What would you rather? (Sleep related)

[emeralue]

__A toddler who needs/has needed feeding back to sleep 4-6 times per night every night of their life but never has split nights or early starts, or a toddler who usually sleeps through the night but goes through periods of split nights/early starts?

I have one and a friend has the other, and we were discussing which child we'd rather!

The one who usually sleeps through definitely. Getting solid undisturbed sleep would be great and means I could deal with occasional split nights and early mornings.

Continued wake ups for months/years on end is so hard. DD is 8mo and wakes up 4-6 times a night and is fed back to sleep too. We're on wake up one after 8pm bedtime lol.

I’ve had both. I feed my 13 month old back to sleep numerous times overnight but we are only ever awake for 5 mins tops at a time. My now 4 year old DS was mostly a brilliant sleeper but every now and then would have a split night and would be awake from like 1-4am. The split nights were the hardest for me with DS1 than the frequent waking by DS2. With the split nights, by the time he’d gone back to sleep I’d be too awake and agitated to doze back off and the anxiety of not knowing if/when it was going to happen again was awful.
I have been mildly sleep deprived for 13 months with my second child but I’m used to the broken sleep now and I know what to expect. I get more sleep than I did with the split nights even though it’s broken. After a split night I used to feel absolutely wrecked the following day.

Sleeping through.
early rising isn’t so bad I suppose if you get a full nights sleep!!

can’t imagine feeding 4-6 times every night is fun long term (I do that now with baby under 1! So I mustn’t speak too soon lol)

My DS mostly sleeps through now with early rising and occasional split night if he doesn’t nap then goes to bed early.

However, 6 months ago he was waking 3 times per night, and a year ago it was easily 4-6 times a night.

I don’t feel significantly more rested now than I did before. When he was waking in the night we coslept so it would be a case of feeding lying down and going back to sleep. Whereas with a split night/early rise I actually have to get out of bed.

Parenting is exhausting no matter what is going on sleep-wise really. I do think being able to get a full nights sleep, even occasionally is very helpful though as the constant night waking feels very mentally draining.

Feeding a toddler back to sleep 4-6 times a night is ridiculous.

Having had the wakes several times a night, with split nights thrown in for good measure, sleeping through occasionally would have been bliss. I was delights, after 2.5 years, to get 4 straight hours.

In your experience.

Depends how long the split nights go on for - DDs lasted for 6 months or more at a time. It was awful. We now co-sleep and I get woken by kicks and wriggles fairly regularly but she usually (touch wood!) sleeps through.

We had success watering down the milk which eventually stopped the wakes/feeding at night - guessing you've tried that?

In my opinion

I'd give the former a bash.

4 and a half years of split nights here, awake for 3-4 hours at a time. Every night. And 5am starts. Unable to be left unsupervised. He's started sleeping through in the last 6 months at 5 years old and it's actual heaven!

I can't take split nights! My eldest had severe obstructive sleep apnoea so was a very frequent night waker until she was big enough for surgery. It wasn't great, but I fed her back to sleep for speed until she was 2.5. Definitely long term survivable. One of my boys went through a phase of split nights and, personally, I found that MUCH tougher. My brain felt like must after 2 weeks. I really struggled to get back to sleep even once he had finally nodded off, and there was just no way to catch up on thE missed sleep. Gruelling.

I’d rather have a child that sleeps through and gets up early. No question.

Oh sorry. I’d rather have split night than feeding so much!

Definitely wouldn't want to feed during the night once toddler stage but each to their own

Ours has slept through majority of nights since 9 weeks so I can't imagine anything else!