Advice needed from experienced Mummy's about 8 month old DD

[MidgetGem]

DD 8 months old, has always been a very alert baby who gets stimulated very easily, when she was younger she used to have awful meltdowns if she got too tired. Getting her to nap and sleep has always been a challenge. Anyhow up until about 4 weeks ago I thought things had finally calmed down, her daytime naps were great, in cot or buggy and at night she was settling lovely and waking only once about 4am. However during the last few weeks things have got progressively worse to the point where I can't get her to nap during the day for more than half an hour, (but she wakes up wingey). And her nightime sleep has gone totally pearshaped! if she falls straight off in her cot at bedtime she tends to wake up every hour for the next couple of hours and sometimes screams for an hour. She is also waking 1-2am in the morning sreaming the place down and has been in our bed for the past three nights but she still wakes up for the day early and earlier - was 5am this morning! (having previously been 7:30 ish. )This coincides with her being able to sit up from a lying down position (which I often find her in during the night) and attempting to crawl, she also cut her first two teeth two weeks ago. Have any experienced mummys experienced this? does it sound "normal?" also I am worrying that I am getting too hung up on her daytime naps, (or lack of them) and would be interested in hearing what kind of naps any other 8 month olds do during the day. Sorry for long post - thanks in advance xx

Same thing with my 9 month old ds. Just want you to know you are not alone! My ds is always grumpy as he only takes 30 min naps and is knackered. Night time used to be a doddle and he slept brilliantly but now same problems as you. Not sure I have any advice though but there is a similar thread called 'getting through a difficult stage 8-9 months' or something like that! It's quite recent so shouldn't be that far down the page. Apparently it's a phase and lots are experiencing it. Sorry can't be of more help!

for about a week when my ds learned to sit up and crawl (roughly the same time) he was reallly unsettled at night - seemed to practice crawling in his sleep. it passed

Mdget, there's been a few 8 month threads lately. The consensus seems to be that its a dfficult, unsettled time for most babies but that it passes. It seems to be a crunch time for physical and mental development and this causes grumpiness and sleep difficulties.

My ds is getting on for 9 months now so I sympathise - the last few weeks have been pretty hectic. Seems to be improving though -fingers crossed!

Hi meandmyjoe, thanks for that, I think I came accross that thread the other day, reassuring to know we are not alone then?!? How long has it been going on for you? I would say it has been over two weeks now for us. Thanks Stealthpolar bear, that is what I keep telling myself.."it WILL pass..."

Wow lots of replies so quickly, thanks for that wasabipeanut.. I am pleased you are seeing some improvements, I will hold onto that thought

hi there i posted similar things recently - hop these links help!

here

www.mumsnet.com/Talk?topicid=8&threadid=530278#10789900 and here]]

ooopps sorry typing furiously fast so mu husband doesn't see what i'm doing! he's off for the day

try here

www.mumsnet.com/Talk?topicid=5&threadid=509346#10317884

Midget, having really got any advice as such, but i do think they practice their crawling at night once they have learned it!

My ds aged 8mth seems to be bunched up in the cot sometimes in a crawling position!

However i dont really have any sleeping problems to be fair.

He sleeps all night and does nap in the day but usually not for that long. He usually has 2 or maybe even 3 45 min naps when i then run round frantically doing jobs! Or occasionally, he will have over an hour. Cany complain though cos he sleeps so well at night.

By the way, his 2 bottom teeth are just apparearing

thanks for those links luvaduck, they make interesting reading, I hope you notice some improvements soon.

Its entirely normal at that age I think. Both my DC went through doing that kind of thing and they still go through phases now of waking in the night!

I read somewhere that when the brain is learning new things, it needs more of the lighter part of sleep where it proceses new information and transfers it to the long term memory. So it wil be having more of the light sleep where it is easy to be woken and less of the deep restful sleep- so they wake up grumpy IYKWIM.

Its the same for adults too, just we aren't learning as much or as many things at once like babies are!

here is the thread about difficult 8 month olds

things are improving with ds again - sleeping 6-8 hour stretches, feed, sleeps again, naps better so there is hope!

maybe its separation anxiety with your dd?? lots of games of peekaboo so she'll know you come back might help

Hi Again, for me it's been going on for about a month. It started when he was nearly 8 months but not every night, maybe one in three nights he'd wake up. Then everyother night and now every night Sometimes he's not that hard to settle and will go back down easily. Other times he needs a feed to be comforted and other times he just refuses to go back to sleep and my day starts at 3am!

Hoping he will grow out of it though. Incidentally, it started the day he learned to sit up from laying down too! I remember being so proud that he could do it but now I curse his new skill!!!

Hope things get better soon. Looks like it's perfectly normal though and will go back to how it was (with a bit of luck!) Sadly he's always been a rubbish napper and is incapable of self soothing to sleep in the day which I could handle wjhen he slept so well at night!

Midget - I really, really feel your pain. It sounds like we have very similar daughters.

I really appreciated finding out others were having similar problems on the thread I started.

2 - 3 weeks for us but it feels like much much longer. I'm afraid it's still argh here too. Though my DD has been pretty good during the day, she's only just gone to sleep now, having turned herself onto her front repeatedly and last night was dire - went down ok at 7.15pm, woke at 10pm - fed back to sleep, woke at 1.30am - fed back to sleep, woke at 4am, got the futon out in the nursery and brought her into bed with me (DH had an early start) woke at 6.30am - fed back to sleep, finally woke at 7.50am.

When you get loads of evening wake ups it feels like you don't get a break. :-(

I'm really looking forward to it settling down again. It's nice to talk to people who have children of a similar age though. Tell me something that's lovely about your DD to keep us feeling chipper.

Mooki

DS ia so, so like this. He spent the first 4 months of his life screaming from overtired, overstimulated wired-ness. I won't bore you with the details but we barely survived it.

He's now 10 months and for the last 2 weeks has been easier. The 2 months before that were a massive ballache. Teeth, wind, waking up at 2am to 'play' for a couple of hours, refusing to nap, eating/not eating, BFing, not BFing, screaming ... oh joy. Last 2 weeks - much better, only 3-4 wakeups some nights (AMAZING, for him). It does pass, just feels like a lifetime while you're enduring it.

Hang on in there!

Oh man, we had a lovely lovely day yesterday. I took Alice to London on the train and she was fabulously behaved so I had really high hopes for last night.

Needless to say it was even more crap than the night before. I fed her 3 times during the night and my husband slept in with her inbetween. She wakes up so suddenly and so upset - stroking and cuddling don't seem to help. She calms down if you distract her with a walk about or a book but then goes back to screaming if you so much as sit down on the bed with her. I don't know about anyone else going through this but I dn't think any form of 'sleep training' is going to help.

I actually started to worry that someting else was wrong last night as she got so batey - so we gave her some calprofen at about midnight. She did have her longest relatively undisturbed period of sleep then.

Today's naps have gone out the window too and I am buggered. Did anyone find shifting bedtimes or extra slow release food or more milk made any difference?