To wonder why I had a baby??

[MissBax]

We really struggled to conceive, were awaiting ivf when we finally got pregnant. It was all I'd wished for for 3 desperate years.

Now I feel like I'm at breaking point. I've not slept for more than 2/3 consecutive hours for a year. The constant mess, the groundhog day and sheer repetitiveness of it.
My DD is wonderful, she brings me so much joy and is very easy during the day. But the nights are awful. She has woken every 30 mins since 7pm. I can't settle her, I feel useless.
I always imagined myself having more than one child but this is enough to put me off ever trying for more. Its torture.
How do other people.manage?! Why on
Earth would you have more than one?? I feel like I could just lock myself away for ever right now

9 months is amazing unless you were surrounded by friends who had babies sleeping through from a couple of weeks, were breastfeeding and having no support from now ex. Don't worry though I'm making up for it now with 2 step children who don't sleep a full night between them.

DC 4 was like this and I have always said that if she was my first, she would have been my only!

A year (almost to the day) afetr she was born, her surprise brother turned up. 4 weeks later he slept through and she was still waking. In the end I just couldnt do it, I think I must have just slept through her waking as I was so exhausted. I dont really remember what happened other than one morning I realised that I hadnt been woken by her and she never did again unless she was ill. In her case I am certain it was habit and the fact that when I went in I think I woke her up more and made things worse. By (inadvertently) ignoring her, she realised there was no point making a fuss and would resettle if she woke.

I am not suggesting you should ignore her, but perhaps dont be so quick to go to her. Leave it a few minutes to see if she will resettle herself, as DD did.

I've been there. I have no solutions, but I want to say that yes, it's shit isn't it? And I was mad enough to have another (who admittedly was better than my first but not much).

It gets better. People who say it doesn't are liars, or they're one of those insanely lucky people whose kids slept through from early on. One day this night will be a fuzzy memory, your child will be sleeping through, a bit more self sufficient, talking and making you laugh. You WILL get your life back.

It's perfectly ok to not love it. It's perfectly ok to admit it isn't the cutesy postcard experience you thought it would be. It doesn't mean you aren't doing a fab job (I can promise you you are).

I had two with a 21 month gap basically the baby woke the toddler and the toddler work the baby. None of it woke DH. I can't remember how we got through it other than we did and I took naps when they did and forced DH to do the cooking as pay back. Neither of us did much cleaning. I caught up on sleep at the weekends. We also thought baby might have colic so we bought him one of those special colic baths. I can't remember if it worked, its all just a blur now, but he did look really funny in the little bucket bath and laughing at this cheered us up a lot. I also found that DMs and MILs know nothing about whatsoever about wakeful babies and any advice they give is wierdly Victorian. There's a lot of advice on this thread about sleep trainers. I'd have grabbed that with both hands if I'd known about it at the time.

I really feel for you OP, I have walked this mile. My DS didn't sleep for more than an hour or so a time for 2 1/2 years. It was utter torture. When he wasn't sleeping, he was screaming. I thought I was going to die from sleep deprivation. He was my second baby and I thought my first had been a nightmare yet she slept through from 6 months. It was quite weird in the end, my husband left suddenly and from that first night DS slept for a full 12 hours. He was subsequently diagnosed with autism and sensory processing disorder (I am not suggesting at all that this is the issue with you) and it dawned on me that my ex-h was so utterly noisy all the time, shouted due to having hearing problems, the TV was always SO LOUD and of course, without being able to explain it, my toddler was under enormous strain just from his environment. I established a routine of a long wind down in the evening, which was a strain in itself to be honest, but dinner, a nice warm bath, PJ's and cuddles, reading a story with the TV off, more cuddles, a final milk before bed and it did just click into place eventually. You WILL get there, I know it doesn't feel like it now, but you will. I can also second the comments about Melatonin. I didn't use this myself but I know a few parents who have with huge success. It might be worth a chat with your HV/GP. Good luck...and do know that this won't be forever

I have been there and it’s hard. Have your dh take over night duty for a couple of nights. I nightweaned both my kids with dh’s help.

Thanks for all your kind words!
I am going to my walk in Sure Start Centre this morning so will speak to the HV then. I actually Co slept with DD from birth until about 2 months ago. It worked well at first but then the bigger she got, the more she kicked and squirmed, resulting in me getting less sleep and DH was sleeping in the spare room. We felt like it wasn't doing our relationship any good sleeping apart and so transitioned DD into her cot, but still in the bedroom.
She then started teething last week and since then it's gone from 2/3 hours at a time, to waking every 30-60 minutes.
After writing this post last night DH went back into the spare room and DD came in bed with me and she did sleep a bit better (4.5 hours from 12.30 - 5, and then 5.30-7), so I think I'll have to go back to the Co sleeping agaib for a while.
DH does help with cleaning when he can, but has a very busy job and is up every day at 5.30. Weekends he let's me have a lie in, which always makes me feel a bit better, but as soon as we get to Sunday night a wave of dread comes over me as I know I'm going to be doing everything on my own on such little sleep.
I am returning to work in just over a month and will also be writing a dissertation at the same time - I'm so worried about how I'll manage being this exhausted.
I'm going to try and look into sleep training or contacting a sleep consultant today.
Which consultants or sleep training methods did people use? I really don't want to use cc or CIO if possible.
Thanks all xxx it does help to know I'm not alone with it all.

OP doesn't say how old her child is. One of my autistic children was given melatonin but not as a baby, and I haven't described my sleep journey with him as 😱 There are no words. Melatonin can be useful but it's not something we had an opportunity to try until he was older.

I also coslept with mine as I just had to do anything to get sleep. It doesn't last forever and I can asssure you they won't be still getting in your bed at age 10...

Sleep training can be a wonderful thing. And forget about getting a consultant- they will just tell you to do CC which you can do yourself without paying a fortune

My daughter regularly woke up at evenly spaced times during the night in phases that lasted months at a time. It affected my health. It's only now at 4 that she has more or less started to sleep through. Unfortunately, lots of kids don't suddenly start to sleep through as soon as they leave babyhood. It's one of the realities of parenthood I wasn't really prepared for.

Sleep training will help a lot. Sleep deprivation is like a form of torture, no wonder you're fed up. I used a loose version of Controlled Crying/Gradual Withdrawal. Millpond has a good reputation.

Other things that helped we're going back to work part time and taking an SSRI. A cleaner to help with the mess.

My DD is now 3 and life is much easier. Once they can talk, play independently and are out of nappies it's much more fun!

As a mother of 7, mine have slept through from approximately 6-8 weeks. I've always let them sleep with an old tshirt I've been wearing and swaddled.
Bathed at 7, fed and put down at 8pm, dream fed about 10 pm and then that's it until about 6 am.
And I didn't rush in immediately if they woke in the night.

The sensational baby sleep plan by Alison Scott Wright was what I swore by for DD2 it worked a treat. Alison does consultations etc as well if it's something you can afford. The book was enough for us though but we used from pretty early on. Good luck and I hope you get a bit more sleep soon

It might be that your baby will sleep better in her own room? We got into a cycle where we (baby dd and I) were waking each other up without even realising it. We both slept a million times better in our own rooms.

I also put a bedtime routine in place and made a conscious decision that I would only offer water between 11pm-5am. Controlled crying for us meant, popping in to offer reassurance if she had been crying/grizzling for more than 10mins, checking she was o.kay and then leaving again. Often she needed a bit of a moan and then would pass out pretty quick!!

Its important to recognise your own needs as important, I would have gone start raving mad with long term sleep deprivation (single parent) so was willing to try anything. From age 1yo she slept 7-7 most nights so routine, cc etc was completely worth it.

Hugs

Only my dc2 was a sleeper. I’m now on dc 4 and at 20 months she still doesn’t go 2 hours between feeds at night.

We do sleep and I go to bed with her whenever I can.

It’ll change one day

The no cry sleep solution book is helping x

I used controlled crying. It was tough for the first couple of nights and then it worked really well. It is really worth doing - how can you parent effectively if you're sleep-deprived? Once you and your daughter are both getting a good night's sleep, everything will feel much better.

I'm not in the best position to comment as my 4 year old still wakes every night and my 6.5 year old sometimes wakes from nightmares.

The 6.5 year old was an horrendous sleeper - he still woke 7-8 times every single night when he was 3 years old! (and I had a 7 month old also waking nightly)

The only way I have "coped" (I use the word lightly, I've been in tears many times) was to do whatever was necessary for everyone to get sleep.

Sometimes I co-slept with one, and DH with the other. Sometimes I had them both and DH was in their bedroom. Sometimes I totally cracked and DH had them for a night (unfortunately rare, they only want me at night).

Once a year I go away for 3 nights with my friends and without DH and the DC - bliss! Once a year I go away for 2 or 3 nights with DH and without DC - bliss!

We adapt daily/nightly based on who needs what. If a DC is ill, they sleep with me and DH elsewhere. DH doesn't feel pushed out by this - he understands how shattered we all are.

We are very open with friends about playing musical beds and it turns out that many have similar set-ups!

@sweetcheeks1980 that's lovely for you and you're very lucky. As you haven't had a child that didn't sleep (and there are several commenters with lots of children-several of mine slept brilliantly) I'm not sure how helpful you're comment is. It doesn't mean any of us with poor sleepers have done anything wrong and dreamfeeding doesn't always work. Remember that everyone is dealing with different children.

I make babies that don’t sleep as well, it’s SO fucking hard.

@boredandtired there’s always one that thinks that their ‘parenting style’ is the reason why their babies slept well 😂😂
It always makes me laugh because if I didn’t laugh I would launch them through the window for their narrow mindedness and patronising posts.

Oh and i have read every book going, tried sleep training and paid a sleep consultant.

The only thing that actually worked a bit for DS1 was discovering his lactose intolerance...when he was FOUR YEARS OLD! The poor mite had been suffering from severe reflux (and still suffers today) which woke him up all the time.

My first dd was like this, she didn’t sleep through until she started school, would wake many times and I was so tired. I didn’t find the first couple of years enjoyable at all. Then I had dd2 and she slept through straight away (still, 2 dd’s Was my limit).

I hated my life after I had my first baby. It's so hard.

My baby woke up hourly until she moved to her own room, at which point she woke up once for a feed and now not at all (well, she does, but she just coos to herself happily and goes back to sleep). It's not a magic bullet for everyone but it certainly was for us. We were waking her up, it wasn't dark enough and when she woke she couldn't resettle herself because it was too noisy and distracting having us in the room.