Controlled crying and night wakings/feeds?

[Hopeless321]

Please no hate or judgement, I’m at breaking point. Up till now I’ve been very pro attachment parenting and have coslept since day 1. However my baby has always woken hourly and more recently hysterically cries too. He’s 7 months. I’m so deeply depressed and starting to resent my baby. I’m getting support for my mental health but I’m making little progress because the external stressor still exists. My baby is also constantly unhappy and exhausted. I’ve tried being strict with nap schedules to prevent overtiredness but it hasn’t helped.

As a last resort I’m considering controlled crying but I’m unsure what to do about night wakings and feeding? He feeds hourly at night to get back to sleep so I have no idea how much he needs overnight. He’s very distractible during the day so he definitely still needs some night feeds. I’m not expecting or hoping him to sleep through the night or anything, just hopefully longer stretches and to go to sleep independently. He’s currently hysterically crying at bedtime anyway so at this point I’m thinking “what’s the difference?”

Does anyone have any controlled crying success stories who were in a similar situation? What did you do about night wakings? How do you know whether to do the check ins vs. Feed?

I’ve tried the techniques in No Cry Sleep Solution for months with no success before anyone suggests that.

We did Ferber method and it was life changing. Definitely recommend reading the book. It covers what to do about night feeds.

We decided on set times for feeds - twice a night at that age for us.
Can’t remember the exact times, but for example we would do a feed at 1am and 5am. If he woke before the set times we would settle back with Ferber method. If it was after the set times we would feed.

We started at 6 months with 2 feeds, and when that was established we gradually moved the times back. We were down to 1 feed at 7 months and then no feeds at 8 months.

@SalviaOfficinalis Thanks. Can I ask how much baby woke and fed prior to sleep training? Were the night wakings more distressing because they were me expecting a feed?

We did very similar to Salvia. At that age he was on one night feed - so if he woke up before 1am, he didn’t get milk (and we’d redo the Ferber settling method) but around/after 1am he would get milk once. We faded out the night feed I think around 9 months.

To answer your follow up question, we started the controlled crying because he was waking every 1-2 hours and I was breastfeeding him to sleep every time… unsustainable!

@SalviaOfficinalis @SuburbanMummy123 as my baby currently feeds hourly overnight, what would you suggest starting with based on your experience?

@SuburbanMummy123 ah thanks! Did you find your baby made up for it during the day? How long did they cry during night wakings vs. Start of night?

DS used to sleep for 3 hours at the start of the night and then wake every 40 mins for the rest of the night…. Didn’t feed every time but did feed a lot. Maybe 3 or 4 feeds.

He responded amazingly to the sleep training though. I thought it would be horrendous but the first night we did it he slept for longer than he ever had before. And less crying than usual because he didn’t wake up so often. Once he realised he could fall asleep alone, he could stay asleep.

I always recommend reading Dr Ferber’s book - I downloaded the e book. It’s really good at explaining how sleep works and why it’s so important that the baby falls asleep by themself.

I’m afraid I really don’t know what to advise, I’ve only done it once and luckily it worked for us. I think at 7 months baby can cope with one night feed if feeding well in the day - and if not they will learn to feed more in the day which should help with night sleep. You could feed more often but try to break the habit of feeding him to sleep, as a compromise? The way I cut out the last night feed was to time how long it took - say 12 minutes - then the next night I only let him have 11 minutes, then 10 minutes etc.

To start with, you could just say that you woll feed at every other wake up. So don’t feed on the first wake up. Settle back without, and then feed at the next one.

Then when you’re more confident he can go back to sleep without you can decide what to do.

We did the sleep training at about 6 months old and by night 3 he was crying for less than 10 minutes at bedtime, much less during the night. The longest cry we had was about 45 min the first night (we did pop in during that to very briefly reassure him). Honestly, the best parenting decision we ever made. 12 hour nights and a very happy well rested baby and mum!

But the important thing is that even when you do feed, you’re not feeding to sleep.

It will only work if he learns to go to sleep himself.

You are doing amazing and if you need to sleep train do it. ❤️

Totally agree with Emmamoo & Salvia. 😊

Not the same situation but we recently had success with crying it out. Like you I was at the end of my tether, my 2 year old had been waking every hour or 2 hours for over 6 months, I had gone back to work and I was a walking zombie. Even bed sharing he would still wake thoughout the night crying and could only be settled by being carried. I lost it one day as I knew I was being crap in every area of my life and sleep trained. I let him cry it out and settle himself (whilst offering reassurance etc), and after 3 nights he now sleeps through.

After 2 years of constant night wakings it has been like living a beautiful dream. I have my evenings back and I know when I finally go to sleep I won't be woken before 6.30.

Be strong, do this for your family...sleep is a necessity, not an option!

I did something similar to controlled crying as we had a settling issue (fed to sleep). Basically at nap time and bedtime I would feed to soothe and encourage self-settling, but night wakes would feed to sleep. Initially it was a disaster (he was big enough that night feeds caused more wakeups), but after a bit I could resettle him at night without a feed and we all benefitted from decent sleep from that point

It was the best thing we ever did, like you, I was absolutely at breaking point. I agreed to feed my daughter at a certain time as others have suggested, but within a few days she wasn't waking for it! It's hard the first few nights but it will get easier. I found my daughter was a much happier baby when she started sleeping better too so was a big improvement all round for all of us.
You're doing amazing.

Hi @SalviaOfficinalis and @BabyB2022 just found this thread as my son is 6.5mo and struggling with wake ups. We had a sleep consultant a few weeks ago who suggested patting back to sleep for any wake ups pre-3am at the start, and then gradually pushing the feed out. He is on 2-3 meals a day and I haven’t dropped any daytime milk feeds. He had had bouts of sleeping through so I know he is capable, and the patting to settle in the night did work initially but now just makes him angry. My issue with it is that i would have thought it’s confusing to feed at some wakes and not others - is it not simpler for him to just go fully night weaned?