DD has only ever slept through the night with painkillers

[Yadhap]

Expecting to get flamed by some for this but would really appreciate anyone who could help me make sense of this.

DD is 14 months old. Was a decent sleeper from birth but all went downhill at 3m and she was absolutely dreadful until 12m when she started sleeping bigger chunks each night (maybe only waking once).

We give her calpol/nurofen before bed when we think she’s teething. She has 8 teeth and currently has two molars coming through. They are halfway out but not all the way out despite the fact they first little sharp edge appeared over two months ago. She always seems to be teething - I think hers take a while to move but I’m always hesitant to blame everything on teeth.

In the last couple of months she’s slept through the night a few times but ONLY when she’s had calpol/nurofen before bed. So for example, in the last seven days she’s slept through the night after having calpol before bed but the two nights we didn’t give her anything she took ages to go to sleep and also woke in the night for 1hr and we ended up having to give her calpol to get her back down.

Can anyone help me make sense of this? Surely if she was in that much pain she’d wake again when the calpol wore off? Can teething really cause this? Or is it a complete coincidence?

I feel like I give her too much calpol. I don’t have an issue giving it to her if I know she’s in pain but if I gave it to her every night she’s teething I would have had to give it to her every night for the past two months as that is genuinely how long these molars have been coming through.

Maybe try another non-branded liquid paracetamol, as Calpol is very sweet and can create psychological addiction.

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/jun/04/why-parents-are-addicted-to-calpol

@Callardandbowser

Calpol is just paracetamol and innocuous as a medicine. Don’t beat yourself up.

This is inaccurate and extremely dangerous advice.

OP stop giving your child this much calpol. Speak to your GP for advice.

She's so young, it's very normal at this age to not sleep through. My 3.5 year old still wakes. I have never given her Calpol just to settle her. Please stop.

I honestly didn't know Calpol had a sedative effect; you live and learn

It doesn’t have a sedative effect.

O/p I’m sure there have been studied which show sweet tastes have a soothing/pain relieving effect. It’s late and cba to look for it now.

But why not try a teaspoon of sugar water or fruit juice instead? Not harmful, try it and see. Then you’d know if it actually the calpol that helps. If she has teeth and you’re worried about that sugar free juice would do, anything with the sweet taster.

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/jun/04/why-parents-are-addicted-to-calpol

Have you not tried teething powder or bonjela if its teeth causing pain these work just aswell.

Calpol does not have a sedative effect. If she's asleep after she's had it, it's because she was in pain and it was keeping her from sleeping. It's literally just the same stuff you have as adults just strawberry flavour.

I would recommend trying to get a phone appointment with your GP to talk this through.

Don't beat yourself up about the calpol you've already given, it shouldn't have done any harm, but you shouldn't carry on giving regular painkillers without getting to the route of the problem.

As a temporary solution, until you can get a GP appointment, why not try only a very small dose (maybe 1/5 of the recommend amount) to see if it is a placebo effect and more to do with the ritual of medicine giving rather than the painkilling properties. If this works, then you could try a similar non-medicated liquid (smoothie perhaps). Then you should know if she actually needs painkiller or has just developed a dependency?

Have you tried teething gel? I found that really helped. Might be a middle ground between calculations and nothing.

*calpol not calculations.

I would find her something natural with a similar taste and tell her it's Calpol. Paracetamol shouldn't be used too often.

Can your daughter fall asleep without the calpol or you? Honestly, it sounds to me like some version of sleep training her with an aid that isn’t calpol might help. My son was similar (in that calpol always made him sleep better) but only reliably slept through the night once I sleep trained him into falling asleep without a breast feed first (I did this when he was about 17 months old) and with nothing more than me singing to him then popping him in his cot with goodnight and a kiss.

If you’re going to introduce a new sleep aid though you need to do it steadily, so I introduced the singing before removing the BF for instance.

No comment on the calpol, but my DD only slept through once she was done with teething. And that was at 2.5. Could be a coincidence, but she actually did sleep through for a few months and then got her final 2 molars and since they are through she’s slept the majority of the nights for the past 6 months.

Have you tried Ashton Powders? My kids had an awful time with teething but those powders worked wonders!

As an aside my son sleeps through most nights but my daughter wakes up every single night, multiple times a night and has done since birth, 4 year old twins so they’ve had the exact same parenting, they’re just vastly different when it comes to sleeping.

Babies basically teeth for around 2 years, hence extensive use of calpol by most parents.

Of course babies sleep better when they are not in pain. It's not rocket science.

Side effects
The most common side effects of paracetamol are:

drowsiness and fatigue

no clue how so many of you think it's not a sedative when it's clearly listed as the most common side effect.

OP who ever gave you the idea that a child is suppose to sleep through the night at that age?
quit drugging her up regularly and speak to your GP.

I think many parents use calpol a lot. My parents gave me it regularly, it was for pain, and I’ve no health issues from it.
It would be worth trying a placebo but it’s going to have to be something very sweet such as a syringe full of golden syrup. Sugar water will be no where near sweet enough.
If syrup works use that for a few weeks then gradually start watering it down. If you need to give calpol in future use different brands as they all taste slightly different then she won’t have the association between the taste of calpol and sleep.

no clue how so many of you think it's not a sedative when it's clearly listed as the most common side effect.

I have just spent ten minutes googling patient information leaflets for both Calpol and adult paracetamol because I'd never heard of it causing drowsiness but I couldn't find those listed as side effects on any of the leaflets that I found.

To be honest we are in a similar boat but know it’s teething pain as there are all the signs like going mad biting things excess drool and physically seeing the teeth coming up, I worry too sometimes we are giving too much but it’s not as though we haven’t tried everything else first! In fact I feel more guilty for withholding the calpol than giving it when I think the baby needs it. My gps advice was if they need it they need it.

Has she had her ears checked for an infection? My son was a terrible sleeper, he always had ear infections. Laying down makes the pain worse so every time he slept the pain built up and woke him up. I could always tell when he was getting one as his sleep started getting disturbed.

It’s so weird so many posters think calpol has a sedative effect.

I think I’d speak to the GP. When DD2 was a toddler we had a similar situation, she was teething for what seemed like months and would only sleep through with calpol. When I eventually took her to the GP she had an ear infection, throat infection and chest infection. I felt absolutely awful. I should have got her seen before but felt guilty about wasting the GP’s time and had dismissed her discomfort as teething. I think this is why the packet says to contact the GP if symptoms persist after >3 days (you might miss an infection.) rather than because paracetamol is a dangerous drug.

I know it’s relatively easy to overdose on paracetamol, especially as it has a cumulative effect, and giving as part of a bedtime routine like BikeRunSki describes is clearly very ill advised when we can’t be sure what the long term effects are. But giving your child who is in pain pain relief is the right thing to do! Don’t feel guilty OP. No one should be flaming you.

God that’s the worst punctuated post ever! Sorry everyone.

Could you try using something that actually is inocuous like a herbal gripe water?

Idk though. My daughter is the same. Her sleep is awful but she does longer stretches if given calpol. I don't do it often because I'm not working and she's my first so I can cope with the sleeplessness for now. I think it is almost certainly placebo/ritual/something in the calpol other than the paracetamol as using suppositories doesn't seem to have the same effect...

adf.org.au/drug-facts/paracetamol/#:~:text=%20The%20most%20common%20side%20effects%20of%20paracetamol,fatigue%202%20rashes%20and%20itching.%201%20More%20