Please help: 10 week old who WILL NOT sleep between 7 & 10.30

[shouldIbecrossaboutthis]

My son is adorable & I love him to pieces but every night is getting more and more frustrating with his early evening sleep. He is tired. He is exhausted in fact but he will not go to sleep.

I can't hold him, rock him, pat him, put him in a sling, drive him in the car etc etc as I have a broken back and he weighs 14lbs.

I have DP but he is useless. The baby gooes down fine for all his other naps and sleeps long stretches at night. He isn't hungry, dirty or windy so why dear god does he do this? He can't be over tired as he has only been awake for 50 minutes! I've tried chaning his 'awake' time before bed but it makes no difference.

Please don't misunderstand this thread, I am not upset that my baby doesn't sleep enough, I'm upset that he is tired & crying because of it but I am phsyically unable to soothe him!

ARGH! I breasfeed by the way and that doesn't help :(

My DS was exactly the same! But I think when he got to between 3 and 4 months old he started to go to bed earlier.

I do have a theory - the evening is probably the most active part of my day, and I think he got used to it in utero. So most of his movements were late in the evening, which carried on when he was born.

DS slept 8 hours at 7 weeks, 11-7, it all stopped at the 4 months sleep regression, sorry to say!

You can't make them sleep if they don't want to. So don't beat yourself up :) (This applies at all stages of parenting!)

Sounds a bit strange, but I wonder if when you leave the swimming pool you tell him so, as in "Come on then X, let's go and get changed shall we?" in that sort of absent-minded, forgetting they can't reply yet way. It might be worth trying just talking to him before you take him out of the bath saying "Okay, bath's finished now, time for a nice snuggly warm towel and then you can have your bottle" - I know this sounds BONKERS as he can't understand but I think they're more sensitive to feelings etc than we give them credit for and the fact you're trying to communicate to him that there's about to be a change, he might pick up on that and feel more prepared for it.

If you want to try and help him sleep but you can't cuddle him, what about a swing, or one of those hammock type baby beds so that he feels cradled. Or you could put him into your (adult) bed and lie down next to him with your eyes gently closed (babies will often copy your expression so this is a good way to trick them into falling asleep!) then if you don't feel comfortable co sleeping, maybe DH could move him into his cot when he's deeply asleep.

unsettled evenings very normal - read up on cluster feedings and fussy evenings on kellymom.

at 10 weeks my baby would absolutely not have been asleep at that time. Newborn babies don't settle in the evening at an 'early ' time until about 3 months.....I have read that somewhere and it is also my experience.

I think you are pushing against his natural rhythm - I know it's awful when they cry a lot in the evening but it's very very normal - I think it's because they need to cluster feed at that time.

You are getting an amazing stretch of sleep from him - which as other said , will probably stop when he hits 4 months - try not to worry - he will begin to settle earlier.

MY DS is 8 months and goes to sleep at 630pm - I would have KILLED for such an early bedtime when he was 10 weeks old, but he arrived at that time naturally - just gradually started falling asleep earlier and earlier and stopping the evening crying at about 3 months.

My baby is almost 9 weeks old and has hardly slept through the day from around 5 weeks, but she does sleep really well at night from 10ish at night till 5.30am ish. Has a feed then goes back down for another 2-3hours. But she ll be awake for most of the day

And she doesnt sleep in the evening, i just entertain her. Its not a problem for me if she doesnt sleep b4 10pm

Thanks everyone for the advice and suggestions, Berite I will give it a try and see what happens. I woke him this morning at 8am, he was up for an hour before looking tired again and has been asleep 9-still asleep now!

Our baby was like this- we thought we were doing something wrong but in retrospect she was just naturally awake for most of the evening. It got to be a bit of a pain though, especially since she fussed a lot. We started at midnight and moved her bedtime - ie the time we started rocking her to sleep - back by 20 minutes every few days. Eventually we got her to 8pm but not until 4 months or so.

My 2 DS followed roughly this routine at that age.

Awake at 6/7am
Nap at 9.30 for an hour
Nap after lunch
Nap late afternoon (4 ish)
Bed at 9/10pm

Once they dropped the late afternoon nap they went to bed at 7/ 7.30 but they were older then.

My first never went to bed before about 10pm until he was nearly 1 (he had had several sleeps during the day I hasten to add!). Really wouldn't worry about it. Someone mentioned cluster feeding - that might be what he wants.

And don't wake him if he isn't awake at 8am. That way lies madness!

10wks is sooo little. Neither of mine had any sort of routine at that age. Just go with the flow and keep him close (as that is probably all he wants).

You are doing great btw!

Yep - that routine sounds roughly like my first upinthhills. Second one, not so much, but we'll not go there (as getting more than 3hrs sleep out of him is a miracle).

Yes - I spent most evenings in the living room with a child on the boob cluster feeding - watched a lot of tv! Would recommend some boxed sets for Christmas - see it as an opportunity to catch up on a great programmes - would recommend The Killing 1,2,3 if you've not seen!

The trouble with advice on stuff like this is that all babies are different.
We wake DS (14 weeks) up every morning at 7 and he needs to go back to bed between 1 and 1.5 hours later.

I then bath and put him to bed at 7. He sleeps till 4am and has done for many weeks.

However, I dont think its anything I am doing really, I think thats just how he is. His brother never slept!!
Sorry, thats not really helpful, but I do think you can get so het up in trying to have a routine and keep taking on peoples advice, so that baby is really confused!

Easier said than done, but just try and go with HIS flow.

Big thanks to Bertie! I put DS on my bed after his bath held him for as long as I was able and then lay with him with my eyes closed might have had a sneaky nap too! and he has been asleep for the last hour so hopefully he wont be so frazzled at 11pm.

Who knows if this will work long term, but thank you Bertie!

Haha, yay glad it worked!