Split night hell

[Orangepen13]

I am done.
my 7mo has always been a terrible sleeper at night (to her credit, she’s a great napper). The best we’ve managed is two wakes a night with co-sleeping. Without cosleeping is 10x worse.

over the last month her sleep has been getting worse and worse. She’s been waking 4 times a night consistently and the last week she’s woken for about an hour every night. If we try to get her to sleep she just screams and screams. I’ve been leaving her to just lie, kick about and explore my face (ie. scratch my face and pull my hair) as she’s not been crying but this morning has been hell. She’s been up since 4:30 and now we’ve given up, she’s been declared awake and is downstairs with dad (which I’m sure has just f£&@ed up her sleep routine so she’ll do this alll again tomorrow)

Ive tried longer naps, longer wake windows, earlier bed times, later bed times, earlier wake up, later wake ups. I’ve attached a photo of her sleep log (I haven’t marked her awake during night feeds, just when she’s actually awake). And now I’m done.

We’re all so tired, my partner and I are arguing constantly. She’s never been a happy baby (colic, reflux etc). She didn’t smile till 8 weeks, she’s only laughed once or twice, screams if I put her down and is not a settled baby at best of times, spending most of her time just going “err, err, err, err” no matter what we try.

I don’t know what to do. We can’t afford a sleep consultant, but this is affecting me so much, I actually wish we’d never had her, which makes me so sad to admit.

any tips or advice would be so appreciated

Oh OP, lots of love, you are clearly worn out and understandably so.
Can you contact the HV? One of my friends was referred to a sleep consultant that way.
With things being worse at the moment, could it be a developmental leap? I used to find the Wonder Weeks helpful in telling me things would get back to normal soon.

I feel for you! DS was the same. Really unsettled, unhappy baby - ehhh ehhh EHHH was our backdrop noise as well! Sleep was never good in the first year but months 6-9 ish were the absolute worst with multiple wake ups a night +/- split nights +/- 5am starts.

My first thought straight away would be drop to 2 naps and stick to it. 7 months is a completely age appropriate time to be on 2 naps. Night sleep has generally improved with every nap drop for us. Early morning starts are so frequently caused by too much or too early day sleep.

Re nights: I suppose it depends how nuclear you want to go. You could try sleep training and there are tons of methods available depending on how much crying your can tolerate. You definitely don’t need to pay an expensive sleep consultant - MN is so knowledgable on all things sleep! I think to be honest though, split nights are quite often not affected by sleep training. Sleep training relies on the premise that your DC is tired and ready to sleep. If they are awake and happy in the middle of the night, no amount of training is going to put them back again! It might therefore be just another phase to ride out…

Just to give you hope, we night weaned at about ten months and sleep go infinitely better. He’s now a really cheerful, easy toddler, so unsettled babies don’t stay that way, IME! X

Try dropping to 2 naps a day for at least 2 weeks.

How was the birth?
I recommend an cranial osteopath
Changed my life within days

We had this problem. DD started waking hourly and would only be held. It was awful. Our HV happened to come after a particularly bad run and saw that we were broken. She recommended we do some sleep training. She explained the Pick Up Put Down technique to us - i didnt want to do anything that left her to cry. We gave it a try and within two nights she was down to 2 wakes a night, which we can live with.

How does she fall to sleep? By herself or feeding, cuddles etc?

I recommend sleep training too. Ferber method saved me. My son was exactly like this and is now 2 and sleeps amazing

This sounds like absolute hell! Our second is just starting to sleep longer stretches at 9 months. Same as you tried everything. Nothing helped in any dramatic way but stopping feeding to sleep for naps helped a little, stopping bf on demand for night wake ups say no feeds from bedtime up to 11pm etc all helped a little incrementally. I'm so sorry you're feeling rubbish. It's shit. I felt like you in the middle of the night too but it will get better! One day at a time. You've got this 💪

Thank you so much everyone, this is all so helpful 😭 even just to know we’re not the only ones (which I know we’re not, but at 5am it feels v lonely!)

Id been feeling really split over sleep training. Maybe a good start is to wean off needing to feed with each wake… thinking about it her sleep was loads better when I wasn’t feeding each time she woke (I’ve been so exhausted I couldn’t face the fight). we’ve only just gone to three naps, she was a little early (37 wks) so feels like everything is a bit delayed. BUT trying to stretch out her first wake might be a good idea too

Thanks for the hope!

Completely agree with posters who said go to 2 naps! You seem to have a mix of 3 nap days and 4 nap days there! We went to 2 naps at 6.5 months, it was a rough first week while he adjusted to the longer wake windows but then he finally started sleeping through the night (maybe 5 nights out of 7) for the first time in his life! We do wake windows of 3/3.5/4.25.

Ive tried longer naps, longer wake windows, earlier bed times, later bed times, earlier wake up, later wake ups.

Have you given any new changes at least 3-5 days to see if they work? I doubt earlier bedtime/later wakeups will be the answer, I found my baby decreased his sleep needs at this age and started sleeping 15-20 minutes less per day. We use the same tracker app by the way!

Sorry just seen in your latest update that you've only just gone to 3 naps so it's probably a bit soon to push her to 2 naps! I'd recommend checking the average amount of sleep she gets per day (your app will tell you) and make sure you're not asking for more sleep then she can do.....for example if she sleeps 13 hours a day but you're putting her down for 3 hours of naps and a 12 hour night then she'll be waking because she can't sleep for 15 hours. Try and make your wake windows add up roughly to the amount to awake time she needs and make the last wake window the longest to build up sleep pressure before bed.

The confusing thing is, I don’t know if she’s undertired or overtired? I try to limit her naps to 2 hrs per day, which allows for 12 hrs over night (this has always been her normal). BUT now she has a huge deficit from the early wake ups, so do I let her nap longer to compensate (in case she’s overtired) or does this reduce her sleep pressure (waking her up early, keeping the cycle going)? Feels impossible!

I've heard mention of an app called Huckleberry that suggests when to put them down for naps and bed etc.

Huckleberry is brilliant. You can log everything on there to look for patterns yourself and if you pay for premium it will take all your data and tell you optimum nap times!

Most 7 months olds will still need 3 naps which add up to roughly 3 hours of day sleep plus 11-12 hours at night. She is almost certainly chronically overtired with her current pattern, not undertired. Look up the huckleberry guidance online for specific windows. The first morning wake window is the shortest and the one from 3rd nap to bedtime can be the longest as they cope with longer wake windows later in the day.

If I were you for night times I would ditch the co-sleeping and sleep train with her in a cot in her own room. Read up on a few different methods, pick one which feels feasible for you and your partner and commit to sticking to it. You need to consider your own needs as well as hers, and it sounds like you will all be much happier if she sleeps better at night.

I feel your pain. My DD was very similar-never seemed a very happy baby, great at napping through the day but always unsettled at night and we were constantly up and down to her all night, sometimes for hours at a time. We used to think that she was just a difficult baby and a bad sleeper and would grow out of it.

We went down the doctor route and she was actually diagnosed with silent reflux and aspiration, and since she has gone onto medicine, has improved so much. I would double check with a doctor to rule these conditions out as this could be a cause for the problems you mention. I hope things improve soon for you.

Ferber method (controlled crying, no cry it out). Works every time and 7 months is a great age for it.

She actually slept until 6:45am today! She woke up 4 times to feed, and I was too scared to not give her a feed in case she woke herself up… but that’s one more day closer to a more normal routine.

Were going on holiday in 10 days, but when we come back it might be a good idea to start sleep training. How have people found the Ferber method? I really wanted to stay as gentle as possible (just my preference)

@ChaseTheSun i have tried the gp so many times. “It’s colic” or “babies cry” 🙄

Did the Ferber method and was life changing. Took a week and was hard at first but totally worth it.

In my opinion you can do gentle sleep training and it can take weeks (if it ever even works) or you can do Ferber (or similar) and it works largely in 3 days to 2 weeks.

i used the Taking Cara Babies course ABCs of sleep but if that’s financially unviable then the group Respectful Sleep Training and Learning on Facebook outlines each method. I found TCB better because it also advised how to cut feeds etc. I kept a 10:45 dreamfeed until my daughter dropped that herself at 8 months.

in my opinion as well, sleep training is quicker and easier before they can stand up in the cot.

you must pick a method and stick with it though as going through all that crying only to back down and feed is just wasted upset. I got my partner to do night 1 as he had better resolve than me.

happy to answer any questions you have

Ferber all the way. Shouldve done it sooner with DS1 and plan to do it again if needed with DS2

In case anyone is reading this and going through the same thing, we managed to break the cycle by extending her bed time half an hour later and waking her up half an hour earlier consistently (8pm - 7am). Even when we had a bad night, we got up at 7am.

We also capped naps to 2.5 hours a day. I noticed that her sleep got worse after her naps became longer than 30 mins, so this might be it.

I haven’t tried any sleep training yet as just focussing on one thing at a time, but she’s back to just two wakes a night (mostly 😝).

praise be!