Help! Baby is a terrible sleeper and I am exhausted :(

[Bella0831]

Hello all,

FTM here dealing with a baby that just refuses to sleep. I know this isn’t a new topic here on Mumsnet but I guess I’m looking for some reassurance, when does it get easier??

my 16 w/o consistently fights sleep both day and night and both he and I are absolutely shattered. When he was about 6/7 weeks old we had a good few weeks of 1 or 2 wakings, but for the last 8 weeks it’s been almost every hour during the night. He is breastfed, and despite full feedings wakes up an hour later - I’m not always sure what it is he’s after, he thrashes his legs around in the crib just sort of moaning and whining to himself. I check his nappy and he doesn’t need a change either. I’ll burp him/wind him, but it doesn’t seem to help. It’s almost like he just wants to play!

During the day the only way I can get him to have some sort of sleep is on me and even then he wakes up after 40 mins. He always seems exhausted, always yawning with red teary eyes and he seems so unhappy.

I feel like I’ve tried everything….

consistent bedtimes (both early and late to see if that makes a difference)
bedtime routine every night
sling wearing round the house
co-sleeping (most the time he just kicks me in the chest/tummy and rolls around in the bed)
Putting down drowsy but awake (just pings his eyes open as soon as I put him down and starts laughing to himself)
WIT theory (from Just Chill baby sleep course - wait, interpret, take action)
dream feeding
bouncer/swing chair during the day
walks in the pram
Dummy - he does take it but prefers to spit it out and just put his fist in his mouth instead
following wake windows - I track everything on Huckleberry app and am always watching for his sleepy cues
hot water bottle in crib
putting my clothes in crib so it smells of me

he does sometimes sleep in the car and after what feels like hours of crying he just sort of gives up and nods off. But once the engine stops he’s bolt upright awake again.

mainly at the moment we are still feeding or rocking to sleep and every sleep consultant/doctor I see seems to say we should have broken this habit by now.

I know he can do it because we used to have a good nights sleep so it’s so frustrating that he is waking so much now. Could it be 4 month sleep regression that is lasting for weeks?

were on 20mg mezzapram for reflux I should add - during the night the only way I seem to be able to get him to drift off is to feed him, and with every feed we’re holding him upright for 30 mins after, so even while he’s asleep I’m still awake holding him up for fear of him choking in his sleep and to keep everything down. This means I’m losing valuable time i could be asleep and I feel so guilty saying it but I’m shattered.

my partner is supportive and does offer to hold the baby in the night but he works during the week and is now struggling to stay awake / perform at work.

many of my friends are very hot on sleep training and keep telling me I need to practice and keep with it, but I feel absolutely exhausted - surviving on about 2 hours sleep a night. My mum also tells me I’ve mollycoddled him to the point that he’s now so needy he won’t go to sleep independently. Are they right?

I guess what I’m asking, is will it all fall into place at some point?? Does it get easier???

I love my baby more than anything but I feel like an awful mama and an absolute failure!

You are absolutely not a failure! You sound like a really lovely, caring mum. It does sound as though he has a very strong association with sleep and feeding/movement and so he is waking between sleep cycles and unable to get back to sleep. You probably do need to try and reduce those associations if you want it to improve. There are lots of gentle ways to support him to sleep more independently.

My first went from doing long stretches to waking every 45 mins at 4 months.

We did cosleeping and feeding lying down to survive. She had reflux too but I could get away with not holding her upright at every feed, especially if I’d been really vigilant about keeping her upright in the earth evening before bed so that might be something to try? Might get you a bit more sleep in the first part of the night?

I did occasionally misjudge it and end up covered in vom but it was worth it overall.

We also managed in shifts a bit so I would let DH get a decent nights sleep but he would take DD for an hour or two in the morning before leaving for work so I could get some extra sleep (he obviously had to get up a bit earlier than he would have liked for this but it was an ok trade off)

Mainly at the moment we are still feeding or rocking to sleep and every sleep consultant/doctor I see seems to say we should have broken this habit by now.

Firstly, this is bollocks. OF COURSE sleep consultants are going to tell you you shouldn't feed your baby to sleep. How would they make any money otherwise? It's probably the easiest and fastest way to get your baby to sleep.

I would recommend following Lyndsey Hookway, Little Nest Sleep and Hey Sleepy Baby for advice on biologically normal infant sleep. A lot of what you describe is normal - baby sleep is not linear and does tend to go to shit around 4mo - but the hourly wakings suggest you might need to do some further investigation for red flags. A lot of these pages have highlights on what to look out for.

Try not to impose your friends experiences onto yours, some babies just don’t conform to our sleep ideas! I remember posting on here about DD’s sleep and a woman on her third or fourth dc commiserated because her baby was also hard going and nothing like she’d experienced before, made me feel much less like I was just crap at parenting. It’s not you , it’s that little independent person you’ve created!

I ended up going with whatever worked, there’s a point where sleep, any sleep, is more of a priority than any ‘sleep skills’ because it’s almost impossible to achieve if you’re exhausted. For us it was cosleeping. It’s not as good as having your own space in bed and an ‘end’ point to the day but it does mean you don’t have to function on very little sleep.

dd took a long time to get into her own bed but she’s was fiercely protective of it once she wanted it and got the hump when she had to share a bed with me at a hotel

Ugh that's tough and I've been there. The things that really helped us (in combination with a lot of the things you have on your list above) were:

1. GOOD white noise playing quite loud. This one knocks my 2 month old baby right out (in a good way): open.spotify.com/episode/2iOqNDvQuv1RyU5SEG0FN0?si=fUIgVDdUS92pWL4YTvdp3w&utm_source=copy-link
2. Transitional swaddle for extending naps - we use the zipadee zip. Went from 20 minute naps to 1h+.
3. Sleep training. I didn't want to do it with DD(3), but we were experiencing what you're going through for about 2 months (waking every 1-2 hours all night every night) and I was starting to lose the plot. Great easy to read book called Precious Little Sleep helped us figure out the best way to do it. The ebook is easy to find.

Good luck!

Firstly, this is bollocks. OF COURSE sleep consultants are going to tell you you shouldn't feed your baby to sleep. How would they make any money otherwise? It's probably the easiest and fastest way to get your baby to sleep.

this ☝

it’s normal for your LO to want to be with you & only settle with you. Especially at 16 weeks. My LO is 18 months and he needs me still, he feeds to sleep every night & for his nap. We started co sleeping at 7 months so that we both could get some sleep.
you are not a failure, you are doing everything right by your baby- well done Mama! You haven’t molly coddled your LO you are meeting his needs.
I know it’s hard to see past what the textbooks or other people say our babies ‘should’ be doing but only you know what your baby needs x

I couldn't see it on your list, but have you tried angling his bed with a reflux wedge under the mattress? Then you can put him down and go to sleep yourself.

There are other ways as well like tilting the bed and then using a towel to create a loop to support him.

Have a google and a youtube, and experiment with different angles and methods.

You sound like such a good mum having tried so many things - Ihope you're able to find the magic thing which works soon

My youngest wanted fed every 2 hours, morning, noon and night till she was 14 months old. Naps were 45 minutes if I was lucky (closer to 10 mins) and the 4 month sleep regression lasted about 3 months 😩

You sound like you're doing everything right, just keep consistent and it will get better, eventually.

Maybe try gripe water see if it helps with the whining.

Some children just dont need much sleep. My eldest slept like clockwork and was a dream, my middle was a nightmare for sleeping as a baby but from around 10yo started sleeping like a teenager. The youngest still needs minimal sleep, she would happily cope on 4 hours a night. Shes like the Duracell bunny..

IME, this sounds like the four month sleep regression, and it lasted for nearly two months for us. By that point, I was absolutely losing my mind, and we did gentle sleep training. It was a million times easier than I expected and involved dramatically less crying than there was with my precious solution (hours of rocking/singing/feeding to sleep). It was one of the best decisions I’ve made as a parent and my DC has been an amazing sleeper ever since.

Like others, we also used white noise, zippadee zip, blackout curtains, and wake windows to support sleep.