to ignore my nearly one yr old when she wakes in the middle of the night for no reason?

[superv1xen]

omg i am sooooooo tired

the last week or so i have been woken up - usually between about 3 and 5am, by my dd (who is 1 on saturday) babbling and chattering which then develops into angry crying.

i always go and check on her and she is fine, nothing wrong with her. it usually goes on for about half an hour to an hour but when she finally gives up the little bit of sleep i then get is disturbed and not very good quality so i am just absolutely shattered at the moment.

what is making her wake up?? she has slept thru the night since she was 6 weeks old. why is she starting now???

it cant be hunger as she is a good eater (3 meals a day plus 3 bottles of formula and at least 2 bottles of water/dilute juice). and anyway surely a 1 YO wouldnt wake for hunger in any case?

i feel bad for ignoring her but i dont want it to become a habit, and i dont want to give her a bottle becaause then she might do it more as she thinks she will get something.

aaarggghhh need sleep.

Hehe Morloth - actually, a couple of years ago my DD (then 6) was complaining about terrible scratching in the night. I was so worried about her nightmares, but eventually she started sleeping through again. A few months later, I was cleaning in the back of her cupboard, when I found the remains of a mice nest [terrible housewife and cleaner smiley]. Guess the cat got them!

I was very tough with my son when he was one years old. Yes, it made him a better sleeper, but he still scared of the dark and resistant to going to bed at the age of eight. If I had my time again with my son I would not do controlled crying.

Being a one year old is a tough age and I have found it harder than having a newborn. It is hard having to cope with an active baby on limited sleep.

My daughter is one years old and wakes in the night. I do my best to comfort her and I know that this phase will pass. I also find I'm less tired if I look for ways of making nighttime parenting easy than fighting her.

Of course YUBU!!

Babies wake up at night - get used to it. TBH, I wouldn't expect a 6-week old baby to sleep through the night. Babies need to eat at night and need reassurance, cuddles etc. There is too much emphasis on babies sleeping through - it's all rubbish. What you're aiming for is to have an older child who sleeps well, and I know many many people who have sleeping problems with 3,4,5,6 and older children.

Your baby may have slept through at 6 weeks but it's a fluke and it wasn't meant to last. Best thing you can do is respond to your baby's needs (to be picked up and cuddled sounds like) and don't have any unrealistic expectations for her sleeping through. She WILL again but it may not be for a while.

Maybe she just wants a hug? She's only one, well, not even that. Don't you think it would be all right (even desirable) to comfort her if she is lonely? I honestly don't see why this would be a problem. Personally, I'd just take her into my own bed and see if she will sleep a bit more there once she's had her cuddle.

Wouldn't it be quicker to go to her and shush her when she stirs, and try to get her back off quickly? That's what I did when DS used to wake up, he would go straight back off with a quick shush and snuggling the covers back round him. Or if a bottle of milk would work - just give it to her! Sleep is more important than 'not making a rod for your own back' - chances are she will grow out of it in time. My DS 'slept through' from 4mo, but had at least one wake every night until about 16mo but like I say I used to jump up straight away and head it off at the pass. He doesn't do it anymore.

YABU
as someone on MN pointed out once, parenting does not stop at night. If leaving your daughter to cry for up to an hour during the day is not something you'd do, then why would you do it at night?
I bring DS into bed with me at 5am,when he wakes at the first time for a feed. This is because I can't be arsed doing anything else at such an ungodly hour.

You have options that will let you have a rest and will let you comfort your baby (and yes, at one they are still babies!).

Ooh, Morloth, I used to have a dream as a toddler about a milkman climbing up a ladder outside my bedroom window, and when he turned around, had no face, just the empty back of a mask...But I digress

Supervixen, you have my total sympathy as lack of sleep is nasty nasty nasty, but what is happening is completely normal.

Both mine did the same thing - they would go through long periods of great sleeping interspersed with periods of bad sleeping - it will pass.

There is always a reason - With mine it was either teething, light coming through the curtains (try blackout blinds) or actually was hunger/growth spurts and for a short while (a week?) I used to give them a bowl of cereal before bed and it would see them through.

Good luck - it will pass, I promise

Im in the ignore camp..

I mean, let her think youre ignoring her but dont just go back to sleep you should stay awake until she's gone back off in case there is something wrong.

Going in every time is just making a rod for your own back.

But you have to be strong if thats what you decide to do becaus eif you let her cry for a while then give in she'll just do it every night knowing you'll give in.

Sometimes as they get older theyll have bad dreams or whatever and genuinely need some comforting but you'll have a sense for this.

I would say your DD is just having trouble learning to settle herself alone.

morloth is your milkman like the one in "the tiger who came to tea"?

My opinion is that most mums know the difference between a distressed cry and an attention seeking cry from their own child. I can tell instantly whether my dd is upset and needs me, or whether she just wants to get up and play. If it's the former, I'm in there with mummy cuddles and lots of love. If it's the latter, I wait a few mins, then go in, shush her, stroke her head and say time to sleep, then I leave. I'd repeat this after 10 to 15 mins if she's still awake. Personally I wouldn't start giving milk in the night at this age, but would maybe increase the amount at bedtime?
I also hate the competetive tiredness that goes on between parents in rl and on here. If someone usually has a full nights sleep and then is suddenly woken even once or twice in the night, they'll feel tired! Are they not allowed to mention how tired they feel just because some other mum gets up more often?? It's all in comparison to what you're used to surely?
Op just do what feels ok for you. Good luck :-)

I agree wrt to the 'ohhh dont telll ME about tiredness' type comments- bizzare do people want a medal for sleep deprivation or something?

I would agree usually, but the OP must realise that a child who has slept through from six weeks is incredibly rare, and yet she's complaining to a forum of mothers about the fact that she's been woken up once a night for a week.

It's a bit like me coming on here and saying OMG I am sooooooo poor, I'm only getting a 5% bonus this year and I won't be able to afford the deposit on the new Porsche.

On a more sympathetic reading, though, it's sometimes useful to hear that other people have worse sleepers (if you're so obtuse you don't know that) because it rids you of the conviction that you're somehow doing something wrong.

OP - re: rod for own back. It's nonsense. I did all the demand feeding, rocking, cosleeping, shushing, stuff with my daughter for as long as she needed it. And then around 15 months she stopped needing it and started going to sleep on her own and mostly sleeping through. Simple as that, and that's even though her last breastfeed was at night. Talk about incentive to wake up, right? But they don't do that. They're not fast asleep and think, in their sleep, oh hey if I wake up I'll get some food. Because they're asleep.

If it was a habit/rod for back issue, why has your daughter started waking up now after a year of not doing? That clearly isn't a habit, it's a new need.

Take turns with your husband, go to bed earlier, it'll pass soon enough.

My DD occasionally makes moany noises for 2-3 minutes around 4ish. I ignore those because I'm as convinced as I can be without going in (which would wake her) that she's not really awake - and she always drifts back off to sleep after that without my help.

Having been spoiled on the sleep front myself (aside from the expressed dream feed DH would give her at midnight, DD went through from about 10 weeks ) I do understand that when you're suddenly up in the night again it's a complete shock to the system, like not having been to the gym in ages then being asked to do a five mile run. But other posters are right. We are lucky. You'd rather be us than be hardened and used to it, wouldn't you?!

So she can't complain on here about being knackered and having her sleep disturbed Tortoise? My goodness! I've read countless threads about the same thing. Sleep deprivation is horrible whatever way you look at it. How you can use the Porsche scenario? How is that helpful? In the same style, I might come on here and talk about the fact that my father died from cancer this year. Someone might come on and say 'you think that's bad, I lost both my parents to cancer this year.......'

What is the purpose of all this competitive tiredness?

It's not a competition, simply a reminder that

I don't want a medal for being tired. I got 2 hours sleep last night (combination of me being an natural insomniac and my 19 month old frequently waking because she's teething). Believe me, I don't want a medal. I don't want pity (I get enough from my mum). I JUST want it to end. I know deep down it will (as she does have periods of much better sleep). But I'm just not prepared to leave her to cry is all.

I simply got from the tone of the OP that it was a bit of a shocked 'gosh, I'm tired' and since it was in AIBU asking if leaving a angrily crying child, I said YABU and you don't know you're born

If someone had unwittingly posted in AIBU about how sleep deprived they were, how unhappy it was making, how it was affecting their parenting, their relationship, their job, then I think that demands a sensitive response and I certainly wouldn't have given it the 'you don't know how lucky you are' response.

I think the Porsche analogy (I am lucky to have a cheapo second hand one!) a good one!

oops, simply a reminder that it's normal for babies to wake and for some it's much much more often than just once.

OP you DO have my sympathy but you are also lucky in the great scheme of things.

she has slept through since 6 weeks?

then you deserve some pain, evil cackle

Ineedmorechocolate, I don't think waking up once a night for a week counts as sleep deprivation. But I would've still given her a pass if she'd said Ï know I've been lucky, but... as opposed to omg I'm sooooo tired.

But i did give actual advice as well, you'll notice.

I don't think it's being unreasonable to wait for a few minutes to see if she drops back to sleep by herself and if she isn't distressed. Most people wake during the night.

Depends how long you're awake for though, I suppose tortoise. I'm also an insomniac, only wake once a night most nights. However, I'm often awake for three hours or more during that one wake up.....

I do see how the way she has expressed her tiredness may grate on those of us who survive on less.

I'll have to remember to acknowledge my luck before I write any post in case I offend others who have it worse than me....

Coughs, dons helmet...

'There is too much emphasis on babies sleeping through - it's all rubbish. What you're aiming for is to have an older child who sleeps well, and I know many many people who have sleeping problems with 3,4,5,6 and older children.'

Why not try for both? We were encouraged to encourage our babies to sleep through by about seven or eight months: even though it was quite a short night and they woke early.

There was little crying or distress when we went through this process. I slept. They slept. We all felt good. We got up early with them but we'd had unbroken sleep--unless they were teething or ill or whatever.

Mine have slept well ever since. At home, away, wherever. They're 11 and 13 now and I just laugh when I read some of these assertions that encouraging older babies to sleep will harm them.

My 18 month old has never slept through. He'll wake up at least once a night usually at about midnight when we'll bring him into our bed (cos we like co-sleeping!) and usually he'll sleep through till the morning, but he will go through phases of waking up a couple more times during the night too. So these things come and go. It's a phase and it'll pass.

At the moment my DS is waking at about 5.30am, wanting a feed and then sleep for another hour or so.

The early walkings are I find much more difficult to handle than him waking once, twice a night. I need my sleep at the moment as my 28wks pregnant too!

Come and join us on the 5am thread

YABU, I have fifteen children under one and haven't slept for six years!!!

Seriously, I would check remind her that it's night time and leave. My first two were brilliant sleepers but at 12 months ds1 would wake at 3am and I was 7months pg, so we pandered for a month. As baby two was rapidly approaching and I thought I may have an other c section we knew we had to break the habit. It took three night of 20 minute controlled crying and nearly killed me. But needs must and if you think you can do the same, do it.

Don't come on MN looking for support because some days you'll get loads of CC supporters and sometimes none. Trust yourself.

BTW I have never had all children sleeping past 6am, unless we're all jet lagged!!