I know she will sleep through eventually...won't she??

[loopyloo82]

I realise that this is strictly speaking a sleep issue, but closely tied up with bf, so hoping to get some support here. I don't really know what I want here, mainly just to share and maybe hear some of your reassuring stories... Hopefully!

Anyway, dd1 is 2.8 and still nurses avidly at night alongside her 6mo sister, we co-sleep. She has never slept for longer than 4 hours at a time. She loves bedtime and goes to bed so quickly with a feed, but wakes after usually no more than 2 hours. We did night wean her while I was pregnant, and this did improve things (alhough she still woke a lot), but once dd2 was born we kind of slipped back into old ways.

I cope fine by going to bed early- usually about 8.30 when she first wakes. Dd2 also wakes a lot but I just keep her with me until I go to bed, which works well as she is.no trouble. I would just like to be able to have only 1 dd to worry about at night I suppose. I hate night feeding dd1, apart from the initial bedtime feed, but can't really see a way out of this that I am happy with. If dh goes to her when she wakes she goes mad. When I went out for once a few weeks ago she woke 30 mins after I left and was still awake when I got back.

So, has anyone got any stories to share- maybe of dcs who miraculously started sleeping through at about 2.9 years?
Really, I think I'm mostly just after sympathy/shared moaning from people who are or have been in a similar boat. Nice to have someone to whinge with

Thanks

DD started sleeping through when she started pre-school so aroung 2.9years. She just need the extra stimulation to wear her out enough to sleep longers. But we didn't co-sleep so don't know if that helped.

Of course she will. Some children just take a bit longer than others. DD2 took about 2.5/3 years, but now she sleeps fine (apart from last night when she allegedly needed a tissue at 1am). The first few years were a killer and I honestly think I just survived initially and didn't really have a life, but she's 4 now and a great sleeper and I feel like a weight has lifted from me and I can think about having some time for me. Hang in there, it will get better.

Thank you both. I know really she will do one day, sometimes that day just seems a little long in coming!

The thing is, MigGril, she is so active during the day and never naps, but however tired she is, she never sleeps any better. Every time we spend time with people we don't see regularly, they watch her and say "she will sleep well tonight", but she's always like that!

Well, one day!

Funny you say that DD was just the same, she gave up her nap completly at 2 1/2years (hadn't had a nap everyday since 18months) and still didn't sleep through the night.

To this day I still don't know what it was about preschool that help her sleep through. As we would do the same have busy day's out and still she would wake up.

I think sleep is a developmental thing they all get there on their own evetualy.

Yes. Were 3 next month, and in the past few weeks have just started doing some better sleeping. Its not every night, but 3-4 nights a week.
And it's coincided with later waking - 7am this morning. Yippee!!!!
Good luck, and I hope your sleep patterns revert to sensible ones when your 2 are sleeping through - I'm still awake for about 45mins if anything wakes me - just not used to rolling over and going back to sleep!

Wow, nextphase, that is great news- congratulations! I guess when it finally happens, I will take a while to adjust to not being woken. I can't even imagine it at the moment- the idea that I ever slept all night through without being disturbed seems bizarre! Did you do anything differently or did it just happen?

MigGril, I guess that makes sense about pre-school, as I know lots of my friends with children at pre-school have also mentioned how utterly exhausted their children got at first. Well, roll on September when dd will start nursery school and be 3! It's got to happen then!

Thanks all for posting

Oh dear. This doesn't fill me with hope at all. DS just turned one. Shit sleeper. Used to only wake up once till he was four months then went downhill. Is the worst he's ever been now. Slept through once a couple weeks ago when my dad looked after him for the evening while we were staying with them, then he had a couple nights with some long stretches and I thought we were getting somewhere, then we got home and it gradually got worse.

Im annoyed i think because i feel like he can sleep, or knows how to sleep. I casually co-sleep. He always gets put down in his cot, sometimes he's bf to sleep, sometimes rocked but sometimes patted in his cot. Usually ends up in our bed. I try and get him back into the cot. Not much room in our bed, but I do love the snuggles.

Ah well, like the rest of you, im just waiting for it to happen. I enjoyed the rant. The long rant

I gave up waiting for it to happen miraculously! I night-weaned at about three and half. Over quite an extended period tho - a couple/three months IIRC.

Well, possibly not the way you want to go about it, but after a particularly bad night (we have a bf 11 month old also), of double figure wakes, I was pretty grumpy, and he asked why I was cross. So I told him I was very tired as they both woke lots, and if he slept longer at night, I would be a nicer Mummy.

He also wants to grow big, and when a member of staff at a childrens centre heard this, she said he needed to eat and sleep lots to grow big.

Wakes got treated in the same way, but they were just less frequent.

Good luck. Its a weird feeling having had a long sleep, and I actually feel quite ill some mornings if they have conspired to give me 6 straight hours!! The irony!