Need some advice please.

[Callisto]

My dd (1yo) has just lately become a very bad sleeper indeed. She has never been brilliant, but she was managing to sleep from about 7.30pm (bedtime) to midnight, have a feed and then sleep until 6.00 or 7.00am.

The last few nights she has been really unsettled and I have found it very difficult to get her to sleep - it was taking about 10 mins and now taking at least 30mins. When she is asleep she keeps waking herself up and it takes another 30mins to settle her again. She is very restless through the night and I have noticed that she is arching backwards.

She is a very happy girl in the day, shows no obvious signs of teething, eats for England, and we have had no upheavals of the slightest kind that could explain change of behaviour.
Any advice on why and what I can do would be great.

Anyone?

Does she nap during the day? Could be worth reducing the number of naps/length of them/it so she's more tried at night.

no idea I am afraid. Could be the lighter evenings, could be just a phase and finding it harder to settle. Could be a warmer room and waking up hot? Be careful to be consistent and avoid hanging around and forming a bad routine habit. It was at a similar age with my DD1 that I ended up sitting by her cot with her little hand having a handful of my hair to hold while she dropped off to sleep! Crazy situation and took me ages to break the habit of having me there and yet took only a couple of nights to establish it.
Hope someone else can be more use to you.

My normally fabulous sleeping 13 month old had a run of bad nights last week with no obvious teething signs then hey presto a premolar appeared so I reckon it was teeth after all. Might be worth trying calpol one night to see if it helps.

Hi Callisto, i know i may be totally wrong about this but i have a baby with acid reflux. it's a condition where the stomache forces back bits of acid up the oesophagus which is very much like severe heartburn. the reason why it springs to mind is because two of the main signs are back arching and restless sleep, they arch backwards to find a comfy position where the acid doesn't hurt them. the thing is, to my knowledge, it usually starts when they are babies (my son started with it at just 3 weeks old) but i thought i might mention it just in case, it's not a serious condition but can make them very uncomfortable and poor sleepers.

hth, billiejo. xx

It sounds just like that Billiejo, but how likely is it to start at 1yo? DD has always had a strong stomach - rarely vomiting even when tiny. If it carries on I shall see the doc about it. Thanks for the replies all.

yes, i think it would be rare for it to happen in older children...it may even be impossible tbh?? the one thing i would point out though is that there is a variation called "silent reflux" where there is no vomiting but lots of pain as the acid washes up and down the oesophagus.

billiejo.x

Well a tooth came through today so it was teething after all . Thanks so much for all responses.