Please please baby sleep help at 9mo - am desperate

[AtlasLand]

I know it's a question that people always ask on here but I'm desperate so any help you can give I'd be so grateful!

My 9mo dd started waking up in the night frequently at about 8mo. Before that she slept through the night. At first we were feeding her (she is FF) but having found out about sleep regressions we decided to wean her off the milk at night- we did this cold turkey and it was fine. She was clearly only taking milk for comfort. However, she is still waking up loads. Is there anything else I can do? I'm shattered beyond belief at the moment and struggling with no childcare bubble or help. I don't know how I go on.

She is frequently waking due to rolling around and squeezing herself into different positions in the cot. She then cries. I've been trying pick up put down sleep training, so I remain neutral but pick her up till she stops crying then put her down again. This can go on for hours and hours. She might drop off for 10 minutes but then wake again crying. If I cradle her she will fall asleep. A sip of water will also make her fall asleep. But as soon as I put her back in the cot she wakes up and cries. She obviously wants comfort and has separation anxiety but what can I do?

The situation is not helped by the fact she's still in our room. Due to husband wfh there's no other space.

Does anyone have any advice at all please, if you've been through this?

Bumping this, hoping someone may be able to suggest anything

You say that she found comfort from having a bottle in the night when she would wake? I'd probably just do that again.

I was giving my DD a bottle in the night till she was nearly 2. She'd wake once, I'd give her a bottle, she'd have 2 gulps then fall back asleep. I knew she was only doing it for comfort, not hunger, but I didn't care, I needed my sleep! She's 2.5 now and sleep through with no wake ups.

Hope you find a solution OP. Sleep deprivation is brutal.

Won't be a popular opinion, but I would try co-sleeping if you're really desperate for some sleep yourself.
Also second the return of the bottle in the night. She's still quite young and night feeds are normal at her age.

Stop doing what you think you're 'supposed to do' and provide comfort for her. Give her milk and co-sleep. She may still wake up but you can be next to her and you can both fall straight back to sleep.

How does she fall asleep at night?

And for the record I have an 11-month-old who isn't a great sleeper, it's the only way we survive!

Is there any way she can go into the other room, even if it is an office during the day? She's not going to get out of her cot so it doesn't matter for now and you'd be surprised how much you're waking her, especially if you're exhausted and therefore probably snoring.
Also, is she having a nice big tea before bed?

Oh, and we swore by dreams

I don't think I was very clear in my OP, sorry. She has been sleeping terribly in spite of having milk. She used to sleep well and just have one night feed, but then at 8mo just started waking up all through the night. At first we were giving more milk each time she woke, but then she was drinking way too much milk at night. The HV said she should be on water so we tried night weaning. She now still wakes but has a sip of water not milk. This behaviour has remained the same with or without milk iyswim. So to clarify, even if we give her milk she still won't sleep.

Third time lucky
We swore by dreamfeeds at that age. Around 10pm, a whole bottle and then back to bed.

Re co-sleeping, I tried this. It was awful as I felt so hyper-vigilant in case I'd roll in her or she'd fall or something. I also found the position really uncomfortable, not being able to shift or roll over. What with that and worrying about her I lay awake all night all tense and next day my whole body ached. I don't know how people do it - no judgement at all - but I couldn't relax and stop being vigilant about her in the bed.

I think its likely to be a phase - has it lasted more than six weeks? For us, sleep improved a bit at that age, but we were co-sleeping on a mattress on the floor. We found that she'd wriggle, wake, be comforted to realise you were there, and go back to sleep. Tbh that was the pattern for the next year: if there was a warm body next to her she'd briefly wake once, squawk, then go back to sleep if you put your hand on her belly. Approaching two she seemed to shift in her patterns and we worked on leaving her alone in the room and now she sleeps straight through like a dream, but I think there are definitely stages where their sleep shifts. Ours went through one about 9 months - in our case night weaning worked, and she mostly stopped waking (would wake once for a belly rub) but she did need the comfort of knowing someone is near. I'd maybe try giving in and giving cuddles on demand for a week and see what happens?

Ours is 10 months now and has been noticeable more wakeful last few weeks.

One thing I’ve found works over the last few weeks is to just cuddle him because every single time there is something wrong. He’s uncomfortable or in pain and cannot tell us. He’s had teeth erupting, diarrhoea, cold/cough amongst other things and sometimes it’s not apparent until the morning. There always seems to be something at the moment and he usually goes back with a drink of water and a cuddle.

We co sleep but just moved into his room with a mattress on the floor to get him used to his own room.

Dream feed, bottle instead of water, white noise.
Co sleep, if done safely it’s fine.
I co slept when I returned to work as I wasn’t coping with no sleep at my desk the next day and it worked. Everyone was having a good nights sleep resulting in a happier mood next day!

Oh and re co-sleeping: we actually set up a mattress on floor with her cot, with the side taken off, beside it. So no fear of rolling on her but physically adjacent to her (it was insane but we were desperate for sleep) It seemed to work

@HeeeeeyBogie

Is there any way she can go into the other room, even if it is an office during the day? She's not going to get out of her cot so it doesn't matter for now and you'd be surprised how much you're waking her, especially if you're exhausted and therefore probably snoring. Also, is she having a nice big tea before bed?

I'd like that but a) how would we do her two day naps? And b) DH works till late in the evening so past her bedtime.

Also even if we had a spare room do you think this would really make a difference? All the wakings up would mean constantly getting up and going next door. I'm not clear on how much of a difference sleeping alone would make, but I'd love to know.

Mine is like this at the moment and I co sleep from the first wake up after I've gone to bed, before that I just resettle her. Then she has one night feed like usual when she next wakes. I get what you mean though, sleep quality for you co sleeping isn't great. My partner and I do a night each with her whilst the other sleeps in the spare room so we at least get some full nights sleep each, is that something you could do?

@AtlasLand I read this thread in hope of answers myself. I fully sympathise as a mother of an 11 month old who is becoming a real pickle at night. She has never slept through but would feed back to sleep. Since teething (and more so this last month as her top front 4 teeth were all on the move at the same time) she has become more and more clingy. Co sleeping if I just can't get her to sleep in her own cot and room has got me through to where I am. She still has breast feeds but her issue over night is teeth and really really bad trapped wind. Yesterday I removed her cot and have her in a floor bed in her room so I can let next to her and get her back to sleep in her own bed. I have a white noise machine and a little night light turning up this week in the hope it might help.

All I can say is that it does get better! I have a 17 year old son who didn't sleep through till 18 months just suddenly had it all click and I never looked back. As a teenager now he never wants to get out of bed. I'm going down the route with my daughter that if she needs comfort I'll give it to her as all too soon she will not need it

Re cosleeping position: yes, when I started I was the same but we put him in a place where we can’t smother/roll on him now and everyone gets a great sleep.

We both sleep like this and he’s up where our pillows are except we have tiny pillows just big enough for our heads. So we can’t smother him with the quilt because we’d have to cover our own heads first and that’s the stuff of nightmares, we can’t roll into him and he can’t climb off without waking us up.

For naps could she go into your room? Or him move into your room to wfh?
My point is that she might not wake as much at all if she isn't sharing with you at night so there'd be no need to keep going through. Both of mine slept much better away from our noise.

I'd try her in her own room as PP said, it made a huge difference to us as our LO is such a light sleeper. Every sniffle, fart and change of position was disturbing her! It's worth a try!

If you're worried about rolling over her (it doesn't happen nearly as often as you might think, unless you drink alcohol or take drugs or medicine that makes you sleepy) you could attach her cot with one side off to the side of your bed, so her bed is an extension of yours. She's still really young and needs comfort, it's not her whim but her need and you're not making a rod for your own back.

How much is she sleeping in the day, OP? It could be that she isn’t tired enough. My 9m old has 1.5h (20-30 mins in the morning, an hour-ish at lunch) and if I let her have more then we get a restless night too.

I sleep trained DC2 and DC3 focusing on the daytime naps (self-settling and length) then after night weaning the nights seemed to sort themselves out, with help from DH.

Co-sleeping isn’t always the magic bullet that people think it is. I co-slept with DC2 and around 9m his sleep became just dreadful - I BF on demand but it somehow wasn’t enough and I ended up walking him around the room all night to re-settle him. Nearly broke me! I had post-birth POP and couldn’t cope. Sleep training saved us all, and he was a far happier baby once he was getting a full night’s sleep.

@fretnot what kind of sleep training did you do? We already sleep trained her before all of this and she was sleeping brilliantly, so I don't know why it's suddenly gone bad.