7mo wakes up screaming and picking him up makes him worse! :-(

[asicsgirl]

7mo ds2 has started waking up at night after a while of (mostly) sleeping through. he really shouts his head off and yet if we try to rock him, soothe him, pat him etc it just seems to make him even more incandescent with rage!!

we have started leaving him to cry and this sometimes works - he gradually stops screaming so much and hums to himself, then screams a bit more, then hums again, and eventually drifts off.

but i feel terrible about it! with ds1 we used to pick him up, sing to him, rock him etc to get him back to sleep. this felt normal and natural and loving. i hate hate hate leaving ds2 to cry, it goes against all my instincts. do i just have to harden my heart, as it does seem to work (although not always)? or is there something else i could do that wouldn't make me feel like such a heartless cow?

My Ds, who is now 2, did this for a while. We were so frustrated because he didn't sem to want comforting. He grew out of it, though, so there is light at the end of the tunnel.

thank you for that... let's hope ds2 is the same. he's very cuddly and affectionate the rest of the time, so i guess that is a positive, but it's really starting to grind me down as i seem to spend so much time listening to him cry - he does the same in daytime too