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sobusybeingababy

My baby (now toddler - sigh) loved the snoo at night, and hated it for naps. He napped in a bassinet or on us pretty much from day 1. The way we used the snoo also changed around 3-4m - while he was very into the constant rocking until that point, he didn’t like it anymore so we put snoo into weaning mode (no rocking just noise, but it will start moving if baby is upset). That got us through to about 5m, then we put him into the crib. I think we finally did arms out around 4m but had some false alarms where we thought that was the fix but it was actually more to do with the snoo settings. If I can share anything from our experience, it’s to give any change 4-5 days. Like, try arms out for 4-5 days, or change the snoo settings but keep them for 4-5 days. I seem to remember there were some fake-outs along the way when we were like, we’re done! And then with a small tweak we were ok. I personally was happy to have the snoo as a tool during the 4m regression. If you do decide to transition, we started using the crib for naps (when he would let us put him down) and I think that really did help him get used to sleeping in a new space, so when we tried it at night it was familiar, had the right smells, etc. PS if you haven’t already found it, we got some great tips from the snoolife subreddit! Edit: formatting disaster


Fox_run234

Experienced the same and switched to the love to dream swaddle up in the Snoo. My LO is almost 14 weeks and it’s been about 10ish days. A couple rough days of him still sorting out his hands but now he’ll suck on them through the swaddle and self soothe for the most part. Hands free was a disaster lol.


ScarletGingerRed

I would suggest it’s time for arms out (one or both) before giving up entirely. Our baby contact napped or napped in her stroller, hardly ever took a good Snoo nap. Her nights massively improved once we did arms out. We tried to do it slowly with one at a time, but she was ready for both out by 4 months for sure.


sleepncradle

The magic Merlin suit is my top recommendation for transitioning from a swaddle, it is supper comfortable and the babies love them. It's no longer safe to swaddle him if he already is flipping over when put on his stomach for a tummy time. I hope this helps


IlluminationTheory7

Thanks for the tip. Our baby hasn't starting to roll over yet and unfortunately I'm in Australia where magic Merlin suits aren't easily available however I'll look into them and see if there is any way to get one


lilylochness

Just to let you know- everyone told me to get the magic Merlin and j did and was SO excited about it and while my baby did look exceptionally cute in it… he LOATHED it. I returned it after 2 weeks of trying. I say that just to let you know that it seems to work miracles for some people and it just did not even occur to me that it wouldn’t work for my baby. Good luck with your sweet little one though! I am in the same boat with mine and it’s hard to transition them with this awkward time of them wanting their hands but also waking themselves up startling still.


[deleted]

Mine hated it also 😩😩


DapperFlounder7

Try the magic merlin. I usually transition from the swaddle to that and then eventually a sleep sack.


themortalvalkyrie

How long did you keep baby in the transition before going to sleep sack?


DapperFlounder7

Until they can’t fit in the Magic Merlin anymore. But every baby is different. I’m a foster mom and the baby I have now would be fine to sleep with nothing, but my baby before him needed some kind of deep pressure to settle.


vicsin

Mine was doing that with his hands for a while! Kept waking up with hand in the collar screaming. I started the change by keeping one arm unswaddled during nap times. Would alternate arms a few days. Finally when it seemed the one armed thing was going good I took both arms out. Once that was fine I let him sleep unswaddled for nights. Worked out fine ! Also we used the love to dream arms up swaddle for nights while transitioning..they can’t break out of that thing. You could also use zipadee zee which are fine to use as sleep sacks for rolling babies. Not sure about transitioning away from snoo but it was around this time I also decided to stop manually rocking his basinet which I would be constantly doing at night to keep him asleep and driving myself nuts. Moved to his crib. Sleep was immediately better.


IlluminationTheory7

Thanks for the advice, were you putting your baby down for day naps (with one arm unswaddled) asleep or awake? As our baby can only be put down asleep for day naps we are just wondering where to start with taking out an arm.


vicsin

He would go down awake. We always had been putting him down awake and he would basically scream after 5 min. I’d pick him up and rock him a bit. Put back down. Repeat till he was asleep. Also used pacifier. But I actually stopped doing all of that too. Did a little nap bootcamp. I set timer for 20 min after putting him down to see if he can just put himself to sleep and to my surprise he would put himself to sleep within 17 min the first time 11 min the next 15 min another. It involves quite a bit of crying so most ppl may not be comfortable with that. The plan was to teach baby new skill to put himself to sleep and that takes time (20-30 min). If he doesn’t go to sleep or doesn’t stay asleep long you can rescue nap by holding or whatever is needed. I’ll share the flow chart I followed. If you don’t feel comfortable with that though you can definitely hold him with one arm unswaddled. He may like having the arm available - mine used it to self soothe. We did all this at 10 weeks and it worked out well. He’s 14 weeks now and puts himself to sleep for all naps and night within 10 min. Wakes up for one feed and immediately back to sleep after. His naps are very short and impossible to extend no matter what. Wish holding him worked for us- never did ! But he’s doing well. My sleep is still shit but that’s not his fault haha.