Hello
We’re having serious separation anxiety issues with our DS, particularly at bedtime. He’s never been great at settling at night; he’s put to bed awake but there’s often a protest and no amount of rejigging timings to account for under or over tiredness makes a difference. He’s always settled fine for naps although they’ve always been short (45 mins). We reached a point where he’d suddenly settle well and that lasted about a month. Now he’s utterly bereft as soon as he’s put into his cot at night, I try to leave him for a few minutes but end up going in to attempt to calm him but nothing works. It can often take more than 30 minutes each night to get him to sleep by which point he’s exhausted. He was waking once for a feed but now he’s up multiple times, sometimes for an hour at a time and then waking at 5am.
We play lots of peekaboo games, hide and seek, my DH or I will leave the room but keep talking or singing to him, lift the flap books...basically everything we’re told to do to help with this anxiety. Lockdown isn’t helping the situation as he’s with us 24/7 but that can’t be helped.
Does anyone have any suggestions or just reassurance that this is all normal and won’t last forever? I’m at my wits end and completely exhausted.