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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To go and live in a cave with no human contact

17 replies

PinkFondantFancy · 22/02/2012 09:08

My DD is 5 months old, and I am still trying to eek my way through each day on whatever crumbs of snatched bits of sleep I can get during her still very broken nights. All my friends have the same age or younger babies and are enjoying blissful huge chunks of sleep, and bragging about it all over facebook and whenever I meet up with them. Either that or complaining that having slept through the night, they now, shock horror, have to get up once a night to their babies. AIBU to go and live in a cave with no human contact until my beautiful but insomniac DD one day works out how to sleep??? As much as I tell people I don't want to talk about it, sleep seems to be people's favourite topic of choice....

OP posts:
CailinDana · 22/02/2012 09:20

I really feel for you, sleep deprivation is horrendous. It used to drive me mad when my friend would complain about her DS sleeping till 5 every morning, when my DS was still waking at least three times a night Angry It does get better, honestly it does. My DS suddenly started sleeping longer and longer at 10 months and now at 14 months he sleeps 7-6:30 every night.

Do you have a partner who can share some of the wakings?

Original poster
PinkFondantFancy · 22/02/2012 09:24

Fingers crossed she'll turn a corner soon then. Sadly she's EBF and a bottle refuser so no hope of any respite :(

OP posts:
TheBigJessie · 22/02/2012 09:32

I had some very cruel responses, that I never actually got to use, because women would look at my expression, and backtrack very fast. I had twins, who didn't sleep, and it was explicitly medically recommended to me that I should feed them whenever they wanted milk, because they were so small. At one point, they fed every hour! At different times. Then I learnt to breastfeed lying down.

I'll see if I can remember them...

MixedBerries · 22/02/2012 09:38

Can I come with you? DS is 4 months and we were up 9 times last night. Who are these babies that sleep through?

TheBigJessie · 22/02/2012 09:46

If someone (you don't mind losing as a friend forever) tells you that your baby should be sleeping through, because theirs is, say: "yours is sleeping through at this age? Oh dear. Is the HV concerned about their weight gain and energy levels at all?"

"Alternatively, you and I could act like rational adults, and accept that people are individuals, even as infants, and thus develop differently."

TheBigJessie · 22/02/2012 09:51

By the way, (and this is purely anecdotal), the amazing sleeping-12-hours-a-night babies seem to turn into rather more wakeful bigger babies and toddlers.

And as toddlers, mine sleep perfectly right now!

MixedBerries · 22/02/2012 09:55

What annoys me is that everyone else has a "cure" for DS's broken sleep pattern (completely ignoring the fact that all kids are different and that, actually, he used to sleep very well and changed overnight for no reason). When people outline their definite cure, I just say "wow, that sounds fantastic. What time will you be coming tonight to implement it"? Or "I'm glad you know better than the pooled research of the developed world, could you suggest that solution to the NHS or WHO ?"

blueballoon79 · 22/02/2012 10:04

My daughter, who is almost 3 years old now didn't sleep through until she was over 2 years old.
My son who is 11 years old was sleeping through from 4 months old.
Some babies sleep through and some don't and I used to get sick and tired of different people giving me very much unwanted advice on how to get my daughter to sleep through.
Some of the suggestions even included giving her alcohol! Shock
I was a walking zombie at the time, but now she sleeps through all night and often I have to wake her on a morning as she likes to sleep in, whereas my son was up at 5am for years!
I know which way I'd prefer it! Smile

TheBigJessie · 22/02/2012 10:05

MixedBerries

Good answers!

If you get tired of repeating yourself, get a miniature water pistol and Shoot the Buggers.

Birnamwood · 22/02/2012 10:14

I feel your pain. Ds2 is 6mths and is still up 3 or 4 times a night. Lst night I had two blocks of 2 hrs and he was up and ready to start the day at 5am. The week before last was horrendous, I was almost at breaking point as I was averaging 3 hrs broken sleep a night and no opportunity to nap in the day as I have a 3yo ds too, DP has thankfully stepped in and is doing the night feeds after 1am at the weekends (ds is ebf but thankfully will take a bottle) which has been a Lifesaver for me.

As a lst resort, I took ds to see a cranial osteopath last week, (quite frankly, if you had told me that shoving an onion up my bum and doing the chicken dance would have got me more sleep, I would have done it!) and the difference in ds has been amazing. Instead of waking and feeding/fussing for 2hrs he now generally feeds, burps and goes back to sleep. He's also a lot more settled during the day and can even, on occasion, sleep for a whole hour! Before, he just slept for 20mins at a time. Is this something you could look into?

You'll soon be starting to wean and hopefully things will improve after that (didn't for ds, but generally they do!). It does get better, ds1 was the same, it just takes time, but look after yourself, these days and nights of exhaustion are bloody awful and try not to let yourself get run down

TheBigJessie · 22/02/2012 11:06

Once they start walking, you can start taking them for walks.

fanjoforthemammaries7850 · 22/02/2012 11:08

my DD is 5.4 and was up from 1-4 this morning messing around..

fanjoforthemammaries7850 · 22/02/2012 11:10
fanjoforthemammaries7850 · 22/02/2012 11:19

don't worry though, DD is exceptionally unusual in her awful sleep patterns and I hope it all resolves for you soon :)

Belleflowers · 22/02/2012 17:49

It's awful, I would happily go and live in a cave any day now.

Mine are 4.5 and 2.5 and have been awful sleepers.

Oldest only began sleeping properly through the night from age 3, the other one is very stubborn. Falls asleep ok at 7, but is currently insisting that I stay on the end of her bed all night.

Although they are both super intelligent human beings (rolling eyes) so perhaps clever people sleep less and will? It's a little bit of consolation for me anyhow lol Brew

aldiwhore · 22/02/2012 18:33

I feel your pain pink but can safely say, it does and will get better.

You have to sleep when you can, even if it means sleeping during the day when they nap, its hard work and feels like its going to last forever.

Both my boys were ebf (not completely through choice, milk/formula allergy was a huge factor!) but from about month 6, once they'd started weaning I found their random sleeps were longer, at about month 8 they'd wake maybe 2 times at night rather than 4 and so on... they're still not perfect and my youngest is 4!

That zombies feeling fades but don't start fretting if they never fit into that category of all nighters. My youngest wakes at midnight still (and goes straight back down) and my eldest who's 8 wakes at 5am on the dot every morning. They're a tag team.

It will get better. x

Re the cave, find yourself a Lord of the Manor, they used to be very big on hiring oranmental hermits (but you'd be required to grow a beard) so you'd get paid too!

Original poster
PinkFondantFancy · 22/02/2012 20:12

Thanks all. I am definitely getting used to the permanent foggy brain, I just get hacked off with all the smuggery all around me :( I'm going to start working on that beard Grin

Oh good thought about the cranial osteopath, I know they work wonders for some people but no luck here sadly.

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