Non sleeping 6 month old, all advise welcome.

[bopoityboo3]

My 6 month old DS is a bad sleeper. He hardly sleeps during the day and when he does it's only on a boob or being rocked to sleep. At night he falls asleep about 7:30 on the boob. He'll then sleep for maybe two hours three if I'm lucky then wake for more milk every two to three hours trough the night until DH gets up with him at about 6am. If we held him all night I pretty sure he'd sleep more but I sleep even less if co-sleeping and he won't be comforted by DH in the night (who has tried numerous times) DS just cries louder and harder until I go take him from his dad. Any advise on how to break this pattern would be great as the minimal sleep is slowly sending Me round the bend and making me useless for elder DD and work. I'm getting so desperate I found myself looking GF books up online last night help!!

[NotAllItsCrackedUpToBe]

What about one of those side sleeping cot things that kind of attach to your bed? I only read about them after my DS was older but they could be a good alternative to co-sleeping in your bed and might allow you to sleep better.
My DS was exactly the same and he did grow out of it in the end so there is hope but you have my sympathy.

[bopoityboo3]

oo that's a good idea will defo look into one of those. Also any advice on how to get him to stop wanting so much milk through the night?

[MrsMarigold]

Put him in his own room and ditch the baby monitor, close the doors. Three days of howling you'll be sorted. Sounds harsh but a sleep trainer told me to this when I was at my wits end with DD. Ditching the baby monitor makes you listen to their cries more and learn to interpret them. We live in a big house and it isn't necessary to have a baby monitor.

[NotAllItsCrackedUpToBe]

Feed feed feed through the day. I did the Gina Ford increasing supply plan, basically tons of feeding and expressing for 2 days. It did help a bit, and DH gave an expressed bottle at about 11pm which gave me a block of sleep from 9ish til 1 or 2am.
More sleep = more milk apparently.
Think my problem was I was exhausted from never getting more than 2 /3 hours sleep at a time and therefore milk supply had dropped meaning DS was having to feed constantly to get enough.
It was hard to break the cycle but increasing supply helped.
It will get better.

[ktj88]

Just wrote this out for a very similar thread for a 5month old, please ignore if you have already heard of all this but made a massive difference for me and my DD!!

Unfortunately I have no experience with a BF baby so I'm not sure my theory is valid in this situation but the best thing I did was introduce a E.A.S.Y routine around 9 weeks (when we stopped swaddling). It's from The Baby Whisper Book by Tracey Hogg. You may have read about it or even tired it ....but it is really good for encouraging baby to not need food/comfort to go back to sleep during the night when they wake - which they WILL, it is 100% normal. By 6months they really don't require food every few hours at night, in fact I read that the heavier the baby, the more capable they are of going longer without food (not entirely sure on that but it was on a baby sleep site???)

My 17 week old DD does (E) eat, (A) activity and then when she is tired (yawning, rubbing eyes, getting fussy) I take her up to her cot, put white noise on the radio (again, HIGHLY recommended) and walk around until her eyes go droopy, then I lay her down and she falls asleep (S for sleep). It's a loose routine that she does 4 times throughout the day with the last one being 'bedtime' and then she is down for 12hours. Don't get me wrong we have our fair share of crying when I miss the cues/naps or mess around with the schedule due to baby classes or (essential!) supermarket trips but on the whole it really has changed our lives. Ignore the timings to start with if easier, just concentrate on NOT feeding baby to sleep as he will need help/comfort every time he wakes up during the night...I read online that their sleep changes a lot around 4months (regressions etc.) and they no longer have as much DEEP sleep as they did as newborn-3months so are likely to drift in and out of light and deep sleep as we do.

Best of luck with whatever you choose to do!!!!

[bopoityboo3]

Thank you all for the advise. ktj88 going to look more into the idea of E.A.S.Y. We are just starting to try DH going to him first in the night as I'm sure he doesn't need the feed in the night and that it is just comfort (he eats three solid meals a day as well as his milk so not lacking in the food department).
notall I didn't realise that about supply interesting to know - might have to try and get some naps in during half term.