18 month old won't sleep!

[squiddybear]

Loosing the will too live a bit here.
DS has for the last few nights been really bad with sleep, he is cutting molars so I think it's partially that but I'm exhausted! He went to bed eventually at 9:35pm, he then woke up at 11pm and again at 12am and just screamed and screamed. I ended up bringing him down as he was inconsolable.
He had some calpol for teeth then we gave him some warm milk at about 1am and stared bedtime again. Once again screamed and screamed so I sat downstairs with him until 2:30am. He fell asleep on me so I carried him up and put him down. Walk out the room and he starts screaming again. At this point DP came in and got him off at about 3am.
He then woke again at about 4am and we've been downstairs since as he just screams in his room and I'm concerned about the neighbours.

I don't know what to do. Any advice?

Bless him! Have you tried bringing him into bed with you?

Is it possible that he's suffering from nightmares? Does he eat enough before he goes to bed?

Perhaps leaving a small light on in his room during the night can help.
Our DS was also waking a lot at 16 months old, it stopped the moment we put up a protective amulet in his room that we got from a Buddhist Temple. I know some might laugh at this idea but I felt a few times there was 'something' in his room and he kept looking at things I couldn't see and 'talking' to them. We figured out some divine protection might help and he is sleeping so much better now. I put up the same type of amulet in our bedroom as I was suffering from nightmares nearly every night and this has also stopped.

@TwinMum89 yep we've tried bringing him in and he hates it no idea why he always has!
@LaBellina were in a new build so hoping it's spirit free! DP did suggest nightmares though

Just wondered if it might be to do with his ears? I know when mine were little if they had an ear infection lying down made it so much worse. Hope you all manage to get some sleep.

@Kat2000 he doesn't seem to have any symptoms but will keep it in mind.
He's just gone back down so fingers crossed he'll have an hour or so

When my DD was cutting her molars she was really affected by the pain. And it went on for weeks and weeks cos they took so long to come through. It really affected her sleep. Calpol did nothing for her when teething, so we would use Nurofen and anbesol. She'd often still wake around 3am so she would just come into our bed at this point. We worked on resettling her in her own room once the molars where through. This happened she was 18 months (Christmas 2018) and then again (second set of molars and final teeth thankfully!) at 2.5 years old (Christmas 2019). I wouldn't underplay how painful pushing molars can be for toddlers. A lot of what you're describing is exactly how DD was during these molars teething phase. I remember my DH had to at one point just lie with her on our bed until she fell asleep, and then transfer her. This was after she had been falling asleep independently for months and months! Even with her usual teething meds.

We use ibuprofen for teething as I read somewhere that it's better due to the anti inflammatory aspect. Maybe give that a go? We also use bonjella and anbesol on his dummy/on the back of a spoon to get it into his gums as well as teething granules.

My little boy is just a bit older than yours (21 months) and had all of his teeth by 19 months. It's so so so hard and like you we were/are also worried about the neighbours! He went through a stage right at the end where he would do exactly what you're describing with the screaming blue murder if we left the room (he'd just sit there looking at you quietly if you were in the room) and we dealt with it by slowly backing away from the cot towards the door, then sitting with the door half ajar, then eventually moving away from the door to sit on the stairs (where he can't see us) but leaving the room door ajar. We also have a light on in his hallway as well as a blue night light in the room. We also used to occasionally take the spare pushchair upto his room and rock him to sleep in that, we've only had him in our bed a handful of times in his life as I'm terrified of squashing him and we didn't want to make him want to sleep with us. It took hours and hours and was relentless some nights (we fortunately have a spare room so could do shifts) but he's now back to putting himself to sleep again.