To feel bullied by my 10 month old?! What would you do? Pls help

[Mummyofmay2020]

She's become a boob monster at night. Was waking 3 times a night initially,, I thought it was excessive for her age so started trying the tap/shush to sleep method and refused to pick up. It was going well ish but we took a short break and after the break it's like she grew a temper and found her voice and decided I'm not having this - I'm putting my foot down!

She now wakes SIX times a night demanding a feed each time or will scream and cry until I give in. The other night she went on for 40 minutes until I gave in. We are in between houses atm so cannot put her in her own room yet.

What am I doing wrong? Surely 6 times a night for her age is ridiculous. Fyi she is not ill and i dont think teething.

Any ideas please desperately welcome?

My friend thinks i need to stop bf'ing altogether as she will get confused being allowed it in day and not night, but I'm not sure about this.

I think it’s worth trying different options. At 10 months with DD I was exhausted, she was waking 5 times a night, feeding a tiny bit then going back to sleep. I was about to go back to work and I knew I wouldn’t cope with work on so little sleep. I tried controlled crying. Increments of 2 minutes, then go in and pat and shush, but don’t pick them up. 2 mins crying, then I went in. 4 mins, then went in. Then she fell asleep after the 7th minute and didn’t wake up until 5am. I was stunned and delighted and amazed! The next night she cried even less and slept from 7.30pm to 7 am. I can’t tell you how brilliant I felt after a couple of nights of uninterrupted sleep for the first time in months.

I tried the same thing on DS at 9 months and he did sleep for longer but not quite all night, so it didn’t work 100%. He was a much much easier baby in general though (until he could walk and then it all went to shit) so I was less exhausted.

All I’m saying is try a few different things - different babies respond to different methods, and don’t forget that your needs matter too.

And bf doesn’t affect sleep that much - I carried on feeding DD until she was 20 months.

#Bluntness100 it's but necessary about boobs. My first was bottle fed but wouldn't give up a 3am bottle until 15m, and that took a in lot of effort.

She didn't start to sleep through for another 2 years, except rather than a quick feed and back to sleep in 20 mins, it often took a couple of hours.

I think the op would settle for one feed a night rather than six..

Babies are not different to adults.

A comfortably full tummy, not stuffed, not hungry, warm enough, and we become sleepy and sleep well.

I think you've described the problem... "until you give in". Sleep train her and she'll learn to give in. A few tricky nights and then she'll sleep, all of mine did once I put my foot down around this age.

That sounds so shit but also completely normal (sorry!) It will just be a phase, no need to stop bf - if you want to then by all means do but it may not help at all with the sleep and 10 months is a funny age to introduce a bottle when you will need to take it back off her at 1. I would just pick a direction and stick to it like glue - either ride it out and feed when she wants and hope its over soon, which it hopefully will be, or decide youre night weaning and stick to that. Personally I think 10m is a little early to night wean just because there will be sleep regressions yet to come so you might have to reteach it a few times, but it definitely can be done at 10m. Hope things get better soon either way

OP, I think you should do what suits you and your family best. But you should do it knowing what your options are - stopping breastfeeding might not make any difference at all to her sleep. She could just need a cuddle, she’s still very little. So it’s absolutely fine to give up if you’re ready to, but formula feeding is not a magic solution to what is a perfectly normal (albeit exhausting, I know) sleep pattern for a ten month old.

I’d be really cautious about taking some of the advice on this thread. Mumsnet weirdly brings out a lot of posters who are anti-breastfeeding, anti-responsive parenting and pro-training. Your baby is still really little and she’s not some kind of pet you can force to follow a different schedule just because her schedule is annoying. I don’t say that lightly, sleep deprivation is horrible and none of mine slept well. But if it’s what she needs, it’s only for a very short time. You’ve done incredibly well to get this far with breastfeeding, a lot of the attitudes on this thread are a prime example of why breastfeeding rates are so rubbish in Britain.

Just feed her.

It’s been proven that babies that age can’t “manipulate” or any of the other things they are sometimes accused of. I’m not saying the sleep deprivation isn’t rubbish. I’ve had three that didn’t sleep.. one ebf, one bottle fed, one combi fed. None of them started sleeping through when I night weaned either. But it is normal; it is a phase; and this too shall pass.

But you should do it knowing what your options are - stopping breastfeeding might not make any difference at all to her sleep

Sure. But she can express can’t she, give it a few days see if her baby sleeps and if it doesn’t work start again.

No harm done unless you’d rather she continued to both their detriment?

I’m not anti breastfeeding, I’m a mother, I don’t know any mother who is.

But I am anti It when it is probably the route cause of a mother and child’s suffering. Because I fully believe you do what’s right foe the baby, not follow some fanatic I suffered so so should you mantra.

@Bluntness100

But you should do it knowing what your options are - stopping breastfeeding might not make any difference at all to her sleep

Sure. But she can express can’t she, give it a few days see if her baby sleeps and if it doesn’t work start again.

No harm done unless you’d rather she continued to both their detriment?

I’m not anti breastfeeding, I’m a mother, I don’t know any mother who is.

But I am anti It when it is probably the route cause of a mother and child’s suffering. Because I fully believe you do what’s right foe the baby, not follow some fanatic I suffered so so should you mantra.

You’re the poster who said ‘babies are no different to adults’. Which is just so incredibly stupid.

It’s following her baby’s natural instincts. That’s what breastfeeding is. Nobody said it was easy. It’s not.

And no, she maybe can’t express. Loads of women can’t. It’s no indication of how successful breastfeeding is.

A comfortably full tummy, not stuffed, not hungry, warm enough, and we become sleepy and sleep well.

A decent meal, some supper, unlimited tit at bed, exactly 19 degrees (it varies by a maximum of 0.2 degrees during the night). Exactly the same pink noise in the background at exactly the same volume. As many variables as possible are controlled.

Occasionally she will sleep through.
Sometimes she will wake every 2 hours.
Sometimes I'll get a block of 5 hours followed by 3 awake, followed by 2 hours sleep.

You coukd just roll a dice for which you get in a given night. Babies and toddlers aren't machines, and their sleep just isn't that formulaic. If it was, none of us would have 3 year olds that still wake in the night.

You’re the poster who said ‘babies are no different to adults’. Which is just so incredibly stupid

Well I’m not the one who had problems getting my child to sleep. So I know which one of us I’d be listening to.

And as much as you might not like it, give a baby a comfortably full belly so they don’t wake up during the night and make sure their temp is right, and just like a grown up, unless there is a medical reason, that baby is going to sleep through.

Honestly some folks just want to make a rod for their and every other woman’s back. It’s ridiculous.

She's probably a bit stressed and confused by the move and too little to ask what's going on so is in need of more comfort and reassurance than normal. If it's just you and her in the room, could you have her in the bed with you instead of in the cot so it's no effort to latch her on in the night? And just go with it for now, stop battling, make any adjustments you can to make things easier on you until you're settled in your new house and then think about it again. I bfd until 18 months but at 10m I was going back and forth in the night & trying to settle him in his cot again after a feed, but he wanted to be right next to me, by the end of each night I would give up and we would co-sleep but it was a struggle and exhausting and looking back I wish I hadn't bothered with all the the efforts to get him to settle in the cot again. All it did was wear me out and make me feel like a resentful failure.

Good luck, I know it's tough but given the circumstances you're in I would just ride it out for now in the most painless way possible and hope the next phase comes sooner rather than later. There's such an industry selling ideas about what babies should and shouldn't do and how to make them do what you want them to, but if it was as straightforward as the baby books say, nobody would need to write those books. All they do is make mums feel like knackered failures, instead of just knackered!

I 2nd all the advice to send your dp in if at all possible. This is what I was advised by my HV as Ds1 would wake every 2 hours wanting to be fed, and he was a very sturdy baby so did not need feeding. She said it was probably more for comfort rather than food and if I went to him he would cry until he bf because it's what he associated with me, he probably wouldn't be satisifed with just cuddles, whereas he didn't associated DP with bf.

It wasn't perfect, we had a few rough nights, and I did still bf during the night, but he tended to feed around 11pm, and so if he woke before 3am DP would go into him and soothe him, cuddle him sometimes offer water in case he was thirsty and most of the time he would eventually go back to sleep. If it was after 3am I would feed him. Luckily things did improve a lot by a year (otherwise I think I might have died).

@Bluntness100

You’re the poster who said ‘babies are no different to adults’. Which is just so incredibly stupid

Well I’m not the one who had problems getting my child to sleep. So I know which one of us I’d be listening to.

And as much as you might not like it, give a baby a comfortably full belly so they don’t wake up during the night and make sure their temp is right, and just like a grown up, unless there is a medical reason, that baby is going to sleep through.

Honestly some folks just want to make a rod for their and every other woman’s back. It’s ridiculous.

So you say, but you say a lot of stuff on here that’s complete rubbish, so who knows?

There are a million non-medical reasons a baby might not sleep. Fear? Thirst? Wet nappy? Over-tired? Uncomfortable pjs? Too much light? A weird noise? Just needs a cuddle? I really can’t understand why any woman would be so anti-breastfeeding to the extent they’d pretend it’s the only thing stopping a baby sleeping. It’s pathetic. You don’t know what you’re talking about.

@Thespottytortoise

Where do I say I deny my baby water? She is 11.5 months! If she is thirsty, I let her have sips of water from her sippy cup. There are alternative ways to give in to baby thirst once they are above 6 months...as long as you do not load them up on water. But to be honest, she is content and happy in between breastfeeding times and solids. She does not ask for breast. I have offered her breast as comfort if she had a little tumble or bump (this does not happen often, but if I feel she needs comfort I will offer it and she only sucks a few seconds and then off to play again).

I breastfed on demand the first few months, as before solids they need to be fed more often and when they want. When she was a newborn I woke every 1-2 hours the first month or two! Then it became 2-3 hours the next month. But once she was eating solids well, I put her on a schedule...if I just breastfed her...she would not be eating a good amount of solids...The other poster seems to be asking for advice on what to do...so I am letting her know what works for me. My baby sleeps 12-13 hours straight through the night. If she wakes at 5:30am the odd day, I dont deny her. Tdoay she woke 5:30am so I went to feed her and stayed w her. HOWEVER, if she started making it a habbit, I might delay feeding by 30 mins to help her get back to waking at 6/7am.

Also, as for meal times, I do not just eat until my hearts content through out the day...I eat at my meal times or when I can fit it in. Some people seem to think we can not delay eating or it will cause problems (for adults). It is actually healthy to skip a meal sometimes (intermitten fasting). It has a lot of health benefits (not that I do it often).

Some women are fine on broken sleep and happy to continue waking multiple times a night until their child is 5 etc....

I knew one lady who would have to give her dd strawberry milk when she woke in the middle of the night....EVERY night. The dd would wake in the middle of the night and scream from her strawberry milk....at the age of 4!!!! Sometimes, you need guide your child....sleeping well is just as important as feeding well...and its a learned habit.

Some babies just aren't good sleepers - like some adults. My DH, for example.

It isn't always about temperature or food. And it isn't necessarily anyone's fault as some fellow parents and health visitors would have you believe. Expressing isn't always the answer if the baby won't take a bottle.

My DD was a lot more challenging than my DS in this respect. After I had him, I was braced for the same. He was, and still is, a different child, though.

It is possible to sort out, however, but you have to do what works for you and, sometimes it means not following the rules and doing what you can to get sleep.

You will get lots of conflicting advice and hear some downright BS but, trust me, I've been there with two breastfed - and very different babies. It will get better

And as much as you might not like it, give a baby a comfortably full belly so they don’t wake up during the night and make sure their temp is right, and just like a grown up, unless there is a medical reason, that baby is going to sleep through.

Bollocks. You had babies that slept. Good for you! It’s luck, not perfectly controlled temperatures and the exact sweet spot of full-but-not-too-full tummies. Do those things help? Maybe, depends on the kid. But I’d be more inclined to listen to parents of children who don’t sleep, because we know how hard it is, rather than parents of children who slept, who think their dumb luck gives them some sort of scientific insight into sleep.

And of course babies are different to adults!

I imagine it's teething related (or she misses you). Have you tried giving her calpol at night to see if this makes a difference?

@Bluntness100

Babies are not different to adults.

A comfortably full tummy, not stuffed, not hungry, warm enough, and we become sleepy and sleep well.

And i still dont sleep...

My Dad is a poor sleeper. My brother didn't sleep until he was 6. I don't sleep well. And my son hasn't started sleeping until he turned 5 and even now he's not great.

I do not believe that its a question of merely sleep training them. We tried with DS but he is the most stubborn child ever (a trait picked up by both nursery and school - who have an attitude to just let him get on with it as its not worth the fight unless it physically endangers him). He's a good kid but he was just never going to sleep.

It was destroying our mental health trying. And the lack of sleep was not helping. DH had to work and we only had one bedroom.

So we just fed as long as he wanted it for all our sanity and well being. Otherwise we were exhausted, shouting and incapable of operating day to day.

Anyone who tells me that we were merely not sleep training correctly can fuck off to the far side of fuck and then keep going. They. Do. Not. Know. What. They. Are. Talking. About. If it bothers them so much they should volunteer to sleep train other people's babies.

Some children and babies just don't sleep.

I think you've described the problem... "until you give in". Sleep train her and she'll learn to give in

This is a BABY. Christ what am I reading.

@bluntness100 Babies do not know the difference between night and day. They will regularly wake to ensure parents are still with them, in reach, and they haven't been abandoned. You will have done the same thing.

OP just get her in bed with you and feed when she wakes.

How MN has such a hippy reputation with some of these horrific responses I have no idea.

Have you tried offering water instead? Sometimes they are thirsty. I would bf the first time ds woke up around this age but any time after that he was offered water and a cuddle. He wasn’t happy about it but soon stopped waking as he wasn’t getting his ‘booby reward’ lol. Has she recently started learning a new skill? Walking, talking etc? I only ask as I have always been plagued by the progression/ regression. When they progress in one area, another regresses so it could be that too. Good luck with everything. X