How am I supposed to settle my child?

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DC (11m) only has two states: on and off. "Drowsy but awake" is not a phrase I've ever seen in DC, it's full of beans and wanting to be into everything or asleep.

As such it can often be a real battle to get them off to sleep. All forms of settling - shushing, rocking, patting, trying to hold a hand, singing, cuddling - all resort in DC getting more and more distressed. Our usual method of getting them to nap (the pram) has just failed and resulted in full on screaming out in public, and now back home is having a complete meltdown in the other room with DP.

I cannot cope with the ear piercing screaming and I find it so much more difficult to deal with when I'm trying to help by being comforting and it's just making things worse.

Has anyone else ever experienced this and what did you do to try and help?

Your use of the phrase 'a real battle' might be telling. Are you expecting your child to stick to a routine that you think it should adopt or are you guided by the child's natural sleep patterns?

Nothing to do with my expectations. I never set out listening to any of the wake window stuff and purely went off of tired cues (eye rubbing, yawning, etc), experimented with trying to facilitate sleep as soon as we saw these, a bit before, a bit after... nothing. Spoke to our HV who suggested implementing some structure regarding timings, again tried at the time, just before, in combination with tired cues - still didn't work. We're back to following DC's lead and it's no easier to understand than the first time.

Regardless it's not really the point, whether DC is tired or not none of the ways everyone suggests to try and help soothe and comfort them work and instead cause upset. If you've never been in a position where everything you're trying to do to demonstrate love and security is backfiring in your face and you're having to watch your baby distressed, you probably won't understand.

Was the nap shortly before you posted? If so, even when my DD (11 months) desperately needs a second nap, she will fight it with all her might and often goes to bed after being awake for 4-6 hours during the day! Our cut off point is around 2:30 - if she hasn’t begun a nap by then, it’s futile trying for us, she just won’t do it.

How do you get them to sleep at night?

Sorry I meant nap attempt* in my first sentence!

I've got no idea of sleppy but awake either, neither of mine did that although dc2 is 6 now and I'm getting a glimps.
Dc1 would need to be given the chance to sleep sooner than you'd think, and somewhere really dark and quiet. It's grueling, but eventually they drop naps and it's once a day challenge ( we'll, twice, she often screams blue murder when she wakes up too). She is still horrible to get to sleep at 9 years old most nights , I think she'll be the kind of adult who drinks every night to knock themselves out.

I had two kids like this...NEVER "drowsy but awake"..I feel your pain.
We used a baby swing, is he too big for that? Ours was mamas and papas, a battery operated thing. Because you could set it to swing and walk away mine seemed calmer, like we werent right there to distract them frim sleep. Ive seen baby hammocks too, similar theory i think & maybe better if he is bigger?
We also had a rocking chair and i rocked one of them to sleep until about 18 months, holding her on my chest.

On the worst days we used to put baby sleep things or general calming kids stuff on youtube and snuggle them up on the couch, again, walk away a bit so we werent distracting them.
You will be happy to know somewhere between 18 months (girl) and 3 years (boy) they both started to nod off with less intervention from us.
Good luck x

Mine is the same and also 11 months. I do manage to get him to sleep by breastfeeding in the pitch black, but if I didn't have that I wouldn't have a clue what to do for him. Dad can't settle him etc. Weaning will be interesting...
Terrified of him starting nursery as he'll just melt down and be a huge problem for them, argh.
The only thing I can suggest is Furber method, have you tried anything like it yet?

Would feeding to sleep work? Or perhaps a dummy? You sound in a very difficult situation

I had this with DC1. Every attempt to settle her seemed to enrage her further. I'd spend 40 minutes trying to get her to sleep, she'd manage 8-10 minutes sleep then wake up furious. It was exhausting. In the end I effectively gave up - if I thought she was tired I popped her in her cot, left her alone for 10-15 minutes during which time she'd either fall asleep or not and after that if she was still awake I got her up again. This approach hasn't worked with DC2 though, who also fights naps (DC1 would generally lie quietly or just grumble a little bit, DC2 just gets more wound up). Sorry I can't help but you're not alone.

Absolutely sleep train.

This was DD - ‘drowsy but awake’ was total bollocks for her, and any attempt at settling led to outrage.

So we put her to bed and checked on her at intervals (2 mins, then 5 mins ect).

It never took more than 15 mins total for her to go to sleep, and after a few days never more than 5.

I know lots of people don’t like sleep training because they associate it with crying. But I suspect they don’t have babies who are crying whatever you do.

I breast feed my now 14month to sleep - I was also rather anxious about her settling for naps when she started nursery, but she's now a month in and apart from when she was ill they've had no problems getting her down for 1.5-2hr naps!! I think it's because I'm not there at all. I hope yours adapts like this too x

100% agree

That is amazing to hear, thank you for sharing 😀🤞🤞

“Sleepy but awake” didn’t exist for my DC either. They went from being completely awake, to unconscious, in less than a second. I could only get them to sleep by feeding them or driving them round. Buggy didn’t work. None of the books helped either (I tried so much gradual retreat, and pick up put down! It was hell!)

I don’t know the answer but I can promise one day they will be old enough that you can tell them to stay in their bed awake and you can just go downstairs. For us that was age 3. 🙈

Same, honestly just ended up leaving him alone if he slept he slept if he didn't well we dealt with whatever fresh hell that brought until things settled down again after a few months. Even now at 5 if we're in the car he'll demand our silence and no music or sounds before he'll nod off!!! He just literally hates fuss.

Been there. My first went through phases of screaming blue murder the moment she got a sniff of a nap routine, just absolutely furious at the very idea, and the more tired she got the worse it was. Weirdly she rarely did it at bed time. Anyway by the time she was 13/14 months she'd mostly stopped it by the time she was two she would ask for her nap!

DD2 (8 months) likes to have a little cry before a nap too but only for a minute or two so that's fine. Actually if she doesn't have that little cry it means she won't sleep so I quite like to hear it!

Yes I have one of those, now 13 months old. I’m afraid I can’t offer you much help just to let you know you’re not alone.
sleep training wouldn’t work for our baby, his screaming just escalates to the point of vomiting but at the same time if you try and comfort and cuddle that just enrages him more. We have tried everything and I mean everything but I think we have to accept he will never be one of those babies that when they’re tired they calmly fall asleep no matter where they are.
We do find he naps best at home in the dark and quiet and is usually tired sooner than we think (his sleepy cues are not very obvious as they tend to be he just gets more hyperactive and chatty but as a person he literally never stops moving so you’re never quite sure if it’s tiredness). So yeah no real advice really except some babies are just like this.

I have a ten month old and since about 3 months old we have held him and bounced on a yoga ball to get him to sleep.

I hate it.

But he will not go to sleep any other way. He does not feed to sleep, cries in the car, cries in his pushchair, he will tolerate a carrier but will cry if he’s tired instead of just sleeping. Like you, attempts to get him to sleep in any other way tend to result in him getting worked up and crying/screaming at us.

I have no idea how we’re going to stop and feel slightly panicked at the thought of bouncing a 3 year old but I am forever hopeful that one day something will just click 🤦‍♀️

Some babies can be so hard to soothe to sleep, I feel for you OP. I would keep trying down regulating activities and try a variety and potentially lengthen the down regulation, so a soothing prior activity before napping (eg. Swinging or reading, avoiding up regulation like active climbing play in playgrounds etc). Mine were hard to calm as babies too, but my youngest improved a little with age. My eldest (8y) still struggles to down regulate to be sleepy but awake. I do a long story etc and he still gets up and down a hundred times before bed on many nights. Baby massage helped a bit, not sure if you’ve tried a bit prior to nap time?