6 month old waking every 45mins

[FidgetMcGee]

I posted a week or so ago about my dd who had eventually taken a dummy after refusing for months. I was hoping this would help to get her to sleep without having to rock or comfort feed her - I pop her on, she suckles and falls asleep immediately so isn't feeding for hunger - each time she woke through the night. We're now using the dummy consistently for naps, bedtime and through the night but unfortunately things seem to have got worse. I don't think it's due to the dummy but the changes have coincided.

She's now only napping for 30-45mins at a time and last night her sleep through the night followed this pattern. She'll only nap in her buggy so yesterday I made sure that we went out about 60-90mins after she'd woken up, anticipating her next nap time. She didn't always fall asleep immediately but drifted off without crying/getting overtired. It seemed to work and we got in some decent naps through the day. Bedtime was fine and she fell asleep at about 7.30. She then woke up at 10, 11.30 and then around every 30-45mins through the night until she was awake for the day at 5.30.

I really don't know what to do. I keep reading different advice but I just can't get it to work. I know I need to give the new daytime napping/dummy routine longer? It's only been a day but I honestly thought it would give us a better night's sleep, not one that was so much worse. I think I'm struggling so much because I'd pinned all my hopes on it working, spent the day walking around to get the naps in and then last night was dreadful. This, coupled with months of bad sleep, is making it difficult to see how it's ever going to get better.

If you made it this far thank you. I didn't realise the post would be this long. Any help/advice/success stories would be hugely appreciated.

[FATEdestiny]

This sounds like a server case of unrealistic expectations.

Firstly while a dummy may help with independant sleep, it is not a Magic Wand that will make everything wonderful immediately.

Secondly, regardless of any changes you make, you nedd to allow a week or 3 or consustancy to see any improvement.

If you've never used a dummy before and then give it one night and are expecting miracles, the only thing wrong was you pinning your hopes on an immediate change.

If you have a baby with prolonged lack of sleep, exhaustion and ingrained poor sleep habits - it will take time and focused attention to change this.

My best advise would be:

• keep going
  
• have a goal or end point in mind, what are you aiming for?
  
• have realistic expectations. Baby may be 12 months plus before you get to your end-point.
  
• break the transition from where you are now, to where you want to end into small chunks. What little change could you make so you can see a small amount of progress in the next month?
  
• make life as easy as possible for yourself until you get to the end point. Cot next to your bed makes resetting easier on yourself.

[FidgetMcGee]

Thank you so much for replying Fate. I've been trying to implement your advice from a few of the other threads on here - specifically around awake time between naps as I know we were all over the place with that and overtiredness was common.

I wasn't expecting the dummy to fix everything. It has helped lots over the last week with day time naps and getting dd back to sleep without having to feed every time. I think I was expecting yesterday's nap schedule to have a positive impact on last night's sleep and when it not only didn't but we seemed to have even worse sleep I just wasn't sure if I was even doing the right thing. I didn't want to continue for a couple of weeks if I should be doing something else. I think I'm just so tired I don't know what's for the best. I feel like I can't think straight and I'm just desperate for things to improve.

Thank you so much for this advice. *

• keep going*

I can definitely do this! I just need to keep reminding myself of it. *

• have a goal or end point in mind, what are you aiming for?*

Ultimately this would be sleeping through the night but at the moment that seems so far away so I'd aim for waking twice a night and settling easily after each time. This is where we were before the 4 month regression. *

• have realistic expectations. Baby may be 12 months plus before you get to your end-point.*

That's ok. I just have to keep reminding myself that it will happen. *

• break the transition from where you are now, to where you want to end into small chunks. What little change could you make so you can see a small amount of progress in the next month?*

I think I need to write off last night as a bad one and just stick with getting the regular naps in so we are not reaching over-tiredness, and using the dummy when she wakes through the night rather than automatically feeding each time. Then further down the line I can look at getting her to nap for longer and to nap outside of a moving buggy. I can't even contemplate thinking about that yet. *

• make life as easy as possible for yourself until you get to the end point. Cot next to your bed makes resetting easier on yourself.*

We're already using one and it does make things a lot easier. My husband had suggested moving dd to her own room as she might settle better there but that would make things a lot tougher on me and I don't think it would help her at all. She just doesn't really know how to fall back to sleep so I don't see how a new room will help this.

[FidgetMcGee]

Not sure what happened to my formatting.

[TittyGolightly]

6 month development leap? She'll be getting ready to crawl soon and that takes lots of brain power.

[FidgetMcGee]

Perhaps Titty. She's been lifting her little bum up when she's on her front so I don't think it'll be long. Wonder weeks tells us we're just past one leap but might be slightly out.

[Joffmognum]

Could she be going through a sleep regression due to a developmental leap, as PP suggests? My 6 month old went through one last week. He woke up every 45-50 minutes and would only be put to sleep through breastfeeding. It felt like torture. We had to cancel all plans for the week cause I felt like a zombie.

Then it stopped as suddenly as he started, and the last couple of nights he seems to have a more mature sleeping pattern than he did before (waking twice instead of the three times he did before).

Give it a week, they rarely last longer than that. Make yourself coffee in bulk. You'll get through this alright.

[Joffmognum]

Also, I'd really recommend against putting her in another room. She won't wake up any less until this regression settles, it'll just be worse for you having to get up and walk further, and stressful for her if she's used to having you there when she wakes up.

If your husband is funding it difficult and has to be up early for work etc, could he sleep in another room for a few days? And then you could swap at the weekend if it's still going on by then, or you do one day each if it's affecting your day too. No point you both being tired :(

[Thistledew]

Might actually be worth trying her own room. My DS was not quite as bad as your DD but was waking every two hours throughout the night. We had to move him to his own room at 7 mnths as he started crawling and so wasn't safe in the bedside cot. He instantly started sleeping better and waking just once or twice in the night.

[FidgetMcGee]

Joffmognum - I really hope it's a leap as it's exceptionally bad, but we should have a better routine for naps, etc anyway so I need to make some changes. I think a week of doing very little will be very good for us.

DH sleeps in another room during the week so it's not that he's not resting. I think he's just making suggestions in the hope that something works!

He's just got back from a 1.5hr walk/nap with dd so hopefully that will help!