My child will not sleep

[JuneBug94]

16 month old DD who I love more than anything in this world.

She's been in her own room since 6 months and as a whole she's slept really well from 4/5 months.

We have a rough routine but we've never been strict with it as we have always followed her lead.

Dinner at 6pm, bath every other night, cuddles and a story with some milk and in bed by 7.30/8. Sometimes earlier sometimes later depending on how tired she is. We put her down drowsy but awake and she has always been able to self settle since she's found her thumb.
Wakes up anytime between 6 and 6.30. Lovely.

She only has one nap a day now normally around 11am for 1hr 30 minutes. Occasionally she'll have a car nap in the afternoon if we're travelling.

The past 2 weeks she has been waking up at 11pm and not sleeping again until 4. Then will wake up at 6/6.30. We've been doing the minimal chat, going in and patting and sushing and saying 'bed time' but after 2 hours she's in such a state we end up getting her in with us. She just wants to play. She kicks and cries and wants her toys. It's flooring us. Me and DH are both doing our fair share but as she's bigger now her cry is loud and none of us end up sleeping. It's killing us both as we have to be up for work at 6.30 anyway.

Any suggestions? She could possibly be teething. I've given her teething granules, she's not poorly, nappies are normal. If we have her toys and let her play during the night she's happy as Larry so I don't think she's in pain.

Any suggestions? She's sleeping worse now than she did as a newborn. We're probably struggling now more than when she's tiny as we're getting 4 hours sleep tops and it's been every night for the last 15 days.

Please help a tired mum I'm on my bloody knees!

Hopeful bump

I'm no expert but we had long long wake ups in the middle of the night too and my cry for help resulted in lots of people saying she is over tired. We moved bed time earlier and it helped a lot.

In my experience it's too much day sleep. Reduce her nap in the day.

One of mine dropped her nap altogether at 18 months, the other would night wake exactly as you've described if she had longer than 45 mins at lunch time. So, gradually reduce her nap and if she's shattered bring bed time forward while she adjusts.

I'd personally wake after an hour and the gradually reduce (a minute or so a day) until you get to 45 mins. And see how you go. If you reduce to an hour and she's sleeping well at night leaver her there for a bit.

Thank you, I'm going to do that.

We've been out and about today in the sun and she only had 20 minutes in the car so no real nap.

I'll try and keep her awake until bed time and see what happens tonight.
Tomorrow I'll start dropping back her morning nap and see how I get on. Thank you!

With her nap being very short today you may find she's really cranky. You could adjust bedtime to 18:15/18:30 ish and bring it forward a bit if she's really tired.

Thank you, that's what I'm aiming for. She's a bit moody now but keeping her occupied. Going to give her dinner at 5, then do a slow bath story and bed at 6.15/6.30 and see how we go. Fingers crossed as we're up at 5am tomorrow for a long drive!

I'm going to work on bringing her bedtime forward too, I'll do this with reducing her nap time in the morning. Thank you for your help!

Classic split nights.

www.facebook.com/watch/live/?ref=watch_permalink&v=891445324626924

I'd wonder if the nap is too early and then too long between waking and bedtime. I'd try moving it to 12.30 or 1 and then waking her up by 2.30/3 if she doesn't wake herself.

[quote BertieBotts]Classic split nights.

www.facebook.com/watch/live/?ref=watch_permalink&v=891445324626924[/quote]
This was so informative! And really interesting too.

Thank you, I will be going back to this and using this moving forward. What she was saying resonated so much!

I agree with pp, the nap is too early in the day so she's going too long between nap and bed and getting overtired. I'd shift the nap back gradually until its after lunch, 1-2ish and make sure she's awake by 2.30 latest.

I really love her in general for sleep stuff. Definitely worth a follow if you're on FB or instagram often :)

We had a massive problem with sleep (I was up 7-8 times at night and he barely had any naps during the day) and we eventually turned for a professional help from a sleeping consultant (best spent money ever!).
Strict routine and teaching little one to self soothe worked for us.
Also, trying to shorten little ones naps is a big mistake as they sleep less at night if they're overtired.
Now, our 15mo sleeps 11-12 h at night, half hour nap in the morning and 2h nap in the afternoon and actually goes to his bedroom and takes the sleeping bag himself as he is ready for bed.
Good luck!