Nearly 4month old waking every hour after initial long stretch

[TopKittyKat]

Hello wise mumsnetters,

Please offer a FTM some help. My little one was initially a good sleeper waking just 1 or 2 times a night for a feed.

She is now waking after her initial first long stretch of sleep every hour. What do I do to help her sleep better?

She goes to bed 6pm-7pm. I rock/bounce her to sleep and normally have to resettle her three times at 20 min intervals until she's properly asleep. She will then sleep until 12.30am/1am/1.30am when she wakes for a feed.

From then onwards she wakes every hour. She's been pooing at about 3am/4am and so I end up having to do a nappy change which wakes her up and then I end up bringing her into our bed and feeding her to sleep so we can just get some sleep.

So, what's going on? I don't always feed her when she wakes hourly. How can I get back to her just waking once or twice a night?

It may or may not be relevant but she's just learnt to roll from back to front.

Help us to get more sleep...

TIA

[HT85]

It definitely sounds like the 4 month sleep regression! Have a look into it. Mine would sleep 8-1am but not is very unsettled in the evenings and then woke every 45 minutes - it lasted two weeks. It was exhausting but it does pass! Hang in there x

[TopKittyKat]

Thanks HT85

So do I just sit it out and she'll revert to her old sleeping patterns?

I was a bit worried about her getting used to coming into bed with me in the early hours.

[HT85]

I am not the best person to advise on that as I bedshare anyway, but I put my daughter in the cot first until first night waking. Sometimes that's midnight, but recently she did a 4am! So I don't really believe anything causes a habit

[ClearHeartsGreyFlowers]

Unfortunately, normal! 4 months was the worst. My DS woke up just as you're describing. Do what you need to, don't worry about any "bad habits". I was on my knees at 4 months but at 2.5 months that baby I slept with, sang to, rocked and fed now waves me off at 7.30 and sleeps til 8am. It's just a phase - one of the worst, and it'll pass.

[FATEdestiny]

I was a bit worried about her getting used to coming into bed with me in the early hours

If your hope is independant sleep (ie baby in the cot) then a sidecar cot would be a good compromise to allow for cuddles while also encouraging in-cot settling.

You can remove one side of many cots and most cotbeds to make a 3-sided cot. Wedge it up to your bed and match mattress heights and you have the cot as an extension to your bed.

When you were bringing her into be and feeding to sleep, was she staying asleep longer? Babies usually stay asleep better if they go to sleep where they stay asleep. There's no situation past newborn where moving or transferring baby once asleep is a good idea. That's the problem with rocking to sleep, baby goes to sleep in your arms then (I assume) put down once asleep or dozing.

[TopKittyKat]

Hi FATE - yes, she sleeps longer when she's cuddled up to me.

We do actually have a sidecar cot but it's about two inches lower then our bed (we have a high bed). When I say I bring her in, I actually shuffle her over from there. It's only about 30cm difference.

Normally I feed sitting up and pop her back but when I 'bring her in' I feed her laying down and she stays snuggled up on her side and goes to sleep.

[FATEdestiny]

We do actually have a sidecar cot but it's about two inches lower then our bed

Tin of tuna height? Or a brick?

Yoy couod find four sturdy things of equal height and put under the cot legs to raise the height. I used to use old VHS video cassettes.