What's the psychology that stops babies wanting to sleep

[kingfishergreen]

DD is 8 months old, often she will do anything she can possibly think of to avoid going to sleep, until she literally has no choice:

1. Babbling - usually charming, not when she can hardly keep her eyes open.

1. Squealing, repeatedly and with increasing annoyance.

1. Rolling over and over - even though she is so tired she can hardly lift her head.

1. Flapping her arms and legs.

1. Inspecting the label on her soft toy, very carefully.

I swear she faked doing a poo the other day.

...all to avoid the possibility of dropping off.

Why do they do this, what do they think is going to happen if they allow themselves to sleep?

If I understood the psychology I might know how to soothe her to sleep a bit better (and stop the nightly battle of wills).

My 16MO has always been like that. She's still like it now. My eldest two weren't. Baffles me.

It's so ANNOYING.

I love her to death, she is a lovely little girl, but we've been 'putting her to bed' for over an hour and half, and she will do ANYTHING not to go to sleep, despite her eyes rolling back and closing for the whole time.

Now she's crying, a grizzly cry, DH and I are taking it turns to stand by her cot and reassure her that everything's okay. If she just stopped for five seconds she'd be asleep.

I've never shouted at her (there's literally no point in scaring her) but MAN do I feel like shouting "JUST GO TO SLEEEEEEEEEP!"

Fear of Missing Out!

Something might happen! The world is so exiting!

It's cos the world is far too interesting to sleep. Has she dropped her third nap yet? It might be she's getting too much day sleep? I think at that age mine were doing 2 naps totalling 3 hours and then 11 hours at night. With lots of wake ups etc obvs! There are some good resources online re bedtime routines etc that be helpful.

Theyre naturally nosey. They want to see everything and everything they see is a valuable learning experience. If you're asleep you cant absorp all that amazing information.

She is the noisiest baby alive, I love that about her, she gets her sticky beak into everything (I think it's a sign of being very clever... of course...(PFB)). But trust me there is nothing going on to spur her FOMO right now. All DH and I want to do is sit quietly for 15 minutes then do the washing-up.

She sleeps two or three times during the day: usually 30 mins in the morning, 45 mins -1 hour at lunchtime and sometimes 30 in the early evening. I've been trying to encourage a longer midday nap. Most nap times she fights against it (spending 30
minutes putting her down for a 30 minute nap is disheartening).

Once she's asleep she's fine, usually 19:30 to 7am ish - sometimes with a bit of a wake-up at 4 or 5am just to test our reflexes.

They're prats.

nosiest rather than noisiest

They are total doofuses, Taylor, total... she has no idea how lovely a nice sleep in her lovely cot could be.

Does she need an early evening nap? I would say not if she then can't sleep in the mid evening! But I know it's hard when they are nearly dropping off.

Why are you waiting in the room, perhaps your presence is making it more exciting? Could you not just leave her babbling, or even slightly crying if not agitated, one of mine used to have a 5 minute protest cry when very sleepy, and then fall into a deep sleep. But if you stayed in there, it would have been too disturbing and she would just keep herself awake to find out if you were still there.

There's no magic solution, though, just time!

I know what you mean, it does seem a design flaw!

FourEyesAre I totally agree that maybe having us there too exciting so we tend to gradually retreat:

1. Say goodnight
2. Leave room and stand just the other side of the door
3. Cries
4. Come back, reassure her (stroke her cheek/hand, shush her)
5. She lollops around like a seal
6. Step away from the cot
7. She cries
8. Reassure her verbally we're there
9. She rolls over 80,000 times, repeatedly lifting her upper body of the bed and slapping it down because she's too tired to hold her head up

10. We put her back on her back, dummy, blanket 11. Stand by the door, she cries....

FOREVER

I wish I had the nerve to just walk away and let her 'cry it out' but we've never done it (once again PFB).

With the evening nap, if she's falling asleep wherever she is we put her down to sleep, if she's not we charge on until bath and bed time.

Not everyone is happy to leave a 8 month old to settle, including a bit of whingey crying, but the way I looked at it, it was far nicer for my dd to be asleep in 10 min and out of it for the whole night, than have hours of being unsettled. But lots of people do do the withdrawal/patting/shushing stuff and it seems to work, or they just get older anyway. I just know it would have been too exciting for one of mine, essentially you are prolonging the interaction (it seems to me).

I think if she's had an evening nap you have to accept a later bedtime that night, not the end of the world, but they won't just sleep 5-6pm then go down at 7.30 I wouldn't think.

It is a phase, it does pass!

I've found that interacting with DS (5mo) when he's in the fussy sleep fighting mode just makes it worse. Even eye contact is too much and sets him off into laughing/crying hysterics. What works best for us is to put him down in his bed or otherwise reduce stimulation e.g. close hood of pram and leave him to sing himself to sleep. Then again I'm confident I know the different cries he makes, if I hear the cry change or intensify away from the "going to sleep" type sounds, I go back to him.

I've got a real interest in the psychology of sleep in babies and toddlers. I would say that your version of gradual withdrawal is what is causing all of the sleep fighting. I would do Gradual Withdrawal, but I'm a very different way to you.

My explanation for the psychology is that your baby does not want you to leave. Knowing you are there helps baby feel secure enough to relax, knowing you are there.

Your constant trying to withdraw, leave baby, means that baby has learnt that the only means she has to stop you keaving is to stay awake. Baby knows that the moment she relaxes and stills (Never mind actually goes to sleep), you leave. And she doesn't want you to leave.

So she battles against going to sleep so that you don't leave her. She only eventually goes to sleep not because she feels secure, but because utter exhaustion means she cannot fight to keep you with her any longer.

Compare to my version of gradual withdrawal:

Stay with baby giving as much reassurance as baby needs. Don't move away from the cot in any way until baby is fully asleep.

I also add my hand on baby's chest/back so that baby can relax and close eyes and still feel that I am right there, even with eyes closed. Since eyes closing is a necessary step in going to sleep, this touch feeling has an important psychological role.

Because there was no battle to make me stay, going to sleep took 5 or 10 minutes usually. Never more than 15 minutes. It will take you a lot longer than this initially, because the trust is gone. Psychologically, baby doesn't trust that you are going to stay and comfort as much as is needed.

By 8 months I'd been gradually reducing how much reassurance was needed for several months. This doesn't mean leaving and coming back. It always means staying until fully asleep and always giving every bit of reassurance baby needs. But gradually refucibg how much reassurance baby needs.

So by 8 months I would be putting baby into the cot, stepping over to the other side of the room and leaning against the wall until baby was asleep. 5-10m it took. If baby needed any reassurance I'd go over, hand on chest/back until settled, then withdraw back when calm. Wait until asleep, then leave. By 12 months I was placing child into cot standing up, kiss nan night, leave and close the door.

Sorry for the rambling post - but you did ask.

Your actions are what are psychologically causing baby to battle going to sleep. Either:

• quickly get baby to understand you will not be there for her when she goes to sleep, so she needs to develop security in her own quickly

Or

• stay and provide the comforting presence, without the battle of "will mummy leave as soon as I go quiet?"

It's plausible that I've taught DD some bad habits by being too available and nicey-nicey at bedtime. She seems to bypass the whingy-sleep-crying and goes straight for fat-teared-howling... as soon as DH or I take a side step away from the cot.

Some nights she's great, some naps she's great, in general she's really nice, but when she's been consistently rejecting going to sleep for any period of time it feels like it'll ALWAYS be that way, or at least until she's 13.

I'm in bed now, and I can still hear the odd whimper down the intercom. No full wakings though.

Sorry FATE I didn't see your post.

You're right, I've actively stopped waiting until she's soundly asleep and started moving away from the cot when she's on the brink of sleep. The theory was to give her the tools to settle on her own so she's used to having that final little but of awake time with me stepped away from her bed (but still in the room or just outside it, visible and audible).

I wondered if it's worse knowing that when she is goes to sleep I leave, or thinking I'm still there and waking up realising I'm not.

She moved to her own room at 7 months, settling her was so much easier in our room, she was in a cosleeper so we could easily lie with her going to sleep and me with my hand on her back.

It's horrible to think she doesn't trust me, we've always been careful to reassure her and nurture her rather than letting her feel like she's been 'abandoned'.

I agree with Fate either commit to being in the room, even if you are reading a book in the corner or just leave her to it unless really distressed, then go in, pat, shush and leave again. I was happy to leave mine as I went back to work when youngest was 6 months, so needed her to be able to sleep without me physically present. One of mine was very distracted by me being in with her, the other was a great sleeper and just went off whatever the circumstance. Babies differ!

Don't worry about having messed it up- but it sounds like the combination of you having been next to her in a co-sleeper and having physically been present is quite a contrast to what's happening now. I didn't want to personally be the cue for sleep, so I was probably harsher than you would be prepared to be and perhaps all going back in together for now would be a way forward (you are putting them in their own room at the start of separation anxiety stage).

Great post Fate.
I hope it helps you OP.
I'm one for cuddling and touching til they settle. I know you're desperate for the break and to do normal boring stuff but you WILL miss these snuggles soooooo much in years to come.

It ties in with so many things and makes perfect sense:

1. She moved from our room
2. I returned to work (DH is with her the four days a week that I work).

Suddenly her sleep routine has gone from 'mummy will lie here next to me until I'm sound asleep' to 'mummy or daddy may try to sneak out if I close my eyes'.

That + the heat + weaning + the fact her room is next to the kitchen so susceptible to general end-of-day and dinner noises.

We need a re-boot. So we'll revert to staying with her until she's fully asleep... I will need a more comfortable chair in her room!

Then go back to pottering around in the room while she drops off (this is the stage she was at when we migrated her to her own room).

In my house until ds was about 1.9 rule one of baby club was never go back in (obviously unless he was very upset) it may have been when he was older than this I can't remember but it was a case of putting him in the cot awake (if he hadn't fallen asleep taking his bottle) night night see you in the morning kiss love you leave!!!
If he did do a little cry I kept an ear out for if it was getting worse or less (almost always less) if you stayed he would want out and get very upset same if you went back in and he saw you. If you left him to it he soon drifted off.