Awake for hours in middle of night

[girlmummy25]

Hey,

When my DD wakes in the night and I give milk she almost never went straight back to sleep - this has been the case since she was a tiny baby. At 7 months I sleep trained doing controlled crying in the middle of the night (she fell asleep fine at the start of the night) and it worked within 3 nights and her waking in the night reduced massively.

She is now 16 months but a few times a week for the past month or so she has been waking in the night and its like she just cannot get back to sleep! She will be awake from anything from 1 hour up to 2.5 hours. Shes not crying when im holding her but if I put her in her cot she will be quiet for 20 mins then start crying again. Its not every night either so im confused.

Her room is pitch black, its warm enough, shes well fed & falls asleep in cot from being awake when tired. What can I do or is it time for another round of controlled crying?

[Dillybear]

I don’t have much advice I’m afraid, my baby is much younger than yours and I’m an FTM. Though at 16 months I’m guessing she’s down to one nap? If not, maybe she’s getting too much day sleep? It might help others if you include information about her routine as possibly a few tweaks could help with the long wakings. But hopefully this bumps your post at least.

I am here on the sleep board a lot because my DD isn’t the best sleeper, and it’s a bit of an ongoing project... I was hoping you could tell me a bit more about what happened when you did CC for night wakings, if I’m not being too cheeky! What you wrote about your DD at seven months really resonated with me. My DD is eight months and sometimes when she wakes at night it can take hours for her to go back to sleep, even though she self settles at the start of sleep, and often goes straight back to sleep after a feed. The long wake ups are such a killer, and it can take a good few days of ‘just’ couple of quick wake ups a night to recover after a bad patch of that. I really feel for you now you’re going through it all again.

Just wondering what you did when you did CC? Did you feed her and then do it? Did you offer water? And what changed about her waking? Did she wake just as often or only if there was a ‘problem’ (teeth, illness etc)?

[girlmummy25]

@Dillybear yeah i offered her milk first then as soon as she finished id make sure her milk had gone down then put her back in her cot and started the controlled crying with intervals getting longer, dont think I ever went past 10 mins and if she was hysterical i would pick her up and comfort then back in cot (a lot of people say dont pick up at all but if she was too upset i just had to)
The first 2 nights were bad and it took 2 hours but she wasnt constantly crying for that time it was on and off. Next night was about 2 hours again but less crying. 3rd night around an hour and minimal crying then she slept through.

[Dillybear]

Thanks for sharing your experiences. I’m going to give it a try with my DD. You would think that self settling to sleep should mean that we wouldn’t have to do this! I hope last night was a little better with your DD.

[Sexnotgender]

Is she teething?

[girlmummy25]

@Sexnotgender possibly! Her bottom 2 molar are through but she doesnt seem in pain as she stops crying as soon as I pick her up... she just seems like she cant get back to sleep

[Sexnotgender]

Maybe try some calpol. Molars are a bugger!

[girlmummy25]

Bumping incase anyone else has this.

So she is now waking in the middle of the night and rolling around for an hour with the odd moan but then after an hour she must be so bored or annoyed that she cant get back to sleep that she will cry for me. Im not offering milk anymore and havent done for about 2 weeks. But even with me cuddling her she still takes another hour to fall asleep so ends up being awake for a total of around 2 hours!

Happening a few times a week

[icebubbles]

My baby is 18 months and does this when teething. Calpol usually does the trick. He's obviously been night weaned for ages but sometimes if we're all shattered and he won't go back to sleep one of us will give him a bottle of milk and that always does the trick x

[WinWinnieTheWay]

Is she stimulated enough in the day?

My 5 years old wakes in the night for a couple of restless hours if she hasn't had enough fresh air and exercise. It's like having a dog!

[FiresideTreats]

I knew from your thread title should would be around this age. We went through the same, as did other posters and people on various FB groups I'm in. All I can tell you is it does eventually pass. Mine used to thrash around as if he had restless legs for hours - he wanted to be asleep but just couldn't. It lasted about a month I'm very sorry to say and we were walking zombies.

It stopped as quickly as it started and he sleeps through again now.

[girlmummy25]

Thanks everyone, sometimes you feel like your child is the only child doing these things so its reassuring to hear others have done this