Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Flip

1 2 3

Original poster

to be fed up of being told how to make DS sleep

72 replies

lola88 · 13/09/2012 19:59

Gina Ford herself could not make this boy sleep i've accepted it after trying everything i don't ask for advice but i get it because i look shit tired alot.

Thats it i just needed to get that out.

OP posts:

Losingitall · 13/09/2012 20:01

Yep!

If its any help my HV told me babies that don't sleep grow up with a high IQ!

It made me feel a bit better.

Both mine now in gifted and talented. Not saying its true but it got me through.

MrsTerrysChocolateOrange · 13/09/2012 20:03

My favorite when DD wouldn't sleep was a friend who I had gone to the barricades for when she decided to FF (I live in a very right-on hippy town). She told me that I should swap to FF because it would make DD sleep. She knew I wanted to BF, had worked hard and had a lot of pain to do it, had defended her feeding choices and she said that. Grrrrr.

MrsTerrysChocolateOrange · 13/09/2012 20:03

Losingitall I must have Stephen Hawking.

PunkInDublic · 13/09/2012 20:04

Ah advice. Scurge of parenting.

Just look shocked and say "Gosh no, I'd never thought of trying a different method to get him to sleep, there was me settling him down with a party hat and a can of red bull!" Or maybe say it in your head, nod and smile instead

HumphreyCobbler · 13/09/2012 20:05

unsolicited advice is always annoying when it completely fails to understand the scope of what you are dealing with

Like women with HE who get told to eat a ginger biscuit.

Original poster

lola88 · 13/09/2012 20:06

My usual is oh brilliant i'll drop him off and 6 and let me know how you get on

OP posts:

MyLastDuchess · 13/09/2012 20:06

I had a child like that. My own mother didn't believe me until she saw it with her own eyes. YANBU.

Ours settled down by the time he was 1 and is a great sleeper now.

thebeesnees79 · 13/09/2012 20:09

losingitail my son is very very bright, he is 5 now but never slept for the first 12/13 months. so maybe there is some truth in it?
he is way above average in school and was fluent speaking at 16 months.
I agree op sometimes certain children just don't sleep no matter what you try.

Original poster

lola88 · 13/09/2012 20:16

Actually the biggest culprit for the have you tried quite often moans than her DD is behind DS all the time (same age) maybe your on to something

OP posts:

Sossiges · 13/09/2012 20:20

My DD barely slept for the first 3 years. Just the way she was.
Any solicited advice, I growl "oh, fuck off" under my breath, then [bright smile] "oh yes, thanks, must try that!"

thebeesnees79 · 13/09/2012 20:27

the worst part for me was the same question every day "did he sleep last night" gggrrrr. I know its people just being nice but ffs if he had slept through I would have been screaming from the roof tops not dragging my tired body round whilst holding my eye lids open :/

ItsNotUnusualToBe · 13/09/2012 20:30

I feel your pain. My three year old didn't sleep until he was 18 months and is a good sleeper now and very bright. My 11 month is currently putting me through several circles of hell but I can't face venting at 'yummy mummy' (shudder) friends because I can feel the 'oh but it only takes three nights of sleep training' vibes if not outright 'advice'. I may be that I am oversensitive due to being a barely walking zombie. I am also finding it hard to be sympathetic to 'poor me, I am soooo exhausted. My 12 week baby wakes at 12 and 4 in the night'. I hate myself for my mentally competitive misery.

My very lovely friend has two boys who didn't sleep til they were 4 / 5 years old. They are now early twenties and are fabulous young men. I'm hanging on to that thought :weeps dramatically :

Original poster

lola88 · 13/09/2012 20:34

I hang on to the fact if he doesn't sleep by 18 i can kick him out :)

OP posts:

MrsTerrysChocolateOrange · 13/09/2012 21:07

DD sleeps now at almost 2. Well, she sleeps 10 hours a night which is less than all her little friends but I can cope.

ppppppppenguin · 13/09/2012 21:17

My DS is 4 and still doesn't sleep very well, once he's asleep he will stay asleep all night, its getting him to go to sleep! Anyway someone said to me today "why don't you put a tv in his bedroom that way he can watch it until he falls asleep" err yeah great idea...

MyLastDuchess · 13/09/2012 21:20

The only thing that kept me going in the first year was the thought that when my DS gets to be a teenager I plan to wake him up every night at three-hourly intervals . Revenge will be mine!

littlemachine · 13/09/2012 21:24

Scaredycat3000 · 13/09/2012 21:25

The best bit of advise I got was from a HV I only met once, she was heavily pregnant, so never met again. I told her my DS woke several times a night, and so we co-slept, he was well over a year old, she replied something along the lines of 'My four year old still shares our bed, what can you do?, don't worry.' At about 20 months he sat up pointed to his cot and everything carefully fell quickly into place I'm hoping DS2 gets there at bit quicker! 10 months and counting.

MrsTerrysChocolateOrange · 13/09/2012 21:32

I love my nurse practitioner. When I go to see her, she asks what I have tried. That way, she doesn't waste her time and I don't feel patronised. Many could learn from this.

DayShiftDoris · 13/09/2012 21:36

Have you tried...

Only joking

Ignore them - I had one that slept all night but barely slept a wink in the day, even as baby when 'night' was about 6 hours... that was hell too but according to the busybodies general public he was 'very good'...

But if he didnt get 2 x 15 mins naps then he wouldn't sleep at night... and he would cry SOLIDLY for a hour before falling asleep... for the 15 mins...

But he slept at night so apparently he was 'good as gold' and I was a 'lovely mummy'

I nearly said to one lady offering those gems ' well the nip of vodka is what does it, failing that a soft bang on the head sorts him!'

People are patronising and stupid - ignore, ignore, ignore

Babies that have read the books and do as is expected are like the Loch Ness - everyone has heard of it, seen pictures and read about it but I'd like to see someone produce it!

CaliforniaLeaving · 13/09/2012 21:49

You can't make them sleep. I had one of those, he finally slept through the night when he was 5. Just when I was pregnant with his little brother and had to get up every night to pee anyway. Smart as a whip that one is.
Littlest one is even smarter and has been sleeping through the night since she was a small baby. So lack of sleep and smart are totally unrelated. [SAD]

carve133 · 13/09/2012 21:59

YANBU

DS was a shite sleeper until about 2. He's better now at 3, but still sleeps on average less than other kids his age and we differ on the concept of 'morning'. When people tell me their kids slept until 8am I do this

Expecting DC2 now and was mentioning to someone at work how I was dreading the not sleeping bit, and she said something along the lines of "you don't make the same mistakes with no.2". How I didn't explode I don't know....

SirGOLDBoobs · 13/09/2012 22:00

YANBU. Tell them to sod off, next time. It will happen eventually.

pointythings · 13/09/2012 22:03

Well, I had one who was fab at night and one who was OK at night - and both were crap sleepers during the day. They are now very very able at school, so maybe there's something in it?

I have soooo much sympathy for you OP, having a non-night sleeper must be horrible and the advice just makes it worse. But YOU know you're trying everything so just ignore, ignore, ignore...

NumericalMum · 13/09/2012 22:05

My mum was the worst. Lived with us for first six weeks and would take her for a couple of hours between feeds at night and assure me she had slept soundly for her and yet as soon as I had her she would scream and be up for hours. I realise she was lying but way to make me feel rubbish

She finally slept through at nearly 3 but that was after finally getting referred to a gastroenterologist and getting her medication for her reflux despite me begging for it from 2 weeks old.

Dayshift
YANBU although I suspect very few parents understand what it is to be awake all night long sitting on a sofa with pillows arou d you sobbing your eyes out for months on end. And

Flip

1 2 3