To not know how to get my baby to sleep?

[AbiAbi]

9mos DS will not sleep in the evening, unless in bed with me, nursing constantly.

He is EBF and co-sleeps, until now he has slept in his cot from 7-10, but is now refusing to do this and instead screams when I put him down.

I've read 'no cry sleep solution' and it did work but now he can stand up all he does is stand and shout instead of sleeping.

I'm exhausted

AIBU not to know what to do? Should I call the HV? what books can I read. Please help me

You poor thing. My DD is 8 months + 1 week, and I don't have any advice but I wanted to offer some support.

I'm assuming he's having food now - does he have a big enough tea? Could he still be hungry? Or maybe his teeth? I've started giving DD a teething capsule before bed.

Best of luck, hopefully someone with more experience will be along soon! x

When is his afternoon nap? I find if my 8mo DD sleeps past 3pm I struggle to get her down to sleep for her 630pm bedtime.
Does he have a bedtime/wind down routine?
DD has dinner, bath, story, half hour tv, bottle , bed and works great.
Good luck.

I have used the baby whisperer in the past here. I liked the fact that it was not leaving them to cry.

It sounds like your ds has got himself into a routine and now you need to help him establish a different routine that results in him settling down to sleep. The important thing to remember is that it will take time for him to learn the new routine and the only way this will happen is if you are consistent in your behaviour with your new routine. So take some time to think about how you would like that routine to be and then do what works for you and your family. It does not have to be the same for everyone but i found what worked for us was:

• bath
• milk (breast or bottle) in bedroom
• sit and read a story
• get into bed
• tuck in - kisses
• put music and or story cd on low - lights off
• leave the room and shut the door

We had phases of them getting up and if so repeat from bed/tuck/music/lights etc!

No advice, but I empathise. I am trying some of the strategies from No Cry Sleep Solution on my 6 month old DS but we are in the same funk as you, with the cosleeping and constant nursing. Watching this thread with interest.

Thank for your responses

He does have a routine - dinner, bath, massage, feed, story bed; and it has worked brilliantly, but the last few days/weeks it has been hopeless- mnow he can stand all he does is stand using the rails of his cot and scream I adore him but its getting me down.

He is teething his top teeth horribly, should I calpol? or disregard routine during this time and let him stay up? FFS I have a 6 year old and have forgotten it all!

He doesn't have a afternoon nap QueenCee, his normal schedule is 6am wake up, 9.15-945 snooze, 12-1.30 snooze and bed at 7 (but he has now disregarded this bedtime agrement! )

Thanks Sam, I will look at that link now. Its just so hard, you thinkyou have a routine sorted and then they change it on you!

The last two nights my almost 9 month old DS2 has wailed for over an hour before sleeping. I think it is a combination of teething, sleep regression (I read about this at 9 months I think) and perhaps it is time to cut back his morning nap. Although it's lovely that he sleeps so well for the morning nap so I can browse MN get lots done, I need to start waking him sooner. I also have to bf him once in the night too. I am thinking about stopping bfing soon, but I have no idea how I'll get him back to sleep in the night without it so I think I'll have to carry on! You are not alone!

Thank you camper, when he wails do you leave him to cry it out? or pat/comfort/play music/read etc? If its a sleep regression I dont mind so much because I can reason it with myself IYSWIM, but the crying is so awful!

I've had this with both mine at a similar age. They both co-slept (sleep!) and were EBF and it was just a phase. It was really hard though and you have my sympathy. I couldn't face forcing the issue by doing any sleep training, so in the end I just went with it (bf to sleep and then sat with them for the evening).

It did pass after about a month and gradually I got my evenings back.

YANBU

I didn't have a clue how to get DS to sleep by himself (without endless rocking) and resorted to paying a sleep consultant to come and tell me how to deal with it. She was amazing!! She recommended an approach which is a mixture of controlled crying and pick-up-put-down and DS (6mo at the time) was self settling and sleeping through within a matter of days. We have used the technique again when his sleep has been disrupted by teething, holidays, clocks changing etc.

If you send me a PM I can email you the instructions if you like.

BTW DS never cried for longer than 6 mins using this approach, which is far less than the time he used to spend crying when I was rocking him!

If he is teething, definitely give calpol. It might well pass in a few days when his teeth get better.

Another thing is that when they keep standing up, cuddle them over the cot bars to comfort them, rather than picking them up or trying to get them to lie down. This worked like a charm with my DS. After 5-10 mins he just lay himself down.

Are you putting him down awake or asleep. DS1 and DS2 both nursed to sleep at that age and both went through a phase of waking and crying as soon as I put them in their cot. For a while I just went to bed when they did. They just slept beside me while I read, watched a DVD etc. It did pass quite quickly.

I would be wary of trying any sort of sleep training at this age. Babies don't understand that mummy isjust in another room.

you could try pick up put down, might be worth a try

DD did this at the same age too. It's really frustrating and tiring but I just went with it and let her drop off to sleep next to me on the sofa and then put her in her cot. She was also up about every hour and would only sleep in my lap. So I let her do it. Went on for about 4 weeks and was exhausted. But.............after this 4 week period she started going to bed well and sleeping through the night.

With regards to teething, definitely give him Calpol. Would you not give yourself pain relief if your teeth were hurting?

I tried Baby Whisperer, No Cry Sleep Solution and various other ideas on DS (now 2.10), but unfortunately never had any success.

Don't despair yet though... my DS had never slept in a crib/cot/moses basket/pram/carseat/bouncy chair/swing, since birth! That your DS has been settling well in a cot until recently means it may well be easier to restore or adapt his routine.

If however, you end up feeling the way I did: fighting a long, tiring (and losing) battle, then what worked for me was a sort of compromise. I bought a firm mattress to put on the floor in his bedroom. I would nurse lying down, then sneak away once he was asleep. When he woke up later in the night, I'd co-sleep with him, since that way both him and me got the best sleep. I still got the evenings to myself (and DH), as well as a decent 8 hrs a night.

DS no longer co-sleeps. He happily falls asleep now in his own cot bed, after I've read him a book or two and sang some rhymes. I even miss the co-sleeping a bit, to be honest! Although I understand it's not for everyone. Fortunately for me, DS was not a fidgety/kicky sleeper.

We had something similar at 7m. We had a bedtime routine that worked like a dream from 4m-7m. Then she stopped falling asleep on the boob and was horribly unsettled. For the first few nights I just cuddled her and paced up and down in her room but even that didn't help and as it persisted we decided that she needed to learn to fall asleep on her own.

Once we were sure she wasn't tired, hungry or in pain (and I'd give calpol if you are worried about pain) and we'd had a bath and a cuddle and a final breastfeed the deal was she went into her cot and wasn't going to come out again until she had had some sleep (she was still waking in the night at that point and obviously I picked her up and cuddled and fed her then). Sometimes if she stood up and howled I would leave her for a couple of minutes and then come back in. Once she was calm and tired enough to accept it I'd stroke her back, talk softly to her, sing or whatever it took to help her drift off. The whole thing took about 45mins the first night, then 20mins a night for the next 2-3 weeks. And then she started to be quite good at having a breastfeed to relax her and then being put down in her cot awake to drift off by herself.

The unplanned but much valued consequence was that within another month or so she started sleeping from 10-5, and now goes 7:30 to 6:30 which is aaaaaaaaaaamazing.

The other thing that made no difference to us was daytime naps. DD is a big daytime snoozer, but she will sometimes have a 2.5hr afternoon nap and still sleep 11hrs at night. If anything our experience is that bad naps equal bad bedtimes.

It sounds easy when I describe it. It was horrible to go through and we just made our plan up (though i had read the NCSS too). You have my sympathies. The key thing to remember is that with love, ingenuity and time all children can learn to sleep.

Sorry that should read 'once we were sure she was tired' - doh!

Everytime he stands up just lie him down again, over and over until he gives up and goes to sleep. Only pick him up if he's really upset and reaches up to you, then lay him down again. It might take hours at first but it worked for us.

Give him calpol if he's teething - 20 mins before bed so it has time to work. Put him to bed and let him have his grumble. Go back after 10 mins and tell him it's bed time and lay him down, do again every 10 mins. He will get used to the idea that he can lay himself back down once he's stood up. It's just a new thing to learn.

Cut back on his morning nap and don't let him sleep past 3pm are great ideas - worked here too.

We went through this, eventually I would sit next to the cot until he nodded off. I then had to commando crawl out of the bedroom as standing up and walking out would wake him up and we were back to square one.

It does pass I promise.

Lots of responses! Thank you all

Mishy were you just going to bed at 7pm with them? I have done this and dont mind, but DH doesnt like this.

Iwillonlyeatbeans - have PM'd you, thank you

JellyMold I'll try tha, thank you.

Martha he goes down awake ATM.

UKSKY, VeronicaCake and Brynn Thank you, you all make good points. I'll talk about these with DH and see how we can implement them!

I'll try calpol and sitting with him too. Thank you all so muich for the advice

We went through this. Reading your post brought it all back . It passes, but if he's teething dose him up. Calpol and calprofen if necessary. Ashton and Parsons teething powders also good. A friend of mine had a wisdom tooth come through and she said the pain was horrible, especially when lying down.

We also did the pick up/put down thing. We went in, cuddled him, told him we loved him and it was time for bed and put him down. At first it took about 20 goes, but the next few nights all got much better.

Good luck

OP I could have written your post, my DS2 is 9 months and will only sleep after bf and rocking. I had some success with the NCSS with DS1, but not so greaty that I can face revisiting it.

We are exhausted. Iwillonlyeatbeans would you mind if I PMed you too? We need our evenings back and I go back to work soon. Would be very very grateful