Can someone please please please tell me how they expect you to work when you have a baby that doesn’t sleep!!!

[Biosblbay]

I am loosing my mind. My 11 month old (turns 1 nest week) is waking up every 2-3 hours. She already had me up at 1am, ended up bringing her in bed with me, it was just a hour of fidgeting so I put her back in her room at 2am, she is now awake again at 3:30am crying and will not stop. I’ve been down to give her a dummy and it didn’t help. This has been on going now for days. On top of that My 3 year old (4 in September) has been having later nights due to the heat, no sleep because of the baby and has also been up early because of either the baby waking him up or he has been unwell. Because of this he has been home from school, it was closed due to the extreme heat and then the last 2 days I had to pick him up early due to not being himself and being unwell.

I work a full time job, luckily I work from home so there is no commute but concentrating is pretty impossible when you are being woken up so frequently and having late nights and early starts. She has been crying for almost half an hour and I just don’t know what to do! I have no next to me for anymore, she won’t sleep if I put her in bed with me, I am worried she is going to wake my son up in a minute as their rooms are next to each other.

please I am out of ideas. How can any mum be expected to work when you have to go through this. Maternity leave should be 2 years minimum! I also have such a busy weekend ahead of me, including her cake smash photo shoot Sunday, how am I even going to manage that! I am exhausted!!!!!!

and just so you are aware, I have tried doing 1 nap in the day, it makes no difference, I’ve stuck to the two naps, still no difference, shortening both naps, still makes no difference.

what is going wrong!! I am at breaking point. I haven’t slept properly in weeks, in fact haven’t slept properly since she was born but these last few weeks have been extremely challenging, more so being back at work.

He was propranolol aa treatment for an incredibly fast growing and potentially disfiguring birthmark. Off label prescription (prescribed by paediatric dermatologist at NHS hospital).

It is one of a number of options to treat birthmarks, but propranolol restricts and shrinks the blood vessels. So birthmark went from a barely perceptible red mark a few days after birth to the size of a red egg at 4 months old to faint pink mark after treatment finished. It couldn't have been left, this was really at the start of the rapid growth phase of birthmarks and GP and Paediatrician agreed treatment was necessary.

The night terrors are a known side effect. We had many discussions with the paediatrician about the benefits of the meds for the birth mark vs negative effects of repeated night terrors. We stopped the meds after 6 months but the birth mark started to grow back so we restarted the meds again.

It wasn't colic or general sleep disturbance. He was literally screaming but couldn't be properly woken. For hours at a time. At least two nights, often three nights a week. He was quite literally terrified in his sleep. It was incredibly distressing for him, DH and I. He was a very bubbly and happy baby and wee boy throughout (still is) so it wasn't just his character, illness or colic or anything else. Trust me, it was might terrors.

If your husband doesn’t wake up during the night, could he do the childcare during the day some days, and you could sleep? At weekends for example?

Honestly I read this at 5am this morning when my 1year old woke up. I don’t have much to offer apart from sympathy, it’s awful. I have to travel into London twice a week and was up at 4am both days, managed to get LO back to sleep an hour later but I had to be up at 6 and couldn’t get back to sleep, then didn’t get home until nearly 7. I WFH the other 3 days, which is better I guess. I am exhausted, like completely. I wish he would sleep through the night.