To think that the 18 month sleep regression can’t be this bad?!

[MintGreenLife]

Having an absolute nightmare with 18mo DS sleep.

He’s never been a good sleeper but for about 3 weeks now we have regular protests at bed and nap time, he’s only sleeping around 7hrs at night, and waking 1-2 times in the night for anywhere between 1-3hrs at a time, and then up at 5.30am like clockwork.

We do have a tricky situation in that he can’t resettle himself if he wakes in the night. I used to BF to sleep, but that’s not working any more. So I’m currently rocking him instead, but he doesn’t seem to go into a deep sleep with rocking, which means as soon as I put him down he wakes up and cries and I have to start all over again, hence the 1-3hr wakeups. He will only be rocked standing up - if I try to sit down he screams. He absolutely will not settle in our bed (I’ve tried many times out of desperation) so I’m struck rocking an almost 2 stone toddler for hours in the night and I can’t keep going on just a few hours sleep too.

Is this really the 18 month sleep regression?! He only naps about 1.5hrs a day, so he’s managing on 9hrs sleep, surely that can’t be good?! Can anyone give me any advice on what I can do to get through this please 😭 it’s really not sustainable, I feel absolutely horrendous and I can’t hold him long enough in the night for him to go to sleep properly as he’s too heavy. It’s a complete nightmare!

I absolutely feel your pain with the sleep. Our 2.5yr old is so hit and miss with his sleep!

First thing I would do is look at the nap - could you cut this down to an hour or so, see if this improves the sleep slightly? He may even be ready to drop it entirely? I know some are at this age although mine does still nap anywhere between 45 mins to 1hr 10

Have you also tried putting him in the cot and patting him / holding his hand etc? Sometimes that works for our little one

Sleep is such a tough subject and im sure some people on here will basically tell you to CIO or whatever but that doesn't work for everyone so

You poor thing. It is so so tough. I have had many nights/weeks like that and it's bloody torturous.

If he can't fall asleep independently he may continue to seek you out to put himself back to sleep for some time. He doesn't need anything he's just got used to be rocked to sleep. He will be overtired too meaning he will find it harder to fall asleep independently. It will sort itself out in time. But if you can't wait for nature to work it out (and I couldn't) - I followed the Lucy Wolfe sleep training method. You never leave them. But you sit on the floor and soothe them and pat them without picking them up or rocking them. It's painful at start but works pretty well and you never leave them to CIO. You can get her book on Audible.

If he's only sleeping 7 - 9 hours a day it's definitely not that he's not tired enough. He's just developed a sleep habit which means he's waking between sleep cycles and needs you to put him back to sleep.

@febbabies2023 thanks so much for your reply! Ah it’s so tough! I don’t know anyone else that has the same trouble we have with sleep - everyone else I know that has a bad sleeper co-sleeps and wakes for a cuddle a few times in the night, whereas mine just screams and struggles to settle if I try to bring him into bed with us.

I’ve tried that once recently and he stayed awake 40 mins in his cot with me by his side with one hand in the cot. He was relatively happy most of that time, but didn’t seem likely to go to sleep!

I’ll try cutting his nap down. It’s hard when he’s sleeping well in the day to wake him, especially as it means I get a break too! But he could he well be ready for a shorter nap. He’s always been low sleep needs, so it wouldn’t surprise me if I need a shorter nap.

How have you dealt with night wakings?! That’s our biggest problem at the moment as I don’t seem to be able to get him back to sleep properly, no matter what I do, which is why I end up up with him for several hours at each wakeup 😖

@BargainBlunt thanks for your reply 🥰 oh it’s just exhausting and relentless isn’t it! So the strange thing is he does sometimes to down awake at bedtime and nap time, and this is the method we used in the past to help him learn to fall asleep - sitting by the cot side. But over time for his night wakeups I’ve gone back to rocking him. I’m still BF but that doesn’t get him to sleep any more, so I’ve continued to BF and then rock him in the night, which most of the time would work, but hasn’t been for the last three weeks and he’s now waking more, and no matter what I try nothing helps! I’m reluctant to sit by his cot and leave him in there as I know it’ll result in lots of crying, but at this point I honestly don’t know what else I can do! As rocking him just isn’t working and all it results in is dead arms and a bad back for me, and him up several hours in the night very frustrated that I’m not getting him back to sleep 😖 and also frustrated at being held/put back down when he’s not properly asleep. It’s a nightmare 😭

The only think that worked with my ds was stopping bf in the night and not letting him get up so when he fell back to sleep he did it himself in his cot. So he's in the place he falls asleep in and he put himself to sleep. I laid with him and then slowly reduced contact and then moved away from cot (this took weeks) until I could leave the room. To help us we tag teamed, I slept 8- 12 and dh dealt with ds then he slept 12-7 (he worked full time) I got up in night and slept when I could.

@autienotnaughty thank you! Can you remember how long it took for him to settle in his cot? I don’t know if I could sit by his cot side with him crying for hours, plus we have a problem in that if he gets very upset he gets hiccups, and then that stops him falling asleep 🤦🏻‍♀️

What is the time of his nap and what time is bedtime?

If it makes you feel any better (I doubt it will lol) if our little one wakes in the night it can also be for hours! A few weeks ago he was sleeping for 2hrs when we put him down at night and then was awake for about 4 hours after and had no idea why!

I completely get it's nice for the rest! We still put ours down for a nap but if he fights it we just get him up again rather than battling it and hope that he sleeps well that night!

Ours also doesn't like to co sleep - like you we have tried! So unfortunately we just have to keep going back in and out. We do the usual change bum, get him a drink, make sure he's not cold etc and then we have to be a little firm with him and tell him it's still bedtime. He's not the type of kid that gives up crying or shouting after an hour either so it can be a real battle!

I do think the change in nap could help. If he's ratty during the day etc it may well be because he's not getting enough sleep too. I know our little one has much more challenging behaviour with less sleep!

@Didimum so he would usually nap around 5-6hrs after he woke up. That used to be around midday, but today he got up at 5am, so I guess he will nap about 11am. Bedtime is around 8pm - he used to always go to bed between 8-9pm and that seemed to suit him. Recently I’ve tried a bit earlier to compensate for the early start, but that often doesn’t work and then it ends up being 8pm anyway!

@febbabies2023 ah our LOs sound so similar! Glad it’s not just me 😭 how long do you find he tends to take to settle with a bum pat in his cot? And has this taken less time as you’ve gone on? If he won’t go down for his nap awake I give in and BF him to sleep, which works for his nap but not at bedtime or during the night 🤷🏻‍♀️ like you I should probably just accept he’s not napping, but also then I worry he won’t sleep well at night with no nap…but he’s sleeping terribly anyway 😂

It's definitely not just you! It can be really frustrating too when everyone else's babies seem to sleep! I'm 35 weeks pregnant too with our second so it draaaaains me when he goes through a rough patch! He's currently sleeping through but waking at like 5:45am 😴

Umm it can take anywhere between 10 mins to an hour and a half! I tend to sit with him for a little bit if he's having a funny one, and try and leave when he's still awake. Then leave him for a bit and go back in if he still doesn't settle and repeat until he does. It's draining but with the second on the way I won't always be able to sit with him until he falls asleep and I know he can fall asleep independently so I try!

If he does skip the nap, you could try bedtime a little earlier, even if it's just 15/20 mins. Might make for an early wake up like us but not so bad when they sleep through

@febbabies2023 oh wow you’re doing amazingly well when pregnant also! When I was expecting DS I slept so much 😂 obviously not possible for the second though! Thanks, I should try this, and I intended to last night, but I gave in after 5 mins 🤦🏻‍♀️ that makes sense re his nap, maybe I’ll just have to accept he’s not napping that day if he refuses!

@febbabies2023 i would definitely happily accept an early start if mine slept through, but then I’m not pregnant! At the mo I’m getting 1-2 wakeups lasting several hours plus 5am starts 🤦🏻‍♀️ that’s been going on three weeks now 😖

I would try a bedtime of way way earlier - 5:45pm. Sleep early evening til midnight is the most restorative sleep for an overtired infant. It probably won’t solve all the issues, but it will go a long way in correcting his overtiredness, why will be making his sleep issues harder.

@Didimum thanks, I would be absolutely amazed if he went to sleep at that time but worth a try. He’s never slept more than 11hrs in a 24hr period since he was about 7 months old, and that has probably come down to about 10hrs now, so for us I feel like a bedtime that early would result in something like a 2am rise! Maybe I’ll try bedtime a bit earlier and see what happens x

Yeah, definitely don't cut his nap. He sounds overtired if anything. I would put him to bed much earlier. I know it's counter intuitive but being rocked to sleep and struggling to get into deep sleep are signs he's overtired not the other way round. I'd be doing nap between 12.30 and 2.30 and then starting bedtime routine at 6 to be fast asleep by 7 at latest at that age.

@BargainBlunt hmm I will give it a try for sure, but we’ve never really been able to get him to bed before 8pm 😖

This 18m leap lasted six weeks here. Split nights were awful. My husband and I took resetting and being up hours in turns. It'll pass. I still feed to sleep but she didn't actually want it in the middle of the night during this leap. We did various things like take her to look at the stars, arrange her bedroom teddies, singing etc to calm her down then started bedtime cues again.

Do you have a bedtime routine? Is it worth trying to recreate a smaller version of this when he wakes? So if you normally tuck him in, read a story, have a cuddle etc you could do this again in the night to remind him and signify it's still bedtime?

If my two year old wakes and is upset, we have a cuddle and then when she's ready/settled I tuck her back in and repeat what I say at bedtime 'nice and cosy, don't fall out, mummy will get you in the morning' and she knows what to do then.

@Flittingaboutagain did it just go back to normal in the end then with no intervention? We’ve tried getting him up and looking at books but he just cries and cries as he’s tired and doesn’t want to be awake 😭 and then is still getting up around 5am no matter how long the wakeup/s go on! Maybe I’ll try bringing him downstairs and walking around a bit so it’s calm and not bright, but a change of scene from his nursery where all the chaos is currently going on!

@TheMagicPudding yes we do bath, milk, books etc. we have tried getting him up and reading to him to try and reset him and like you say do a mini bedtime routine, but he’s just cried through that so far x

It’s common for parents to be wary of early bedtimes and more napping time, but sleep begets sleep. He sounds horrendously overtired, and it will take at least 2 weeks for any new sleep method to sink in and take effect. The worst thing you can do is sleep switching up tactics every few days - it’s confusing for him and stressful for you. Once he’s better rested, you can then address his sleep crutches, as doing it all at once is likely to be a mess when he’s this overtired. You’re doing a great job and there will be an end to this x

I wouldn’t take him out of his room. It’s confusing for him. He needs to know that night time means sleeping in his bedroom.

I remember with my first, around that time she suddenly decided 3:30/4ish was when she wanted to start her day!

we tried for weeeksss to sort this out, shorter naps/longer naps/ or different bedtimes, earlier/later everything everyone always advises and nothing worked

one day she just decided to sort herself out and woke up at 6 🤣 took a good 3 months for us

sorry no advice but just wanted to let you know its ‘normal’ and I hope its not as long as ours was

@Didimum but what are you basing that on? As he’s low sleep needs and had never needed a lot of sleep. Any time I’ve let him nap longer in the day he sleeps even less in the evening, and he’s not grumpy in the day like he’s too tried.