Help/advice with sleep training?

[Avie29]

Hey, i had my 10 month old daughter’s development check with the hv this afternoon, and was advised to do some sleep training as she wakes pretty much every hour and feeds to sleep, she is ebf, i just wanted to know how other people have done sleep training with ebf baby, how long did it take, what method did you use?, how did you break the feed to sleep association? What age did you start? Any helpful tips or advice?
Thanks xx

At 10 months, could it be a developmental leap that she's waking every hour? Or teeth if she's in pain? Has she always woken this often or is a new thing? I don't think sleep training is helpful if the disrupted nights/regular waking is because of pain or a leap.

Personally, I chose not to sleep train my children (also both EBF). But do your own research and see what feels possible for you, and what would actually work best for your family. Don't feel pressured just because the HV suggested it (do you trust her ordinarily? HV can be a mixed bag... Some are amazing, some awful).

I'm sure you must be absolutely exhausted, and want a solution as quickly as possible! Just bear in mind that sleep training is also exhausting with no guarantee of it working (plus the guilt you might feel) and there are other options too. It could be that co-sleeping safely means you can get a bit more sleep too she naturally starts going for longer stretches.

If you do decide to sleep train there are loads of different approaches and methods that can seem overwhelming but just remember that fundamentally you don't have to do anything you don't want to do. And you are allowed to change your mind. Good luck! X

8-10 months is a rough age for sleep. They have so much going on developmentally around that age it really impacts sleep.

I know people who have sleep trained and then a few months later baby has stopped sleeping again. So I'm not sure it is always the answer.

Check out Biologically normal sleep (there is afacebook group and/or also look into Sarah Ockwell-Smith.

We haven't done any sleep training.
My boy is EBF and feeds to sleep (he's 14 months now) and I remember those nights not so fondly. We have good nights and bad nights now. Most nights now we get to between 12.30 and 2.30am with him in his cot - something I couldn't even have imagined at 10 months.
But co-sleeping after his first wake means that he goes back to sleep easily most of the time, except the really horrific nights - but these are when there is a reason for poor sleep that isn't always evident until later.

She has been waking every hour or so for the last 6 months, nap times are generally only half hour twice a day, so can’t catch up in the day, i don’t/didnt plan on doing sleep training to be honest and generally want to hear other people experiences before i make up my mind, i have only met my hv once before this check lol she is baby number 5 so hv discharged me pretty quickly after her first appointment when she was newborn, i didn’t sleep train my older children but they all slept alot better lol xx

Forgot to add she does go in her cot initially but we end up co sleeping after first night feed where she has woke me eg goes to cot at 7ish wakes at 8,9,10ish go back in cot each time, i go to bed wakes at 11 and stays in with me till morning xx she will on occasion sleep over an hour, will very rarely hit 2 hours xx

That sounds so hard OP! I'm another one that didn't sleep train so no experience here to share but I'd recommend a couple of Instagram info accounts e.g. heysleepybaby that could give you some tips? I suppose you've tried the usual extra layer in case she's cold, Calpol in case it's teeth, white noise etc?

Its definitely becoming a struggle, saving grace is she is such a happy little girl, angel otherwise, yea ive tried with blanket, extra blanket, no blanket, with or without calpol, white noise weirdly freaked her out 🤷🏻‍♀️ lol and calming music (any music) makes her dance 😂, i took her up at 7, asleep by 7:30/7:45 and have just been up to feed her again, tried lamp on, lamp off, dead quiet, tv/background noise, only thing i can think to possibly help is to put her on bottles but i really love breastfeeding, shes not a particularly cuddly baby even since newborn she always wanted to be sat up and looking around and breastfeeding is the only cuddles i get lol xx

Hey OP,

We sleep trained our son as both my husband and I had safety critical jobs which we needed to be 'switched on' for.

He was waking approximately 6 times a night to feed back to sleep, rocking to sleep had varying success and sometimes took hours. Co sleeping didn't work he just woke up more often.

We didn't do the sleep training until he was properly weaned onto food, I'd gone back to work and he'd dropped the majority of his day BFs. So we would BF first thing in the morning before work, then last thing at night to get him to sleep. He was about 16 months old ish.

We did modified Ferber so instead of elongating the check ins we kept them to no more than 5-7mins between check ins.

Took 45 mins, 35, then 5 mins over 3 consecutive nights and from the 1st night he slept through for 12 hours.

He was a completely different boy the next morning. Happy, well rested and napped more readily. I was terrified that because we'd sleep trained him he would somehow hate me and his dad but that was not the case.