5 month old won’t sleep

[Squirrel81]

Hi all,

I know a common concern, but I am having intense difficulty getting my son to go to sleep. He has always been a terrible sleeper even as a newborn but it’s got even worse. His average sleep in 24 hours is 11 hours but that is a battle and the last few days it has been closer to 10 hours. I am exhausting and stressing myself out beyond belief constantly trying to track his sleep and get him down for a nap. He wakes a lot at night too.

I feel like I have tried everything… rocking, feeding to sleep, taking out in the pram, giving him to my husband to rock, creating a routine, shortening his wake windows from approx 2 hours down to 1.5 hours, co-sleeping… but I honestly spend all day just trying to get him down. It is burning me out.

It is also starting to give me anxiety about going out with him because I am worried about him getting more and more overtired. I am also worried it will impact him developmentally if I am not able to sort this.

My husband thinks he needs longer wake windows more like 3 hours but I find that hard to believe and to be honest I am too scared to trial that. What makes it harder is that I exclusively breastfeed and because of issues when he was born (he had sepsis and then my mum unexpectedly passed away) I never had the energy to express and get him on the bottle. My flow is fast and I’ve sought advice and done everything to help with that but ultimately been told I can’t control my hormones. But it makes him hard to feed before he goes down to sleep because he coughs and splutters and gets upset by that too.

I am looking for a lifeline here. Any advice?

Firstly, breathe. You're getting yourself in a state over something that is super normal - a baby with erratic sleep. You're not doing anything wrong, but I'd stop tracking and just roll with it because let's face it, it's not helped.

I'd get up and a few hours later go for an hour's walk (either in the pram or sling). He'll almost certainly fall asleep. Come home, have a feed, a play, probably another feed - pop out shopping. If he falls asleep in the car or on the boob just let him snooze. Basically just roll with it. Offer a nap opportunity (feed, walk, pram, car) every couple of hours but if he doesn't go over or rest quietly within a few mins then don't stress it, just go and watch some traffic or people watch or have a bath together.

I also had a fast let down. I found that keeping my finger and thumb right by my nipple meant I could quickly pinch off the supply as soon as his suckling rhythm changed - gave baby a chance to regroup without unlatching and then I let go and they carried on.

Good luck! Things will get better. No advice for the nights as both of mine bed shared and I fed at least every 1.5 hours until they were a year old, but at least I didn't have to get up!

I love this - thank you, it all makes a lot of sense. I almost need to snap out of this loop. I will stop tracking tomorrow and see if that works better for us.

So my little one was always awake way, way longer than any wake window suggestions. I have since read they are not evidence based. I always just followed his cues if he looked tired. I have also read try for up to 15mins to get them to sleep and if it’s not working go do something else and try again in 20mins for example.
I also read over tiredness is much less likely than under tiredness but is very much talked about like a big issue.
Give it a go leaving little one to be awake longer and see how they go.
Second Star to the Right instagram account is a nice one about sleep and little nest sleep.