help - DD taking 2 hours to settle and go to sleep

[Madigan]

It seems to be taking DD longer and longer to settle to sleep in the evenings. I give her a bath about 6.45pm and then feed her about 7.10pm. She is bf. Whereas during the day she is a quick feeder (about 10mins-15mins), at this evening feed she can feed for up to 40 mins. It then takes about another hour to settle her down to sleep (i.e. holding her, put her in cot, she cries, pick her up and repeat). In other words, she is not asleep until about 9pm. This is becoming very tiring .....
she would then usually sleep to 12.30pm-1am.

Any advice on how I can get her to settle down to sleep more quickly? Ideally, I would like to have her in her cot asleep before or at 8pm.

and while we are at it ... any tips on how to get into a better nighttime feeding routine? She wakes for a feed about 12.30pm-1am and might feed for about 10 mins. Then she wakes at 3 am and barely feeds at all. Then at 5am (usually with terrible wind) and again only wants a snack. How can I get her to wake up only once after the 1am feed, and feed properly?

Thanks

How old is she? She sounds like she might be a young baby - fixed bedtimes are a bit utopian in the first few weeks/months IME. I also don't think you can 'get' a young baby to only wake up once.

You might just have to give in and put back her bedtime. ds has never gone to bed before 8.30-9. (now 2.4).

I'm working through the same problems myself at the moment with bedtime so I don't have anything helpful to say about that.

As far as the night goes - take heart, when they start to have very short feeds they are close to a point when they sleep for longer periods of time. Your DD is learning how to 'turn off' her digestive system and doesn't realise yet that she doesn't need the feed.

The suggestions that I can offer are to try getting her to wake up a bit more before the feed so that she isn't so sleepy and hopefully feeds a bit better (I know that you are risking your daughter not wanting to go back to sleep because she is more awake but it worked for my DD). The other thing that I would suggest is to make sure that she isn't waking up for another reason and then wanting the comfort of a breastfeed eg too warm, too cold, wind pains, DH snoring!

Other than that, hang on in there. It sounds to me like you are going to be having more restful nights soon.

Madigan and Swaliswan how old are your DDs? Are you bedtime problems related to settling them or trying to establish a bed time which suits you? I'm having problems settling DS (14 weeks) in his own cot rather than falling asleep in either my arms or DPs arms (putting him down asleep no longer works). I'm not trying to establish a particular time for bed IYSWIM. The annoying thing is that we have seen him self settle . We've tried numerous things, but DS seems to keep changing his mind about what's going to work. The past two nights its been a light show which has kept him calm enough until he falls asleep.

Madigan, though DS is typically a quick eater during the day he does have a slow feed at night. I think this may be due to a lower milk supply and him taking in slightly more milk. During the night he is then back to his quick feeds (please let it continue) though I know he's taking a fair amount in. For the 3am feed, does DD really call out for you to pick her up and feed her or has she just woken up? DS sometimes wakes up at this time but I leave him a short while if he's not making hungry signs and he often goes back to sleep. He'll then wake around 5am hungry.

If you're looking for more suggestions may be worth reposting on sleep thread.

DD is 18 weeks old. I've just seen the HV who thinks that she is starting the 'seperation anxiety' stage early as she is starting to cry whenever I leave the room during the day as well. Last night she slept from 8pm-6am but only because she was put down asleep. I do want to try and keep putting her down awake but the other night she cried for 2.5 hours unless I picked her back up. The HV said to just let her cry but I'm not one of those 'cry it out' mummys. She was even crying if I stayed in the room at one point

Swaliswan, good for you for not going for the 'cry it out' approach. Have you read the 'No Cry Sleep Solution' by Elizabeth Pantley? There's a few tips in there, though DS is currently defying them all. Hope DD not having early form of separation anxiety ... it may just be a phase.

Though its no help to you, DS just gets hysterical sometimes until I pick him up, even if I'm hanging over the cot to comfort him . The only reason I'm going for self-settling is because he keeps waking up 10 - 45 mins later after being put down asleep screaming, just as I'm falling asleep myself. Sadly, the light show distraction no longer works. [leaves muttering to try and find alternative form of distraction for tonight ]

Have you tried swaddling? It's working a treat or us. We've just started doing it having read The Baby Whisperer Solves All Your Problems which was recommended to me by someone on mumsnet. DS will now nap in his cot during the day and sleeps better (but not all the way through the night yet but I live in hope!) This is the baby who had to be rocked to sleep and would only nap in his pram just a week ago. But again it depends how old your LO is, sometimes we expect a lot when they're just not ready.....

I tried swaddling a couple of times but DD hates it. I've just started to put her in a sleeping bag rather than sheets and blankets which she does seem to like. Last night she went down sleepy but still awake and fell asleep within 5 mins but she woke up for a feed at at 01:40 so I'm back to looking a bit tired and far less smug today! I think that she got so distracted during feeds yesterday that she missed one out competely and decided that the middle of the night would be a fun time to catch up on her milk quota. Today I'm going to try and stuff her full of BM so that she 'sleeps like a baby' tonight

I've got The no Cry Sleep Solution and must try to read a bit more of it. I think that I'm managing to get DD to sleep without relying on the breast too much but she still likes to be held. I'm dreading her growing out of her bouncy chair soon because then I'll have to deal with nap times becoming a battle as well!

my DD is only 7 weeks old..... last 2 nights have been fairly hellish, with her waking every 1-2 hours, and then not settling down to sleep again for ages. Also - it is still taking me about 2 hours each evening to settle her to sleeep. She likes to fall asleep in my arms - have tried putting her down when she is still awake, but she just cries so I pick her up again. Cannot bear to let her cry.
She does get wind (worst at about 5am for some reason) - but does not seem to suffer with wind so muchearly evening/earlier in the night.
I have just bought the Pantley book - will read it avidly today, and try to implement it, because need to get some sleep.... my friends babies seem to wake maybe 2 or 3 times during the night. That would be fantastic!!!

Madigan - everyone in real life has better sleeping babies then we do . I finally found one mum last week who admitted to putting DD to bed asleep otherwise they all seem to self-settle at 7pm. To be fair, DS does only wake once or twice at night once finally settled (at the moment - its as though he reads what I write here and then moves the goalposts!) so I can't complain there.

I think my problems only started around week 7 of putting DS to bed asleep and him promptly waking up and howling. I also know that there's no point in leaving DS to cry since that isn't going to get him to sleep. Picking up/calming/putting down and various distraction techniques - e.g. cot mobile etc - have occasionally worked. Consistancy is supposed to be the key. We're still working on things so can't offer much practical advice. Your T-shirt (pulled over matress of moses basket) may help, alternatively breast pads. Have you tried swaddling as Lovelace suggests... sadly DS hates it.

Also, is DD waking hungry? ... it may be a growth spurt which will pass in a few days. Keep posting about how you are getting on, and keep with the bedtime routine!

Swaliswan, how are you making progress? You can buy bigger bouncy chairs so you may not need to address naps for another year or so . Think I may need a bigger pram soon!

The latest on DD is that she is waking up even more at night because she is hungry. I still think that she is getting distracted during the day and makes up for it at night time. She is still feeding quite a lot in the evening and won't go to sleep until she is 100% full of milk - 99% just won't do! She is getting back to her usual self of being able to settle herself to sleep if she is VERY sleepy.

A couple of nights ago she got me up just before 2am (again) and then never let me get back to sleep properly until the following afternoon when she had a nap. I'm not sure if she might be having a growth spurt. I'm trying every trick possible to stop her from being so distracted and have avoided going out unless necessary for a few days so that I'm not feeding her in new and distracting places. I've managed to feed her a lot today and she has just gone down in her cot (awake) after a bit of a false start (fell asleep on the boob and woke up about 30 mins later). It sounds like she has stopped making little noises so is either watching her mobile or is asleep.

I'm a bit bothered about getting this going to bed malarky under control as DH has a medals presentation during an evening in a couple of months and I would like my mum to babysit. DD won't take a bottle so I really need her to be asleep before we go out

Swaliswan, really sorry to hear about the increased wakings, hope last night was better following increased feeding. Pleased to hear that DD is getting back to settling herself. Don't worry too much at the moment about the medals parade ... two months is a long time in the world of a baby, just keep up the good work. DD may use a cup by then so the feeding may no be an issue.

DS also woke twice last night which really threw me, though think this was because he missed most of a feed yesterday when I tried some formula since I hadn't expressed enough milk to take with me. Safe to say, he wasn't too keen on it and just looked at me as though to say 'what the hell is this?'. He then breastfed enough to wash the taste of formula out of his mouth. At least, I hope that he hasn't forgotten how to settle himself when he wakes at night (he can do it if he hasn't been picked up by us, or could)!

Just tried to put DS in cot for nap which clearly wasn't going to work so have just had to BF to sleep.