when a feeling of hunger suddenly visits him, he may even ask to be held in his arms between regular breastfeedings. In this case, you can give breast (or formula) unplanned, which will help calm both the baby and the mother.
2. Intestinal colic . One of the most common reasons that prompts children aged 3 to 4 months to constantly ask to be held by their mother is their request for help in. The baby’s intestines at this age are not yet mature enough, so artificial mixtures and even breast milk can cause gas accumulation in the tummy and colic. In this case, you can relieve the child from discomfort by using dill water and special medications, as well as calm the baby by carrying him in your arms.
3. Wet diaper . Another common cause can be a wet butt. They can’t always give the baby a feeling of dryness and calm. Again, the mother will have to do this, not only by changing the child’s diaper to a dry and fresh one, but also by carrying her child in her arms.
4. The child is cold . A newborn may want to be held when he is not warm enough. By periodically checking the baby's legs, the mother will be able to feel when it is time to dress him warmly, and also to carry him, holding him close and warming him with warmth. own hands and bodies.
5. Fatigue and fear . Less common reasons Due to which the child strives to be held more often both during the day and before bedtime, fatigue and fear may occur. IN in this case the mother will have to be attentive to determine this intuitively and carry her beloved baby in her arms to calm her down.

Pediatric doctors and psychologists argue that if childbirth occurred naturally and not with the help caesarean section, the baby was born full term and had no serious problems with health, and all of the above factors are excluded, he is unlikely to become capricious often and experience a constant excessive need to be in his mother’s arms.

Some children under one year of age require to be carried almost all day at home and outside. If this situation is repeated day after day for more than one month, then this can greatly tire the mother and deplete her physical and emotional strength. A few tips below will help mothers wean their children from being held at home, on the street, or at a party.

1. The child asks to be held at home. Introduce your baby to the interesting world around him so that you can prepare dinner and do other household chores. Developmental mats will help with this, musical toys that will interest the child and distract his attention. In this situation, you should not get angry with the baby, but you need to carefully switch his attention to an object that is interesting to him.
2. The baby demands to be held at a party. If a baby asks to be held at a party, he should show firmness and not react to whims at first. Switch your baby's attention to other people, encourage his desire to play and communicate with them.
3. The baby wants to be held on the street. Use distractions to encourage your child to walk independently. For example, give him new toy, draw his child’s attention to cats, birds, and other children who meet along the way. Here again it is better to show strength of character so that the child understands that there is no point in constantly asking to be held.

How to wean your child from motion sickness before bed?

If according to various reasons the child is accustomed to being rocked to sleep, then parents will have to make a lot of effort to wean the baby from this ritual before bed. The following tips will help mothers and fathers of children of different ages:

1. Replace carrying your baby in your arms with other methods . Before going to bed, try to start rocking the baby in his crib, pick him up only when he starts crying and worrying a lot, otherwise he will quickly understand how he can manipulate you. There are others day and night without motion sickness.
2. Buy a pendulum-type crib . Modern cribs are of this type that can be rocked not by tilting the cradle, but by moving the upper part. In these cribs, babies will be able to quickly fall asleep.
3. Place your baby next to you in your bed. After all, for most children, it is not the process of being carried and rocked in their arms that is important, but the presence of their mother nearby. If you also put some toy or interesting object nearby that will distract his attention, and also stroke the baby (patting the butt or stroking the head), then you can achieve good results.
4. Read before bed. If your child does not tend to have evening tantrums before getting ready for bed, you can read a book out loud while placing your baby in your bed. But after he falls asleep, you should definitely carefully transfer him to a crib, otherwise he may get used to falling asleep only with his parents, and then he will have to in the future.
5. Don't hand train again . When you manage to wean your baby from falling asleep without being rocked to sleep in your arms, under no circumstances teach him to fall asleep again. This applies to many inexperienced young mothers who want to put their baby to bed as quickly as possible.

How to wean a child under 1 year old from motion sickness before bedtime?

If we talk about weaning children of different ages from motion sickness in their arms, then up to a year it is somewhat easier to do this. It is worth stocking up on patience and nerves. If the baby is on breastfeeding , then most often he falls asleep during feeding. After this, the mother will just need to quietly transfer him to the crib. You cannot carry a child in your arms while sleeping, thereby accustoming him to holding hands.

If the baby is bottle-fed and then he may not have time to fall asleep for short term feeding. In this case, when the mixture runs out, it is necessary to transfer him to a crib or stroller and rock him. Even if the baby whines a little, be patient, do not disturb the rocking rhythm, and he will definitely fall asleep.

Modern techniques for weaning yourself from motion sickness in your arms before bed

There are scientific modern methods, allowing you to help your child go to bed peacefully without rocking in your arms.

Ferber method

The essence of the Ferber method is to decide not to put the child to sleep using rocking, think over a plan of action and not commit rash actions. To do this, you should remove the bottles and pacifiers, lay the baby down and kiss him, leave the room, pause, even if the child is a little naughty. You can enter only so that the child understands that he has not been abandoned, but at the same time do not pick him up, calm him down and leave again for 5 minutes. On the second day, when going to bed, you need to leave the child alone in the room for 10 minutes; in subsequent days, this pause is gradually increased.

Hand weaning using the Spanish method

The Spanish method of laying down without motion sickness is somewhat similar to the Ferber method. It consists of teaching the child to sleep without the presence of adults, that is, developing the habit of going to bed with the help of a toy, a pacifier, but without the mother. This will require patience, confidence and a desire to teach the child to fall asleep without the help of hands, songs, reading fairy tales, and so on.

Under what circumstances is it better to postpone weaning?

When planning to wean your baby off your hands, be sure to take into account that there are situations when this should not be done.

Don’t start weaning your baby off your hands:

1. If the child is sick . In such difficult periods In the life of a baby, he simply needs to be in his mother’s arms more often, because this brings relief to the child and promotes a quick recovery.
2. When the baby is teething. At this time the child demands special attention because he is experiencing severe discomfort. Therefore, during this period, the baby must be held in his arms to comfort and ease his pain.

If you are patient and apply the above tips, you will gradually be able to wean your child from rocking before bed and from holding hands.

When the baby cries, adults take him in their arms and begin to rock him, holding him close. These actions are intuitive, they seem to be written down somewhere in the subcortex. After some time, the child calms down and begins to snore peacefully, falling into sleep. He feels good and calm. If this is so, why do parents strive to wean off motion sickness? And when is this not only possible, but also necessary to do? Let's figure it out.

Cons of motion sickness

Let's start with the main thing. What pushes adults to wean children from this seemingly natural way falling asleep?

• Child early age grows quickly and gains weight. It’s one thing to pump up 2–4 “kilograms of happiness,” and quite another thing to pump up 8–10. This is harmful to the mother's health, especially the spine.
• Motion sickness requires a lot of time, which could be spent on sleep, rest, business, or your beloved husband. This is harmful not only to the health of the mother, but also to psychological climate in family.
• There is an opinion that children who are accustomed to motion sickness develop sleep disturbances: it becomes intermittent, restless and superficial. In addition, the child loses the ability to fall asleep on his own.
• Motion sickness is very difficult to wean off, which creates additional difficulties for parents.

Despite the obvious disadvantages, motion sickness has its advantages:

• Development of the vestibular apparatus while maintaining a calm but constant rhythm (it is worth noting that energetic swinging or an erratic pace, on the contrary, is harmful and causes dizziness).
• Light motion sickness calms the baby, gives a feeling of comfort and security.
• You can comfort your baby and help him fall asleep in almost any place and environment.
• This is a good help to get through difficult moments in a child’s life (illness, teething, stress).
• In the process, not only the child, but also the mother calms down.

What to remember before weaning

Breaking ingrained habits requires patience and timing. Unfavorable points are:

• teething;
• vaccinations;
• illnesses and illnesses;
• changes in usual lifestyle;
• nervous stress.

Parents should be prepared for the following:

• Most likely, the baby will resist. And that's absolutely normal. He will cry, show dissatisfaction with all his appearance and demand that everything be returned to normal.
• Weaning takes a lot of time. Usually it takes at least 2 weeks. If it becomes easier every day and the child gets used to falling asleep without motion sickness, then the parents have chosen the right tactics. If the result cannot be achieved, perhaps the wrong method or the wrong moment was chosen. Or maybe the child is simply not ready yet, and you need to try again later (in 1-2 months). The main thing is to remember that you cannot suddenly change the conditions for falling asleep. Smoothness and delicacy are the best you can choose.

During the weaning period, all family members need:

• aim for results;
• act in concert;
• do not make concessions and do not respond to provocations;
• at the same time, do not allow violence towards the child (neither psychological, nor especially physical);
• always remember that the main objective- rid the child of a not very useful habit and make him more independent.

All activities should be aimed at benefiting him. He will get used to it, sleep more peacefully and get better sleep.

Suitable age for weaning

The best option is not to teach motion sickness at all. But even those who consciously strived for this from the very beginning do not always succeed. The reasons can be very different. For example, in the first months of a child’s life, colic is often tormented. To make it easier for him, mothers often take their babies in their arms, press their tummy to their belly and rock them a little.

Thus, the child gets used to it quickly and almost always unnoticed. If this happens, it is best to make the first attempts to combat motion sickness at 6–8 months. In children under six months of age, weaning can be very severe stress and will not lead to the desired result.

If parents are not ready to wean so early, considering that it is too hard for the baby, experts advise postponing the process until the age of about 1.5 years. At this time, children become more conscious and new order perceived with inner readiness.

Weaning techniques

1st method. The whole process is divided into 2 stages. First, you need to wean your child from motion sickness in your arms. To do this, you need to start placing the baby in a cradle or pendulum-type crib and rock it slightly.

The toddler, of course, will initially show dissatisfaction and anxiety, communicating this by crying. The important thing here is not to pick him up right away. Instead, mom can gently stroke him, talk affectionately, or sing a lullaby. The baby should feel the presence of his mother nearby. After a while he will fall asleep, although the bedtime will take longer than before.

7–14 days are usually enough for the child to stop being afraid of falling asleep in the crib. When this happens, you can move on to the next step - weaning off rocking in the crib. This stage is easier because the baby is now much less attached to his mother’s arms and is prepared to fall asleep on his own.

To make him feel calmer, you can:

• leave something with mom's scent in the crib - a T-shirt or nightgown, put your favorite toy;
• give a pacifier (if the baby is used to it);
• sing a lullaby without rocking the crib.

First, the baby will need to feel the presence of his mother nearby and hear her voice. After a week or two, you can try to leave the room immediately after going to bed. Some children feel more comfortable and safe when illuminated by a night light. Or when parents play lullabies at low volume. It’s worth a try, and the child himself will choose the conditions in which he feels comfortable.

2nd method. If your baby hasn't fallen asleep at all before mother's hands, you can teach him to sleep in a stroller while walking. You should go outside when the child has had enough of playing and wants to relax. This way he will get used to laying down without hands during the day, and eventually in the crib at night.

3rd method. It’s worth trying to rock your little one to sleep on a pillow at a leisurely pace. Soon the pace can be slowed down, and then the baby can be placed simply on a pillow (but for now held in your arms). Then the pillow with the child can be immediately placed on his sleeping area. You may need to hold your baby's hand while doing this. And only after a while the pillow is removed and the baby is immediately placed in the crib.

4th method. When rocking in your arms, you can give a small plush toy. Then, after a few days, start putting the child to bed with this toy, but in the crib. He won't be so scared and lonely alone.

5th method. Do everything to make the little one love being in the crib: pleasant bed sheets, soft warm blanket, toys, multi-colored mobile. The child will be distracted by all this, and soon sleep will overcome him.

6th method. Lie down on your own and place the baby next to you on your arm. Pat your back or butt and quietly hum songs. Monotony and mother's warmth will lull him to sleep.

7th method. Place the baby on the bed next to you and try to show and read books before bed, patting or stroking the baby on the back or shoulder.

It is impossible to predict which method will suit a particular child. It depends on his character and temperament, interests and preferences, strength of habit, depth of connection with his mother and many other factors. Trying and monitoring the reaction is the only way to success.

What actions will help you get used to the new conditions of falling asleep?

• Spend your waking hours actively and interestingly. This not only promotes development. From large quantity new information The kids get tired and bedtime becomes easier.
• Be in the fresh air shortly before bedtime. After a walk you want to take a nap, especially if it was intense.
• A hearty dinner guarantees that the child will not wake up in an hour from hunger. And a well-fed child falls asleep better.
• Massage is good for physical development and tires the baby, like exercise.
• Baths with soothing herbs (lemon balm, chamomile, motherwort, mint, valerian) will have a sedative effect and help you get ready for sleep.
• Maintaining a daily routine: the child should want to sleep by the time he goes to bed. And if he dozed a couple of hours ago, it is unlikely to pass without problems.

Nothing helps? Then, most likely, the child is not ready yet, and you need to postpone the attempt until a more appropriate time. This happens sometimes. Parents need to understand the following: if the current situation suits both them and the child and does not cause any concerns, then nothing needs to be changed. Public opinion should not affect the way of life of a particular family (if this is the only issue). The child’s psyche will mature, and then 2 scenarios are possible:

• or the mother will feel that the baby is ready to fall asleep in the crib on his own, and all that remains is to gently push him to do so;
• or he will clearly make this clear by his behavior: he will ask to go to bed, point his finger at it and break free from his hands, instantly falling asleep when he finds himself in his sleeping place.

All you need to do is be attentive and understand your child. Then motion sickness will no longer be a problem.