To think some babies just don't sleep

[ThinkAboutItOnBoxingDay]

DD is 8 months and has never slept for more than 3.5 hours. She still wakes for food at 10pm, 2am and 5.30-6am. I go back to work soon and am feeling a bit desperate about this.

I am therefore bringing the barrage of advice on myself but still, it's starting to get to me. Everyone interrogates me about her routine, eating, napping etc and everyone has advice. Or just badgers me to go to the dr.

Recently some research has rehashed some findings that the press has translated into either 'breast feeding is to blame for babies not sleeping through' or 'over attentive mums should leave them to cry'.

The actual data is pretty weak, but certainly the breast feeding thing does seem supported by the research. But I'm not wanting to kick off a bun fight.

What the research says is that at 6 months about 1/3rd of babies do not sleep through any night of the week. This they label 'problem sleep'. Which in fairness it does feel like a problem for me but if a third of babies do it then surely it's not that weird?!

Anyway, comments on mumsnet by posters with, for example, 3 DCs, 2 perfect sleepers, 1 who just didn't sleep, have kept me sane.

I really am starting to believe that some babies just don't sleep that well. Like some adults. And it's not that I am doing something 'wrong' or that there is anything wrong with DD.

And yes, I've had her checked for glue eat, read the millpond book etc etc.

So, AIBU to give up trying and hope she grows out of it? Or do people think there are things you can do to 'fix' or 'treat' non sleepers, as the books would have us believe?

Almost 7 years later I am still waiting for that lovely full night sleep.

From my pov, I moved onto ff ds at 6 months and it made no difference.

Erm, that'd be glue EAR btw....sorry

My 18 month old has slept through the night about five times. My sisters child born the day before has slept through practically since birth, however her other two still don't at 5 and 4.

I agree that some children just don't sleep.

yep, I believe there are some babies who just don't get sleeping for 10hrs at a time. Personally, I think an desperately hoping they are the geniuses of their generation, and think there are much more exciting things to do than sleep!

Could you get DH to feed at 10, and then you go to bed at 8 a couple of nights a week? I found it much easier to find ways to up My sleep than persuade DS1 to sleep for longer!

You get used to it - honest, you do.

DS was exactly the same until suddenly at 10 months he started sleeping through. Now at 2 he is a fantastic sleeper. Don't lose hope, things may change. It might be worth trying controlling crying or something like that, but only if you actually want to. Otherwise just motor on as best you can and don't listen to the eejits who interrogate you - if someone asks just say "Yeah she sleeps fine."

My DS was an awful sleeper too, you have my sympathy. When I look back now, I think it was partly because he always fell asleep when feeding, he never laid in his cot and fell asleep.

However, fast forward and he is a really good sleeper. I still wake at everything and have the circle under my eyes to prove it. :)

Yep, I agree with you. Some sleep, some don't, people just like to take the praise for having those that do sleep!

I totally agree. I have two boys now 5 & 10, both slept through from about 1.5 - 2.0 onwards and now both sleep like logs and now I have to wake them up for school! (cling on to that thought because it will happen one day!)

WIth mine youngest I did the gradual withdrawal technique, with the support of my Mum and of course DH and it worked. Dr Tanya Byron, Little Angels - was a series on TV when my eldest was little.

Also in his year there are three sets of twins and over the years the subject of babies and sleep has come up and all Mums of the twins said that one was a brilliant sleeper and one was dreadful, both born at the same time, both had the same things done to them, food routine etc, but one slept and one didn't. Kind of like a controlled experiment!

With the benefit of hindsight it is so reassuring to know that some babies jut don't sleep as well as others and you can stop looking for that something that you think you are doing wrong, stop blaming yourself and beating yourself up about the fact your baby does not sleep and stop trying to find the reason and some sort of magic formula that will make them sleep!!

I saw a peadeatrician once, something unrelated to sleep with my youngest, and I asked him about sleep and he totally agreed, he said id he knew why some did and some didn't he be very rich. He also said that in his experience of many years babies who did not sleep turned into really good toddlers who did sleep and were prone to much less tempers tantrums, so please think of this when you are up in the night, that you are certainly not, never have and never will be the only one with a baby that does not sleep through from the start.

And do feel free to want to kick in the head those who boast about their sleeping through the night baby and go find yourself some mums of babes who are up in the night like yours, total life saver!

Agreed. People who think they have all the answers just have compliant children.

I actually do agree that some children don't sleep. My daughter has always been a good sleeper but I am a childminder so I look after a variety of children, some of whom seem able to cope on virtually no sleep at all just fine!

However, if your DD is 8 months and is getting a decent amount of food in her during the day then she shouldn't be having feeds at night and it may well be habit...it can be really difficult dropping night feeds especially when they are that bit older but if you want a chance to see if she ever will sleep then you will have to be strong and stop the night feeds. She still might not sleep well mind you, but she might sleep better than that...

OP I wouldn't be concerned at 8 months, I don't remember any of mine sleeping through till they were about 4!

mind you they both slept pretty well, in my bed, only waking once or twice - and ds3 refuses to sleep at all, almost, day or night, he's only 3 weeks but already very different and far harder to settle.

I don't care if breastfeeding makes them not sleep through though I really doubt that's the case - I'll still do it. It has its own compensations...not having to get up to warm bottles being the main one.

Twins - both ebf. 1 brilliant sleeper from just a few weeks. 1 didn't really sleep through regularly until he was at least 5.

The good sleeper is generally more the compliant of the 2 for everything. If I'd just had him I'd have been congratulating myself on my excellent parenting - but I'm very much aware that luck / genetics has played a much bigger part

I think it might have something to do with how well the mother sleeps. I sleep very well and slept very well since I was a baby, I just don't wake up very easily so shuffles and chatting from ds doesn't wake me up, he really has to be hungry to wake me up.

We were in hospital last week and the nurses came in every 2 hours to check ds's oxygen saturation, I was co-sleeping with ds right next to me. The nurse had to undress ds, put nose drops in and take his temperature. I didn't wake up once. It freaked me out a little as anyone could have come and taken my baby from my arms and I wouldn't have known.

Ds is 5 weeks old and I only wake once or twice to breastfeed him I'm pretty sure he wakes more often but he must manage to go back to sleep.

YANBU, I've got a couple of them, although DD1 has had periods when she has slept well.
I have a lifetimes worth of comments, questions and 'advice' I've been given over the last 2.5 years. It's a wonder I haven't killed someone yet and considering my generally sleep deprived state, I reckon I'd get away with it by pleading insanity!!

Smile and nod, smile and nod.

Honey I hope he is alright now? Poor you and poor little mite.

I've been awake and staring at ds3 every night, pretty much - he stares back, sometimes he howls, often it is a case of needing to be jiggled. And fed a lot.

As soon as it's midnight he seems to wake up and stay awake till about 5!

You are doing really well.

Thanks, good to hear about the twins, that's what i am assuming. It's just so hard when you're talking to people who have had sleepers and they look at me as though i must be doing something wrong, and then go on to try to help me 'fix' my mistake.

I had so many people say that i should just leave her to 'grisle' a bit and not rush to her that i tried it. I put her down virtually asleep in a travel cot and i sat and ignored her grumbling for about 15 minutes. Until grumbling escalated to ear splitting screaming and i went to rescue her. She had managed to take the fitted sheet off the mattress and fold the mattress up so she was just sitting in the bottom of the travel cot, a bit stuck with the metal bits. So much for self settling!

Nope Honeytea, i sleep like a rock. I once slept through an earthquake. Woke up the next day with my bed in the middle of the room, where it must have shuffled to. I was utterly oblivious.

Yep. Our no2 didn't sleep a full night until he was 4. No1, 3 & 4 slept OK and we did the same for all of them.

We feel awful now as we think that it was all because he had some fairly severe stomach problems that we didn't take to too seriously at the time.

YANBU. My DS is 8mo and doesn't 'sleep through'. A good night for him would be waking twice for a feed/cuddle between 7pm and 7am; an average night would include 3-4 wake-ups. He was starting to get there, then came the 4 month sleep regression and teething. His top front teeth have been coming through these past couple of weeks so he's been all over the place. A couple of my friends had babies that slept through but again, teething has messed it up. I think I have one friend whose 8mo DC reliably sleeps every night.

I wouldn't worry!

DD is 15 months old and has never slept for more than 4 hours at once. I went back to work 4 weeks ago and it is killing me. Last week I was awake for 22 hours in one stretch at one point. It's a massive shock, never imagined sleepless nights and working because DS has slept like a log from 6 months. Both were ff from a few weeks old.

So givemesomespace, you would say i should get the doctors on it?

Hope he is ok now.

And honeytea, sorry to hear your baby is poorly. Hope he is better soon.

Yanbu. Some babies just don't sleep. Think mine was almost 3 when he started regularly sleeping all night.
I still don't need much sleep and have sadly lost the ability to lie in when the opportunity arises.

My dd2 didn't sleep properly until she was about 3 - she always woke and was a bit of a nightmare to get down. There wasn't one thing I didn't try. Dd1 slept right through from 9 weeks, without me trying anything and dd3 is inbetween . They were all formula fed from the get go.

Totally agree with this. DS is also a terrible sleeper. Not sure breastfeeding makes a difference though. Out if 8 NCT girls, 4 have terrible sleepers, two are BFed, two formula, all awful!

I also have a friend with twins, one sleeps, one doesn't. She does the same thing for both of them. Even when they are both ill the sleeper still sleeps! Just goes to show.

I get so sick and tired if people giving me sleep advice or suggesting I'm doing something wrong. I have tried pretty much everything. Sleep trained twice. Night weaned. He just doesn't sleep.

He's 9.5 months now & has slept through a hand full of times in the last couple if weeks. I can't quite believe it but they are going to do it at some point