Running Away

[CupcakesAndCastles]

My 8month old son sleeps terribly. We start his bedtime routine around 6:15 and usually feed to sleep around 7. From that moment when he drops off, I struggle to get him into his cot as he seems to wake as soon as I think about putting him in there. He will then wake almost hourly if not more.

This is seriously beginning to effect my mental health as I dread bedtime and end up most nights crying. I want some me time but never get this. He won’t settle for bed with his dad and I don’t know what else to do as currently I feel like running away.

I don’t want to co sleep as I don’t feel comfortable doing this.

Does anyone have any ideas?

Poor you. It will get better.

My son was the same. I was told that until a child learns to settle themselves to sleep they will not sleep through. This is advice for older babies, not new borns btw

This is a bit controversial, and we only did it after trying everything else, but we let him cry it out, while still checking on him. He was 7 months so we knew he wasn't hungry. We got rid of his dummy which wasn't helping as he woke up when it fell out. We stopped feeding him to sleep and we left him to go off to sleep on his own. The first night was hell. He cried for almost 2 hours. We nearly gave in but then he fell asleep and woke only once. The next night he cried for 20 mins and then every night after that slept through with no night waking (he'd been waking every 2 hours). A lot of people think it's cruel but after that one night he was always a well rested happy baby in the morning with a mum who felt mentally well! It was like he needed to be taught to do it on his own. From then on he had his feed, then stories and then in to his cot awake. We were militant with the routine but I think it helped. The evenings were ours and we got a full nights sleep (well, until about 5.30 but I could cope with that...and that too eventually stopped).

It will get better, however you choose to tackle it but that's what worked for us.