6 Week old getting fractious and unable to settle in the evenings / night - what can help?

[babysaurus]

My placid-up-till now DS has been getting increasingly fractious and difficult to settle these last few days (last night I was unable to get him to sleep until 4am!)

We are not doing anything diffferently, and I do realise that babies go through both good and bad phases constantly but I am wondering (as too tired to think of stuff myself) if anyone can tell me of something that may help or at least ease things? I know of a few babies that have gone through patches of this too and am also curious why if anyone out there knows...?

When this happens, we check he is not hungry / wet / dirty / windy or in need of a cuddle and I have also tried some white noise (hairdryer at 3.30am this morning) but to no avail. He goes all thrashy and cross and doesn't like being put down and is basically close on impossible to settle.

Can possibly think of more details in a bit but currently too tired so will post this now! Thanks in advance!

My 8 week old has been doing something similar last week or so. I think (nb this is based on no professional knowledge!) that their sleep patterns are changing from newborn (sleep most of the time) to having more awake time - but it's hard for them (and us) to know when they need to sleep, and indeed how to make them sleep.
Annoyingly, once they have been awake too long (ie more than about 2.5 hours) they start getting doo-lally with tiredness and can't go to sleep - which kind of defeats everything.
In terms of solutions, we have just introduced a dummy, which doesn't make him sleep but does keep him quiet! So he chomps on that kind of half asleep from early evening til first night feed - then has some booby and passes out.
Also from around now-12 weeks is apparently the time to (try to!) get a bedtime pattern going in the hope they will turn into a magically good sleeper-through-the-night... (this is my second, it NEVER happened with the first)

Sorry not to be more help - but thought you might like to know you're not alone :)

Knowing we are not alone is wonderful to hear!

Interesting what you say about the sleep patterns, and that does make a lot of sense. He is getting more and more alert but certainly more so in the evening / night and also, last night especially, seemed overtired and a bit doolally as you put it.

At the moment we have not tried to get him into any kind of routine as he was sleeping most of the time anyway and also it seemed a bit pointless when he was so tiny. I have it at the back of my mind, also based on vague things I may have probably read, that it would be pointless to try and get a routine as such going for bed time until he is at least 10 - 12 weeks old. Hence, we currently have him with us (he is, or was until the last few days, asleep) downstairs and then take him up with us after his last feed about midnight (he currently eats every two hours - he is like a hoover!!)

We use a dummy at night time but he seems to spend so much time spitting it out and then crying because he wants it back in that I am starting to wonder if it is counter productive. Hence, me resorting to the hairdryer at 3.30am!

Try googling 'Dr Sears soothing fussy baby' - we used some of his ideas when dd was tiny, you just have to experiment to find what works for your baby. The only thing that would work for dd (when feeding failed) for a time was walking around doing a gentle bounce and singing the same song over and over... 20 minutes of that and she'd normally be calm/asleep. It was hard work!

I've started following baby whisperer with my 7 week old DD and though it's taken 2 weeks I'd say we are now in a pretty good routine. I really found that doing last feed in quiet dark of our bedroom then putting her down to sleep where she will wake up, has made a massive difference. We have bit of feed after a nap then bath then into bedroom to finish feed. I swaddle her at an appropriate break in the feed then do last bit of feed while she is swaddled. Same thing every night in that order though time does vary slightly but last feed started no later then 8.

I really recommend baby whisperer, it's made a huge difference for us!

Do you still keep him downstairs with you in the evening? If so, you could try putting him to bed - DD was like this at that age and it turned out she was overtired/overstimulated and just wanted a bit of peace to sleep, so I started giving her a bath (in the sink! ) in the evening instead of the morning and putting her to bed in a quiet, darkened room rather than keeping her down with us.

About 5w our DD really started playing up in the evenings and it turned out that it was overstimulation and she couldn't cope with being in the living room with the lights and TV. We started a bedtime routine then, bath and bottle and bed in a dark room by 8, and that made so much difference. She wanted to to 'go to bed', she'd got her head around daytime and nighttime and wanted some peace and quiet in the evening. We also discovered by accident at this point that she would self-settle if she was wound down, calm and in a dark room, so it might be worth experimenting with this?

Agree YYY to the Baby Whisperer. Its a very flexible routine, well in fact its more structure than routine, but we followed it from about 4w and we're only just dropping it now at 22w.

Hi all, I am sorry for the late reply, I didn't check the threads I am on for a few days.
I have tried to put him to bed (wound down from 7pm, took him upstairs, last feed etc) and then tried to get him into bed. Frustratingly, even though he was half asleep when I put him down and I stayed next to the Moses basket and put my hand on his middle so he knew I was there, he livened up again. And then got tetchy. I am now downstairs with him again as I am bloody hungry and in need of wine and he's still not asleep two and a bit hours later. Grr.
In a bad mood now!
If anyone is still reading this, I would like to know how long it took for the baby to make the 'going to bed' association? I thought he would be far too young at 6 nearly 7 weeks but after reading the last few posts and wondering if it is in fact overstimulation making him tired.

We started much later than that in terms of evening time - it started with putting her to bed at around 10.30pm whilst my bath was running, then gradually moved to 9pm, then 8.30pm then eventually when she was about 10 months I moved it to 7.30pm bedtime. You could try taking him up at 8pm with the hope of getting him down at 9pm.

typing with one hand so no caps>
thanks emsyj, i did wonder if something like that may help. will try that tomorrow. too grumpy and hungry now!

emssj, do you think he is too young at nearly 7 weeks? just seen the age of your dc

I have a vague idea that DD was about 6/8 weeks (hard to remember exactly) when I started putting her down - initially I just wanted to have a bath in peace, and I discovered just by chance that she fell asleep in the carrycot when I left her in the bedroom whilst I had a bath. After a week or two of that, I started doing a 'bedtime routine'.

There is another thread somewhere about bedtimes and 'getting your evening back' where it has been pointed out that babies are supposed to sleep with an adult in the room until 6 months, including for naps and in the evening. My personal experience is that, unless you want to go to bed at 8pm (which you may do occasionally I suppose) this isn't very practical, but it might be as well to read the SIDS guidance and make your own choices. I don't know anyone who kept their baby with them in the evening until 6 months, but it's something you should be informed about before you decide. There is no way DD would have slept downstairs with us until we went to bed until 6mo.

Persevere with a bedtime routine. Bath, feed bed in darkened room. Also could he have colicky type symptoms?
The info about over tiredness is sooooo right. I used this rule with daytime naps. If your baby wakes at 7am by 9am they are ready for more sleep. Darkened room again might get some protest but only a few minutes! Good luck

It took our baby a while to realise that this was 'bedtime', probably a good week or two. However one thing we did discover by accident was that she would settle herself. She did exactly what you describe, seeming to be mostly asleep then waking up when I put her in the basket and sat by her side. One night I was getting so frustrated that I knew I had to leave the room for a few minutes to calm myself - and while I was gone, she fell asleep! So if you are struggling it might be worth stepping outside the room and just seeing what your son does if he is left 'alone' in a calm, dark room while he is full and tired. (I honestly think if we hadn't learnt this by accident we would still be having a nightmare 5mo later).

I just fed both of mine into a stupor every night and that seemed to work ok!

my dd is a thrasher and when she was wee i used a swaddle, one of the pre-made ones with velcro. it really helped as it indicated to her it was bed time and the cue would send her eyes drooping. never very tight, in fact she could easily get her arms out and often did, but it helped us :)

thanks for all the replies. I posted again last night but the laptop started crashing so I lost it (this didn't help the bad mood I was already in.) I shall try your suggestions and get back to you.

Pod3030 I semi swaddle him anyway as he seems to like it but only sometimes, it depends on his mood.