Those who didn't sleep train, when does it get better??

[Utterlyincandescently]

I'm lucky that my baby slept through the night for the first five months, but then she suddenly started to wake 3 times a night and has done for the past 6 weeks. She's usually asleep by 7:30 and then wakes at 11, 2 and 4, and then she's up for the day at 6:15.

She's always been a terrible napper but this was manageable when I was getting a full night of sleep. We're lucky if we get one decent nap a day now. I'm just so exhausted, with so few breaks. She needs constant entertaining when she's awake or she'll grumble and cry.

Will this get better?? How much longer do I need to do this for?

No but what I am saying is that is why I don’t want to do it. And you said that children who wake in the night are unhappy.

You're very judgemental in your tone. I wasn't criticising people who sleep train. Just looking for stories and solidarity from people who chose not to.

Do you think I STILL sleep in my children's room? Despite not sleep training, they reliably sleep through the night now, although sometimes they do sneak in whilst I'm asleep and I wake up to their beautiful little faces! I sometimes have to ask them to get up now.

We have got to the same place but I did so without having to sleep train.

Can I just ask as someone who has made our room into mine and babies room with a floor bed, what age did you move them into their own room? I love it but my partner wants to know if he’ll ever be allowed back in!

Waking in the night is normal. My son continues to occasionally wake in the night here and there and needs a sip of water or a wee cuddle before settling again. That happens every few months.

What I said isn’t normal and sustainable is waking every hour through the night and I said to the OP that at 7 months I wouldn’t yet rule out sleep training completely. I didn’t think I would at that age either. Then the wakings ramped up and up and up until by one year old it was every hour or more. I was utterly ruined. Co-sleeping didn’t help. I tried. My son wanted his own space when sleeping and is still very much like that now. I held off until one year old and then gently sleep trained him for everyone’s sake.

It’s no good being absolute about anything when it comes to parenting and my advice to OP was to stay open-minded. She might find herself feeling differently in a few months time.

I gradually retreated from the floor bed from about 15 months, but my ex partner was regularly kicked out of our bed until 2 I would say.

I did the floor bed in their room specifically because I wanted them to get used to it being their room. So probably left our room (in next to me) about 7 months, onto floor bed which I slept with them on and off until 15 months and then in own room but came in to my bed fairly often until 2.

OP specifically says she does not want to sleep train, the title says it and she has said it throughout the thread. No one has made any judgements towards you for sleep training yet you continue to make unkind and unhelpful comments to the OP and others. OP HAS ruled it out and if she changes her mind I'm sure she'll send you a message or start a thread asking for help.

My guess is that your baby is waking as she’s hungry which happens at this age. Some people advocate starting solids at 4 months old to prevent this - with my first I scoffed at this and waited til exactly 6 months but she was a terrible sleeper. By my 3rd, I started solids early and he was a great sleeper. So who knows?!

The fact that she’s slept so well in the past means that she’ll get there again, as soon as her calories are all going in during daylight hours.
Night weaning when she’s a few months older will give you back your sleep if it doesn’t happen before then.

I don’t think anything about your sleeping arrangements as I have no idea how old your children are, being that you are a random person on the internet.

You seem really chuffed that you got to the same point as me without sleep training. Congrats, I guess. I’m not pleased one way or the other, it’s just something I had to do to look after my child and myself. I didn’t choose to do it for the hell of it. The same way that it was hard to get him to take his inhaler regularly as a baby, but I gently trained him for his sake. It was hard to train him to accept steroids, but I did that gently for his sake. He couldn’t sleep without waking every hour or more so I sleep trained him gently for both our sakes.

My advice to the OP is just see how you go. If you’re so sleep deprived that you can’t drive or function at work, something may have to give. That might be how things go or it might not. Rigidly refusing to even entertain the possible need for gentle methods of sleep training seems pointless to me.

Same. Didn’t sleep train either of mine and they got better naturally at similar ages.
I can’t get them up in the mornings now at 6 and 12 so it does get better eventually

The OP listened to my advice early on in the thread and agreed she might have to see how things are at one and night wean, which was part of sleep training for me. I outlined my method to another poster who requested it. I’m now responding to other posters who are directly quoting me. I haven’t been unkind to anyone - I have said that I think allowing a baby to wake every hour of the night or more isn’t healthy for them and I think it’s cruel. That’s my opinion. I haven’t attacked anyone or been nasty.

OP isn’t there yet with the number of night wakings, but I suggested she might end up there and need to rethink her stance on sleep training. I didn’t see the need at 7 months and 3 or 4 night wakings either. Then the wakings increased to the point where it wasn’t sustainable to carry on. That often happens.

@Yourethebeerthief your posts are so passive aggressive…you are presenting your choices as if they are the only way to be a good parent. Parents and kids are all different. Yes, perhaps OP will change her mind in future, but she’s said several times, including in the thread title, that she wanted to hear from people who didn’t sleep train - ie, not you.

I hadn’t thought about that, his room is currently just for playing and getting ready so do need to introduce it as a place for sleeping. Thank you :)

I’m presenting them as a very good way to be a good parent when your child can’t sleep and doesn’t take to co-sleeping.

I mean there’s always the other option in those circumstances of… crashing your car due to exhaustion and killing yourself and said child who’s in the backseat.

At the very start of this thread my advice to OP was simply not to rule it out. With a 7 month old you don’t know what lies ahead yet and many mothers still think sleep training means shutting the door all night on a screaming baby. Of course it’s not. Sometimes you have to find a way to gently sleep train your child because, like all aspects of parenting, you just bloody have to find a way to deal with it and your child will cry sometimes through all sorts of problems.

My son screamed bloody murder learning to take an inhaler, he cried about taking steroids, he screamed and tore the tubes from his nose when on oxygen. I had to be gentle but firm because he needed those things. And I had to gently but firmly coach him through learning to sleep through the night for both of our health and safety.

And, yes, I’ll respond with passive aggression to those who speak in the same manner to me.

Have a look at wake windows (apologies if someone has already suggested this). It helped me work out when was best to attempt naps to avoid under/overtiredness. I’d also often do a pram or car nap for one of them just to take the edge off bedtime. An overtired baby will sleep worse! Good luck x

It’s not a choice between sleep training and killing your child for everyone, even if you felt it was for you.

If you were really content with your choices, you might not be spending all this time posting about them.

My youngest was a terrible sleeper. We never trained the only things that had impact were stopping breast feeding g in the night, and stopping the dummy. He was about 18m

Why is the rationale behind not sleep training? As the mum of a 15 year old who was sleep trained quite young I’d love to know what negatives there apparently were, other than me getting a decent night’s sleep sooner rather than later.

Meaningless pseudo psychology.

I didn’t say it was a choice between those things for the OP either. I advised keeping an open mind. A lot can change beyond 7 months. I also didn’t “feel” it was like that. It was. I was falling asleep behind the wheel.

There are a great many things that mothers are absolute about in the early days and then soon find out they need to be more flexible about or change their previous stance. OP can see how things go. Won’t it be nice if her child starts to sleep through naturally? Or she might be like another poster on this thread who quipped “Sleep? What’s that?” Personally, I find sleep important, and the lack of it highly unfunny, so I did something about the problem.

Some people think it damages children and that your child now has attachment issues because of it. They often conflate sleep training with simply abandoning a child to cry one night and not returning until the morning.

Thanks. Definitely not the case for us - either how we sleep trained or attachment issues!

I've never understood why sleep training attracts such missionary zeal. I didn't sleep train either of mine, and people who did just could not accept that that was a line in the sand for me. So many of them were confident that I would regret it, or that I'd change my stance once this or that sleep regression hit. But for me it was the same as smacking - some parents do it, ostensibly out of love and the belief that they can train their child to behave well that way, but there is nothing in the world that would persuade me to do it.
@Utterlyincandescently It's fine to stick to your guns and for sleep training to be a line that you're not willing to cross.
For me, cosleeping was the game changer. Also the possums approach. I never paid for the programme but there's enough free info about it online to get the gist.
It does get better. Mine are 2 and 5 now. The 5yo moved into his own room aged 4 and sleeps through most nights. A couple of times a week he comes into our bed in the early hours. The 2yo still cosleeps and BFs. He usually sleeps from about 8-10.30pm, has a feed, then sleeps again from about 11pm-5.30am. Then sort of dozes and feeds on and off until we get up (and I doze too, while he feeds). So I get a decent amount of sleep. Hang in there!

I don't think anyone can tell you when it will get better unfortunately... but what i always found when mine were babies is many frustrating things like this are usually just a phase which will pass.
I EBF both of mine and sleep was always rather tricky, with lots of night wakings (other than DD2 gave me false hope for the first 3mths then it all went out the window!)
I think they crave the closeness more from BF especially if they don't take a dummy, and also the milk digests quicker.
I couldn't sleep train either as crying is always to communicate a need and I couldn't leave them upset.
Some just seem to need less sleep.The naps thing sounds testing though.
Is she in her own room or still in yours?

You're using hyperbole to justify the choices you made. You don't need to justify your choices of how you parent your child, just as OP and everyone else on this thread who choose not to sleep train don't have to justify why we haven't.

I agree with you about changing stances as your child grows or we mature. You have 1 3 year old at the moment, sleep training worked for your child and I am genuinely happy for you, if you choose to have more and they aren't as compliant, you may have to change your position.