To get wound up about MN and sleep advice

[LittleMilla]

I love MN and will often come on to get advice...can normally count on it for sensible pointers for everything except for sleep.

AIBU to wonder why noone on MN seems to want their children to sleep through the night? I no of noone in RL who co-sleeps - but everyone on MN seems to? And people seem to think it's entorely normal for a 8 month old baby to wake repeatedly through the night.

I just don't get it. So much valuable advice...yet everyone on here seems to go madly soft when it comes to sleep.

Am I the only one?

If "normal" is what commonly happens, then no, it's not really normal for an 8mo to wake & feed in the night. That is because many parents take steps to hurry babies to sleep through the night rather than wait for them to take their sweet time doing it.

I think crying for a few minutes is very different from crying for long chunks. I have friends who let them cry for half an hour and longer. I am unable to do this. Of course sleep training with no crying is different and great if you can do that...of course we all want more sleep...I just think that our needs come second unless we are in changer of getting ill and then other strategies have to be found.

Mama - my dp is entirely different to me. He needs his 8 hour plus a night or turns into a monster

Dd knew from very early on, dark time is sleepy time day time is play time. We had a routine (bath, massage, stories etc), dd would go down like a dream,sleep 5 hours but wake (around 12 midnight), and then wake every 2-3 hours, sometimes less. We did everything we could, bar CIO / CC as that isn't for us personally. But at the same time we had a very relaxed attitude to her sleep.

Her long sleep was always from bed time till midnight and I could never change that. For some, that's a dream; it was never an issue to me - I would look after myself and would catch a nap some days; or hand dd over to MIL for an hour etc. We got a sleep through (7-6am) at 19 months when we took the side off the cot. Could it have been that, god knows!

Leggyblonde has it entirely correct:)

I couldn't give a fig about sleep, encourage no sleep hygiene, bf for every squeak, co sleep forever, don't settle them upstairs until past one, bf to sleep and for every waking.

Am very rarely tired and when I am it is usually hangover related so can't blame the kids. My four all slept differently and grew into their sleep needs. One slept through early and easily one very late, both sleep fine as big kids.

My very good friend implements good sleep hygiene and it worked for 4/5, number five would have been her only had she been born as number one. She woke more remorselessly than any of mine, sleep hygiene didn't make much difference and any improvements were alwYs short lived.

I find sleep in the real world much less controversial doubtless my friend thinks me a loon for feeding toddlers back yo sleep or getting them up if they wake, or having no bed time routine whilst I couldn't do it her way. Can't say as it upsets either of us.

Humphrey- I must confess I didn't do that much breastfeeding because it was just something I HATED, the thing is with DC3 my reflux ridden baby, I found that giving warm water really helped and that combined with a dummy is how I achieved sleep. It may be different as your baby is breastfed.

I think if I was you, with your limitations I would try to establish more of a routine feeding schedule. Consider something that can make a small amount of noise while he sleeps during the night, consider putting him in a crib/basket that you can reach him in and sleep with a hand on him and gently moving away from him over a week or so. I'd persevere with a dummy, maybe when you're out so DH has to do it.

Its easy for me to say what I would be doing but I didn't have the same rules as you. I had to share a room with my first 3 DC until DC3 was 11 months because we couldn't afford more space. That is probably what lead to be being totally persistent and determined with sleep. I

Both of mine have slept through from 3 months ish.I feel like the LUCKIEST MUM IN THE WORLD.It's unusual amongst people I know.I don't know anyone in rl who co-sleeps every night though.It seems to be a last resort!People ask me how I did it and I don't know how to reply because I'm sure most of us do the same thing.With both dc's I did story then bath at 7.30pm,bottle/supper then quick kiss and cuddle then bed.I've always been able to put them down awake and leave them to drift off no problem.This isn't me boasting by the way I'm just stating I don't think its anything I've done.They have both napped during the day,my eldest only stopped when he started reception and I think my dd will do the same.I am very very lucky.

Actually I think a lot of people in RL exaggerate their LO's sleeping well. They're not lying, they genuinely believe they have a DC who sleeps through.

But when you actually discuss the previous week, month, whatever, you find out the DC has woken up a lot of nights.

Because the parent is able to justify the wakings due to being unwell, teething, being cold, being hot or any other number of reasons, they just somehow seem not to count it as 'not sleeping through the night'.

I even remember one mother of a younger child telling me how well her DC was doing sleeping through the night and how she only woke to feed! She genuinely couldn't see the contradiction in what she was saying.

Is regular waking during the night very common in adults?

In this house, yes.

I have always woken twice in the night to use the loo, DH rarely wakes. My sister and mum are the same. DD takes after me, shes 9 months old and sporadically will do 6hours in a row. I'm calling that a success.

Maybe I am a shit parent for not working as hard as I can to get her to sleep - but at stupid O'clock in the morning if getting her back to sleep means getting in bed with us, she can get in.

Not many people will admit to cosleeping, I always do.

For us it works - superking bed, no covers or blankets for me, a bed rail and some thermals. It's not forever, and this too shall pass.

Pit - you mentioned before that negative affects of cio manifests in later life. Do you know when and how please? (genuinely interested!)

I'm still shattered all the time too,I really don't know how I would have coped if they had been bad sleepers.I read some threads on here and I could cry for those parents whose dc only sleep an hour at a time.I don't know how they do it.

Oh I'm sorry, I thought you must have been on a sleep thread seeing as that is the subject of your OP. I will leave you to slag of the parents of sleepless children in peace.

I'm not the OP of this thread.

Pitmountainpony

I have left mine to cry at night, but never longer than 5 minutes and even that was painful for me and had me pacing. Emotionally I was dying to go and lift them, comfort them, sit up all night with them. But I am a horrible person when I am tired and ultimately it would have been worse for us all to have to live with me on no sleep. So they were left to cry.

They were left to grizzle for longer than that though. Because to me there is a difference. And it certainly seems as though they used the grizzling as part of their self soothing. My 5 year old still talks to herself or sings before going over to sleep.

IMO there's a difference between a moany cry and a distressed needing comfort cry.

Dd2 was a terrible sleeper (and taught dd3 well). Over the course of five years I tried co-sleeping (she bounced around the bed for hours), leaving her to cry (except she wasn't crying, just bouncing), returning her to bed, the entire winding down bath-story-bed thing, no naps in the afternoons, encouraging her to have naps in the afternoons... eventually she just grew out of it. She just seemed to need very little sleep, she wasn't tired until late, then would wake a few hours later for some more up-time. And it wasn't like she was sleeping in late in the mornings, because I had a school run to do. I think the only thing I didn't try was drugs, and I was sorely tempted. I don't even remember most of her early years, it's all a haze of sleep-deprived fug.

Thankfully she' 12 now, and she (and dd3) are down and out for the count by 9:30.

arethereanyleftatall this link sites several studies and methodology on CIO. It's an interesting read

Highlander what were you thinking introducing actual research what has that ever had to do with a good barney on Mumsnet where we all know that the evidence is down to between 1 and 6 children or even on occasion the children you have not had yet. You are not playing by the rules .

Thanks fad. I think I'm ok then as I never left to cio as long as they refer to in the article. Phew.
Interestingly, I was thinking about this the other day when the girls were.playing dollies. I asked them how they remembered going to sleep themselves when they were babies. Both answered that I cuddled them to sleep.

The cosleeping thing does depend, though, on whether you yourself sleep well. I have no problems with confessing that I did it, I just don't like it!

I have 3 DC, I have coslept with all of them for short periods of time as younger babies. I really don't sleep well when I cosleep, so it wasn't really much of an advantage, just a survival method on the really bad nights. So there was far more impetus on me to try and get them to sleep in their own beds. If I coslept, I'd sleep so rigidly and awkwardly that I'd wake feeling about a hundred and five. Aching to buggery and with the most splitting headache. But if baby was in their cot, cried for a feed and I got up to feed them, I'd be back in bed within 10 minutes and I would sleep really well between feeds, and wake feeling (vaguely) human.

Personally, I'd rather get up 3 times in the night (as I did for months on end with DS3) and walk across the landing to feed him in his room, then go back to a nice quiet comfy bed without him in it, than suffer the physical discomfort of trying to cosleep.

But that's just me. I am just not one of life's natural cosleepers, I cheerfully acknowledge that not everyone feels like that.

dietcoke when I co slept the baby did sleep in their own space because I am a bit like you describe. I had 3 sides of a cot beside me in the bed in the early day and the baby was on a blanket when he looked for a feed I moved him and the blanket over to me and if I woke up again I moved him back on the blanket so he sayed the same temperature. I doubt I could have co slept in the same bed all night. I need elbow room.

I agree, op.

DS slept through at 7 months. DD is just 6mo and has been sleeping until 5 or 6am for a week.

I'm not 'lucky'. Both woke 1-4 (or more) times a night until we night-weaned and did controlled crying. Not many on MN do that... Or not many that frequent the sleep threads. But I know a few in real life who have done cry it out.

Highlander what were you thinking introducing actual research what has that ever had to do with a good barney on Mumsnet where we all know that the evidence is down to between 1 and 6 children or even on occasion the children you have not had yet. You are not playing by the rules

Haha, erm sorry anothernumberone I thought it was more valid than my research base of one toddler who is 2 next month, who has slept more than 6 hours straight about 10 times in her life.

She always wakes at least once.

Both of my DS's started to sleep through most nights between 3 - 4 months. This wasn't down to any deliberate attempt at sleep training, they just did it by themselves. DH is a very good sleeper, so maybe they've inherited that from him.

DS1 (2.5yrs) has backslid a bit and now wakes more frequently - this is generally because he kicks his covers off and then gets cold. He's now too big for gro-bags.

However, I rarely talk about their sleeping, because I've come across a number of parents in RL with wakeful children who've reacted very very badly if I mentioned that I got a good night's sleep because my DC slept through. Even if I've mentioned this as a response to a direct "How did your DS sleep last night?" type question. There's a fair amount of competitive tiredness going on amongst the parents I know.

I don't tend to post much time on threads about sleeping - partly for the same reasons as in RL, and also because I don't feel that I need advice about sleep.

The reason you don't hear about ppl co sleeping IRL is because alot of ppl lie about their babies sleeping behaviour.

Has anyone got any advice then? Ds is nearly 7 months and I consider a night when he does 5 hours + a good night. Also after one waking he'll wake every hour or so.

He self settles at night and for naps but wakes up and screams if he's on his own (if we're there he doesn't cry). He also needs settling at least once and needs a feed (bf) after about 5 hours. He sleeps in the cot with side down next to our bed as it's the only way we get any sleep.

He is bf on demand but has actually been in a routine of feeds and naps during the day for months. He also now has solids and has 3 meals a day plus snacks (blw but really taken to it and eats loads)

Dd2 was a terrible sleeper (and taught dd3 well). Over the course of five years I tried co-sleeping (she bounced around the bed for hours), leaving her to cry (except she wasn't crying, just bouncing), returning her to bed, the entire winding down bath-story-bed thing, no naps in the afternoons, encouraging her to have naps in the afternoons... eventually she just grew out of it. She just seemed to need very little sleep, she wasn't tired until late, then would wake a few hours later for some more up-time. And it wasn't like she was sleeping in late in the mornings, because I had a school run to do

Oh my this sounds like my dc2. She just doesn't seem to think she needs much sleep. She's 21mo now...hope she'll grow out of it before she's 12!

DS is 10 months old and wakes at least twice a night. Sometimes he goes back down very quickly, other times nothing will get him back to sleep. Last night DH ended up walking the streets at 4.00am with DS in his pushchair to try and get him to sleep. He eventually fell asleep for an hour. :(

Thanks to this thread I now know it's because we don't work hard enough at it. :(

He's been up 3 times already tonight. :(