Periodic screaming self to sleep at 14 months - normal??

[Sikorsky27]

Just feel better to know I'm not alone on this one! Or am I??

DS is 14 months old and generally a very happy content boy. Wasn't at the start - for the first 3 months LOTS of crying (colic and reflux) - but generally a good boy now. Doesn't go through the night - only on the very odd occasion. We have to put dummy in during night at least once or twice. This is on a good night, but will sleep with one or two of our visits, from 7.15pm to 7.00am.

However, every few weeks we have several nights of him screaming himself to sleep. We have tried soothing, picking up, rocking, chair routine etc etc but seems to make him more angry, or, he stops and tries to engage you by talking or grabbing at you. Plus he is freakishly strong and when I sit with him in the chair to calm him he throws himself about I can hardly hold him. So we tend to leave him in cot to sort himself out, going in regularly to check he's not sat / stood up, lost dummy, comforter etc.

He takes over 45 mins to an hour to give in. Is this normal? It is full blown screaming too.

Why do we have lovely bedtimes some weeks and then 5 or 6 nights of this?? (this week it has coincided with MMR jab, but normally there is no obvious reason).

Been a bad one tonight and hate leaving him to cry himself to sleep, but nothing else seems to work. We do the same routine religiously every night too. "Night Garden", then bath, then bottle, then bed, so there is nothing different I can think of.

Help! Thanks

[LoveBeingAMummy]

Yeah we get that sometimes, also sometimes will just scream in the middle of the nght for a min, we have a video monitor and shes still lying down and trying to suck her thumb at the same time

[Cavs]

Could it be teething? My dd is now 18 months and has always been a pretty poor sleeper. However, when she's teething (and that could be weeks before any teeth actually appear but obviously stuff is happening under the gums) we often get days of her screaming at bedtime and nothing seems to pacify her, then once the tooth is through she goes back to settling herself no problem. Not much help I know but could you try putting on some calgel/teething powders and see whether that might help?

[Sikorsky27]

Hi - thanks for replies. Nights like this I give teething gel and granules routinely but doesn't seem to make a difference! He was a different boy tonight during his milk - much calmer - but still 40 mins screaming! Hate it.

Cavs - what do you do whilst the screaming is going on? Do you try to soothe or do you leave her to it?

Thanks

[blowninonabreeze]

Could he be over tired? We used to get cycles like this with DD1. If she hadn't napped well during the day she'd be totally over-wrought by bed time. Became a cycle.

[Sikorsky27]

Maybe blown, but today had a 2 1/2 hour sleep, so that was a good day. Altho he has been poorly with MMR jab so maybe it is all catching up with him..... its getting on top of it tho. We tried putting him to bed earlier tonight, but no luck!

[hairymelons]

Hi, have you tried painkillers alongside the granules? We've tried everything with our DS (and MIL is a homeopath so we've had expert advice there) but the only thing that will help when he's bad is baby paracetamol or ibuprofen. I sort of hate giving it to him but when I see the relief it gives him I feel like it's the right thing to do.
I suppose at this age he could just be protesting at going to bed but if it's off and on like that it sounds like teething could be the culprit. Do you think he sounds like he's in pain or just pissed off it's bedtime? Any other teething signs?
Also, possibly no use to you but we just changed our bedtime routine a bit. It was exactly the same as yours but a couple of weeks ago we changed to bath then Night Garden/ quiet play before going upstairs. It just lengethened the routine enough to get DS good & relaxed before bed.

[Sikorsky27]

Thanks hairymelons (!) - had actually thought the other day about swapping the tv and bath round. When and where does yours have milk? Downstairs whilst watching Night Garden, or back up in room after?

Tried pain relief. We use Medinol (which is sugar and colour free paracetamol) as the e numbers in Calpol seemed to make him more wired! But it doesn't really make much difference, unfortunately. Never has. Even Medised doesn't work on our boy!

I think it is probably a combination of teething, growth spurt, and over tiredness - and this time the effects of MMR jab thrown in for good measure too!

Thanks for all your advice x

[hairymelons]

DS is still BF but to keep bedtime the same we always give a bottle of cows milk & watch night garden downstairs after bath.
When he looks sleepy we put him in his sleeping bag, say 'time for night nights' and go upstairs. If DH is doing bedtime, they take the remainder of the bottle and he has that the rocking chair. If I'm doing bedtime we still take the bottle but he bats it away and lunges at my chest! So it's a BF then sleep.
One day we hoping it'll be just a beaker of milk downstairs. Still working on that one...