Help - 11mo waking every hour. I'm losing my sanity

[HollyFP]

Last night was the worst night of DD's night-waking on record, almost every hour...won't settle without bf or rocking to sleep. Now for some reason she isn't happy coming into our bed either, so I can't even bf her half asleep.
It seems when she rolls over she ends up on her hands and knees so then half gets up without wanting to.
I thought I was about to lose it last night :(

DH has started talking about 'sleep clinics' based on a friend's advice who was told to do CC by such a place. I am so anti-CC it makes me sick just to think about it. I'm reading the No Cry Sleep Solution but we are barely started with it, I'm not sure I can continue with nights like this for the weeks/months it takes to do her process.

Is there anything else I can try? DD won't accept DH in the night any more , so he can't even help out there.

[MarshaBrady]

Masses of sympathy. I had this and it was destroying. Ds is still a bad sleeper some nights. But every hour was horrendous.

The only thing that helped slightly was disengaging bf with falling back to sleep. How bad is it when your dh does the initial put to sleep? If he can do this rather than bf'ding it may help.

We were at our wits end, and even crying didn't solve it so we just kept him in our bed so at least we didn't have to get up and still be half asleep.

Maybe try and crack it with your dh doing i? there may be some tears but you are not leaving her.

[MollysChamber]

Bluntly you either get up to her or you don't.

If you're anti-CC then you're going to continue to have nights of broken sleep as she can't self-settle. She cries and you go to her to comfort her, hence she now needs you to settle her. The objective of CC is to encourage self-settling which would be better for DD in the long run as these nights of broken sleep can't be good for her either.

[HollyFP]

Molly I don't want to enter into a debate about CC. I am against the technique so I need to find an alternative.

[MollysChamber]

I don't want to debate it either. Nothing to debate as far as I'm concerned.

Just pointing out that in my experience it works and as far as I am aware there is no other technique. Sorry if that is not what you want to hear.

I sympathise with your predicament.

[MarshaBrady]

Holly get your dh to do it. Your dd will learn to fall asleep with him and not bfding.

[HollyFP]

Marsha thanks we will try that after this week (dh working late this week).
DD has yet another cold which isn't helping, she wakes herself up just as she's fallen asleep as she can't breathe through her nose very easily. As if we didn't have enough to fight against

[MollysChamber]

If she has a cold raising the head end of her cot may help.

Those karvol room things are supposed to be good too.

[MarshaBrady]

Oh yes our issue was slight sleep apnoea so problems with breathing would mean learnt to sleep on me as a newborn. Issues continued. Didn't feel good to leave him to fend for himself in the night. It's tough I know.

[HollyFP]

Hmm the Karvol plug in made her worse I'll have to get the nose-sucker out again...not her favourite thing!
Is this normal though? I know it's not unusual but trying to convince DH we dont need a 'sleep clinic' isn't easy when we've both had awful/no sleep for weeks now.

[MollysChamber]

I wouldn't say it's not normal but every hour at 11 months is very wakeful.

One of mine suffered from sleep apnoea and had tonsils and adenoids out at three (which stopped it). Bizarrely she slept through from very early on. That was just her nature though. Could self settle and as I had previously had one that struggled with that I did everything I could to make sure she didn't lose the knack!

Vicks or similar on her chest? Not sure what age Vicks is from but there is a baby alternative.

[sedgiebaby]

Hi Holly, would you be comfortable with the approach outlined in this article, there is crying but doesn't involve leaving baby alone. www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/features/article729117.ece?token=null&offset=0&page=1

I'm anti cc too but see the point that sleep is also critical for babies development/well-being not to mention mums sanity. To be honest IMO when you change what you have been doing for so long baby is certainly going to cry and protest because the dont understand the change. There is a difference for me in staying with baby rather than leaving her to cry. I cant help but think a child would close down even just a little if left howling alone in the dark, suddenly no longer 'important' enough for mum to attend.

Also towards the back of the NCSS there is a section on techniques for those who are a bit more desperate (you are right most of her stuff is a bit 'slow burn') a friend is borrowing my copy so cant tell you the page no...

[MollysChamber]

I think it's important to remember that there is a world of a difference between "howling alone in the dark" and half asleep grumbling. I certainly wouldn't leave a child howling alone in the dark but I would use controlled crying in order to get them used to self settling.

Something else that occured to me - I realised with DD2 that sometimes when she was tired and cried, in fact often, what she wanted was to be put down and left in peace. Looking back I wonder if that isn't what DD1 needed as well. I was so preoccupied with trying to comfort her that it didn't occur to me that wasn't what she wanted. Not sure that this is relevant to OP as her baby is much older and probably into a pattern of learned behaviour now but just one of those things that I wish I'd realised earlier.