She'll only sleep with the hair dryer on!

[saffrongirl]

Of course I'm grateful she's sleeping at all but I feel like we should nip this "habit" in the bud. She's almost four months old and I put her to bed in her crib by 8 and then bring her to bed with us when she wakes up next. Without the hair dryer on, she'll wake up within a half hour. With it on, she doesn't wake up until midnight or 1AM. So what do I do? It really isn't convenient to leave the dryer on - it's disruptive to the rest of the household because of where her crib is located. Is there a somewhat comparable "white noise" machine that would be a little more calm? Or some way to wean her off the dryer in the first place?

[Abraisme]

A white-noise machine, static on the radio or a box fan should all work. My DD liked static, the stove fan or the vibration on her bouncy seat until she was around 4mo. She just slowly stopped needing these things to sleep all by herself. If it comforts your baby, do it, it won't last forever.

[kdescalzi]

Homedics brand sells really cheap white noise machines at Walmart and places like that. Also there are a lot of cd's on the market that play soothing white noise or womb like sounds....just put your player on repeat. If it helps your lo sleep I would not worry about it. Our whole family sleeps with some sort of background noise to lull us to sleep. It is definately not a bad "habit" but something your lo got used to hearing inside you. HTH

[JMJ]

I know somebody who downloaded a hair dryer noise... I think off of iTunes and are slowly weaning their baby off of it by adjusting the volume.

[wanderinggypsy]

LOL, hairdryers suck a lot of power (and could be a fire hazard)!! Get a white noise machine for sure!

[saffrongirl]

Originally Posted by wanderinggypsy

LOL, hairdryers suck a lot of power (and could be a fire hazard)!! Get a white noise machine for sure!

Well we do put it on the cool setting so it's definitely not hot but you're right about the power suckage. I'll look into the white noise machine/cd. Thanks!

[mommy2two babes]

We got a noise machine for DS2 and I think I like it better than him.
There is a thunderstorm sound that really help relax me to sleep.
Not a bad habit IMO

[kdescalzi]

I wanted to add that on the website for Colic Calm is a link to noise machines and cd's. They actually have a hair dryer cd

[marispel]

We got a white noise machine (homedics) and put it on the loudest setting and put it right near the top of DS head. We swaddled as well. He loved it. We used a co-sleeper and then at 7 weeks moved him into his own room. For all his naps and bedtime we used the white noise.

[saffrongirl]

Originally Posted by kdescalzi

I wanted to add that on the website for Colic Calm is a link to noise machines and cd's. They actually have a hair dryer cd

That is too funny! Lol!

[Addie]

We got this white noise CD as a gift... It's one track, an hour of white noise. It sounds kind of like a hair dryer, or like being on an airplane. We put the track on an old iPod, docked it on an iPod-compatible clock radio, and put it on repeat. Works like a charm.

[perl]

After burning through 2 hairdryers (and worrying constantly about the fire hazard) we downloaded something off of iTunes (I think the album is Lullaby Land).

I eventually switched to the extractor fan noise b/c it wasn't as high pitched as the hair-dryer noise. DH used garage band to lengthen the track so it was longer than 5 min. Other than losing my time-gauge, it's worked out great! People who come over are always like "what is that weird noise?!?"

[mrstanimal]

My DS would only sleep with the vacuum running for the first 4 months of his life. We eventually downloaded a vacuum sounds CD. I saw a hairdryer one as well. He then moved onto The Happiest Baby On The Block CD, which features --along with other white noise selections--a hairdyer ! Now it's ocean waves, which is definitely my favorite !

[russsk]

Ds likes to sleep with white noise (and so do I) so we do a window fan when it's warm and white noise on the ipod when it's cool. I prefer the ipod to a white noise machine because the speakers were inexpensive and we can use it to play music, books, etc. during the day.