to think it's not odd my baby wakes up at night?

[hereagainalways]

DS is 4 months old, EBF. He goes down for the night between 6 and 630 (early I know but he just can't stay awake past that) and is up for the day around 6am, sometimes 5.30. During the night he wakes (to feed) at approximately 10, 2 and 4. I have tried resettling him without feeding at the 2am feed (dummy, white noise etc) but he won't have it and it's just easier to feed him peacefully and have him go straight back to sleep tbh.

My NCT group look at me like this when I tell them how much he wakes up and say stuff like oh sorry you have such a dreadful sleeper. Their babies either sleep through or only wake up once apparently.

Don't get me wrong as I would love it if he slept through obviously but I really thought this was quite normal for babies??

Ha! Sounds like my 2 year old.

Oh and quite a few babies sleep through for a couple of months around now, then they hit the sleep regression and parents will be sooooo tired as they're not used to baby waking and they worry what's happened! Whereas you won't get that and will be completely used to it... silver linings...!

I was going to post a link to the Infant Sleep Information Source (ISIS) as I found it brilliant for just telling me "yes that's normal" and making me feel much better! I've given the link to lots of friends too. Decent scientific research and studies rather than just anecdotes.

Both options are completely normal.

As research says it's about 50/50 at this age.

on this thread alone, it would appear that 98% don't, but that's because mn is a support network, so many of these parents would have joined for support when their babies didn't sleep. Also, the way you've posted, it would have been cruel for hundreds of mums whose babies did sleep through to post their experience, this they haven't, making it look like the no sleepers are more usual.

I just cannot understand the 'they're liars' brigade. I don't know what people get out of thinking this untruth.

Normal. Brutal, but normal.

We did move ds into his own room at 4.5 months - not planned, but the great lump of a lad grew out of his co-sleeper and his cot won't fit in our room! We did all start sleeping a bit better -our house is so little I do hear if he wakes, even if he's just burbling away to himself and not crying. I think we were waking each other up, a bit. But obviously that's not in line with the guidance - it was needs must for us.

He's now 6 months and was just starting to sleep through... Then he started cutting just first tooth . Hey ho!

To clarify I don't actually mind things as they are now too much. I just resent being told he's a dreadful sleeper when he's just a normal baby.

I certainly don't think they're lying - I'm sure their babies do sleep through!

Are you sure it's the whole NCT group? Are you sure it's not just one or two loudmouths who have openly broadcasted that their babies are sleeping through the night already reading chapter books and have an opinion on global politics ? In my experience one person announces how amazing their baby is and everyone else stays quiet. The silence is often misconstrued as everyone is the same as loud mouth. Reality is they don't want loudmouth attacking them and asking them what's wrong with their baby.

elpth is that the one with the natural sleep and wake cycles? I have that in a very old mother and child book that was passed down to me. I found it really useful when sleep cycles naturally changed and I could adjust the day accordingly. I'll see if I can dig it out and photo it for you OP. It is really useful.

Normal and I reckon they are all lucky. Often you get strange clusters like that.

At my NCT group none of the babies were sleeping through at 4 months. In fact everyone was very jealous of me because DS was sleeping 7 hours at 7 weeks old. But at 4 months he hit the sleep regression and then all theirs started sleeping longer by about 6, 9 or 12 months whereas DS finally slept through at about 2.5!

Are the people telling you he's a dreadful sleep competitive parents by any chance?

It's perfectly normal my 4 year old has never slept through in his entire life. My 2 year old sleeps like a log and has done since she was 5 weeks old. I can get her out of the car and put her in her pj's and bed without waking her.

They're both normal sleepers. No one, adults included has a perfect sleep routine.

I had this a lot with dc1 by competitive parents at baby groups telling me how well their babies slept and looked at me like my baby was broken or I was crap or something when o said mine didn't. I just imagined how nice it would be to see them standing on Lego barefoot ignored them.

Mins started sleeping through th night at around 10 months old. All babies are diffreent. He is waking at regular intervals as he is hungry...I fed mine three hourly for twelve weeks and then he was so used to it he woke the same hours through the night for weeks and weeks before he finally started sleeping more and cutting down on feeds. Up the amount of milk (unless BF - sorry, I havent read all of the replies). You will find he should sleep more when he starts to move around. Its normal. Its fine x

Just re-read OP and saw - he is EBF - sorry!

I don't think this is what elpth is talking about but here's the chart. I do remember with mine that keeping them awake in the evening after a late afternoon nap meant they had better nights. They were awake more than this chart as they were ebf but it was a good guide. I noticed if tried to follow it roughly then they slept better.

Agree with calling people liars is so nasty.
All children are different and have different sleeping patterns.
Having said that, all three of mine followed the same pattern.
I have had three children to two different fathers with a gap of 11 years between oldest and middle child.
All of mine were put down to sleep at 6pm in their own dark room (from birth) with a monitor.
They all went straight to sleep, then woke again around 11-midnight for a feed, again about 2-3am and again 6-7am.
All three went straight back to sleep after their feed - I have literally never had a sleepless night and I realise I am very lucky!
As they got 2-3 months, they all dropped the 11-12 feed annoyingly, but kept the 2-3am one, which gradually pushed back until they dropped it completely.
They had all outgrown the midnight feed by three months and were sleeping 6pm-7am by then.
I am posting this not to show off but to indicate that some babies do sleep and I can assure you I am not a liar!
When my daughter (DC2) was born, I did experiement with keeping her downstairs with us until we went to bed, then putting her to sleep in our room. It was a complete disaster and lasted two nights.
For me, the key was to make day and night completely different - during the day I would put the babies to sleep in the light with family noise around them, whereas at night, they were alone in a dark, quiet room.
I also did not rush to them when they whimpered during the night and tried to let them settle themselves.
I also did not speak to them or engage with them when I fed them during the night - basically did not give them any reason to get up unnecessarily
I realise this is not a popular techniqu nowadays, but I thought it was worth sharing as I would do anything for a good night's sleep!

My ds, coming up 4 months, just doesn't do naps. He goes to sleep for the night between 9.30 and 11pm. He will wake about 3/4 for a feed then up at 7/8. It doesn't bother me to nurse him at nights. It won't be forever, and probably over too soon.

I wouldn't say they are lying, we get a 6-8 hour stretch between the start of feeds at night, and so do others in my NCT group (mine is almost 15 weeks). Equally there are people with multiple night wakings! I must admit I try not to take it for granted. He has always been a reasonable sleeper since birth, but we've hit bottle refusal and I'd like him to start being mixed fed. Everyone has their own issues - be it sleep, feeding, napping... we often say in our NCT group that all the babies combined would be a perfect one or a non-sleeping, crying nightmare if it got all the worst qualities!

My DS was sleeping 6-7 hours until he hit 4 months then woke every 2 hrs. Nobody told me sleep regression at 4 months was a thing - not even the health visitor who worried me slightly by looking concerned about it!

My DD is 6 months and still wakes up that much. It's normal- just ignore them or you will get the rage and want to poke them in the eye.

Normal! That's what my son did till we moved on to formula at 6 months.

My ds slept through at about 4.5 months but people before that would ask how does he sleep does he wake in the night etc etc. Wtf of course he does he's a baby he wakes up to be fed . Don't get it

Bet they all have babies that 'sleep through' when what they mean is that they dream feed them several times a night. Because that's what they all meant in my mummy groups!

most NCT groups are on their knees in hell fellating the devil
and being really fucking annoyingly competitive on sleep patterns

of course its normal!!!!

My favourite was my friend telling me her nephew ‘sleeps through apart from waking up in the night at 1am for a feed’. That’s not fucking sleeping through!!!!

DS2 (baby number 3) is one on Sunday.

So far in the last 364 days we have had 2 nights where he has slept for 6 solid hours. Other than that, he wakes at least twice a night.

Totally normal and flipping hard work

Twinkle