HELP! 9 month old getting worse not better.

[AlCrowley]

DD has always been a terrible sleeper. I joked before she was born that I was due a non-sleeping baby this time after DS who slept through from 8 weeks and it really has come true.

After months of struggle, we'd finally gotten to the point where she was finally having 1 nap in the day then having a BF at 7pm and going to bed and waking at 1.30-ish for a feed then sleeping till 5.30-ish for a feed and being wide awake from then until her nap. We weaned at 5 months on the advice of the HV because she wasn't napping during the day at all! She now eats really well.

Again on the HV's advice, 4 days ago, I added a FF at bedtime along with her BF. She's never taken a bottle - just screams if you put one in her mouth - so we've been giving "bedtime milk" from a tippy cup. She maybe takes an ounce or two before she cries for boob at which point I BF her to sleep as normal. But since then, her sleep has gotten even worse. We now have the 7pm feed, an 11pm feed, then the 1am feed and an extra 3am feed before the 5.30 wake up. The only bonus is that her nap has extended to more like 90 mins most days.

So I'm giving up on the HV and asking MN - what do I do now? Do I ditch the FF or should I give it a few more days to see if she settles? Is there anything else i can do to encourage her to sleep through - or at least go back to just 2 wakes? DH, DS and I are all desperate for a full nights sleep now

Any advice would be appreciated

HI BlueChampagne. We'd gotten down to one wake a night too - then we went on holiday and it all went wrong. I'd rounded up DD's age a little when I started the thread, she's actually not 9 months properly until next week but it's close enough.

I've got the 'Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child' book now so I'll scan it for tips for both of us :)

Cheers m'dear. Here's hoping!

Tonight has started badly already. DD was tired and wanting to sleep on the way home from swimming but I managed to keep her awake long enough to try some dinner. Not sure why I bothered though as she had very little even when I offered her yogurt which is her favourite.

So I put her in her sleepsuit and tried to give her the bedtime milk but again, she had very little, BF her and have put her to bed at 6pm. An hour early.

Not particularly worried about the early bedtime but am concerned that as she'd had almost no dinner, she's not going to sleep for long and it's going to be a long, long night

Hope I'm wrong

Not necessarily (think positive) she probably didn't eat much as she's tired. However try and give her a good feed later and hopefully all will be well

My two also went off food a little when teething badly but I do think it was due to being tired she didn't eat much in this case.

I'm rooting for you that tonight will be ok

Still not looking good. Sleep lasted 20 mins. She's still not wanting to eat so I'm going to do bedtime as normal Bath with DS then another go with the bedtime milk and another BF.

DH was about to fall sleep on the sofa so tonight will be a nightmare if she is up.

I promise I do not advocate regularly dosing of a child but I do think a lot of it is teeth though and it may help her if very tired to help settle and sleep well. Teething is always worse when the child is tired and at night I found.

She had a liberal dose of Bonjela just before bathtime and has had a a large BF even though she refused all bedtime milk.

I may be using that suggestion if she wakes lots tonight though.

I'm thinking I'm probably going to have to relax the 3 hours between feeds rule tonight given that she's had very little food since lunch. Is that a good idea or will I just being undoing any progress we made last night do you think?

If she is hungry feed her. If she's not really taking anything at a feed then I would lie her down again, as you're not a dummy Always try teething gel first before the feed as said previously. I swear by this as you can tell, as it numbs the gums and calms them if it is teeth. I'm not an expert, it was just the rule of thumb I followed as they slept better and were happier after teething gel once teething. I generally didn't give teething gel in the day and saved it for nap times or night. As I found in the day when up and about they didn't seem as bothered teeth wise

I bet she'll suddenly pop a tooth in the next week and return to sleeping better If not then I'll accept I'm wroing LOL, afterall every child is different.

Perhaps feeding didn't hurt once her gums were numb? And that's why she took a big feed afterwards?

I hope you're right.

If the worst come to the worst then maybe I'll treat myself to a nap while DS is at pre-school in the morning. Poor old DH though. He's even got to work this weekend so there'll be no catch up for him

Well, last night wasn't as bad as I expected after all.

After another quick wake up around 9pm that DH sorted, DD slept through until 2.30am! I changed her nappy as that seems to have helped the past few nights and administered the Bonjela then tried to cuddle her to sleep. She wasn't rooting and seemed happy to cuddle but I was so tired, I'm afraid to say that after about 10 minutes of cuddling not producing results, I did attempt to feed her But feeding just seemed to make her more awake!! After a bit more cuddling while she sang at me, I laid her down in her cot and shushed her for a few minutes whenever she cried then we sat in the dark, totally quiet for a while. I thought he was falling to sleep but then she started singing again so I decided I would actually have to go with the book and leave her even if it meant her crying - and it did As soon as I left the room she howled and carried on for over half an hour before finally falling asleep.

I felt awful but I'd been in her room trying to soothe her for what turned out to be an hour and it wasn't a distressed cry, just an annoyed one. I think the book was right, she wanted my company and by giving it, I was stopping her sleeping.

Slipped again this morning too. She woke at 6.15am and as she seemed so awake and I felt so awful about her crying last night, I brought her into our bed for her feed so we could have a snuggle too - then we both fell asleep. Not for long though - DS woke us at 7am

So apart from my two little slips and the heartache of listening to her cry for half an hour, I think it was a fairly positive night. We both got a reasonable amount of sleep and she doesn't seem damaged at all by it this morning. She's still happy and cuddly. Going to make sure naps work better today so that hopefully, we can have an even better night tonight.

I never was brave enough to leave for 30 mins. It is supposed to have quick results and if she wasn't hungry then she did want your company. It's so hard isn't it?

Hello AlCrowley. It sounds like you had a good night last night. My EBF DD is eight months and we were in a very similar situation to you one month ago. She was having a dream feed at ten, then waking sometimes twice, sometimes 4 times in the night. I fed her back to sleep as it was the quickest option! She also had a dummy that I think used to fall out and wake her. But I was exhausted so decided I needed to do something about her sleep.

I had tried PUPD but it only seemed to irritate my DD, so we went for a quick fix method. Basically, we removed the dummy, stopped the dream feed, and put her to bed at 7pm saying its sleepytime now, then leaving. We went back in if she was distressed rather than just moaning, calmed her, and repeated the sleepytime message. The first night it took her 30 mins to fall asleep ( we had been expecting hours of crying!!). She woke the first night between 2am and 4am, moaned for a long time, but did not get really distressed. She then fell asleep till 8am. That was one month ago, and most nights she now sleeps from 7pm until after 6am, and settles really well in the evening. She had a cold last week, and woke very distressed for a few nights, so I did feed her to calm her, but she is now better and sleeping through again.

This method I know sounds harsh, but it was actually much easier to implement than I thought it would be. I had all sorts of worries about her being hungry etc, but clearly she was only comfort feeding. She and I are now both much happier and able to enjoy our days together much more.

It sounds like you are making progress with what you are doing, and hopefully that will continue, but if not and you reach the end of your tether and can cope with a night or two of some crying, this does seem to work, so do not lose hope!!

I think it would have been harder if I wasn't so tired. Hoping for less crying tonight though as it wasn't nice :(

Tears from DS at Pre-school drop off too. No phone call to say he hasn't calmed down though and naps are going well so fingers crossed the rest of the day improves.

Hi Al - our night was better too. DS2 was a bit of a 'mare to put to bed - I can't tell the difference between hand in mouth + howling = my teeth hurt, and hand in mouth + howling = I'm hungry. I'd BF'd him an hour earlier so assumed teeth, but no, 5oz formula did the trick. Mind you, that was after nurofen (calpol usually gets spat out), so maybe that's more support for Tea&Cakes's theory.

So, he went to sleep at 8.25pm (rather than between 7.30 and 8), but slept till 2.50am. Another 6oz, then 4.40, when he was cuddled to sleep by 5am.

He was ready to start the day at 6.15, though neither DH nor I was exactly ready for a 6.15 start so he came in our bed for a cuddle and BF, which meant he didn't want breakfast!

My 2 are at a child minder 4 days a week as I'm back at work - they have suggested hungry baby formula. However, we had quite a struggle to get him to take some formula in the first place, I'm loathe to rock the boat now!

Oh if only DD would take formula! She despises bottles (and I've tried many) and only started taking a few sips of Bedtime milk from a sippy cup a couple of weeks ago!!

Good job I'm happy to carry on BF for now else we'd have even more of a nightmare!

I'd hoped to stop when she was 1 though. I'm hoping we can work something out with a cup so I can change her to cows milk after her birthday without too many problems.

1h 15min nap!

Great stuff about the nap.

My DS wouldn't take a bottle until I found the NUK ones, when he was already 6 months old, but it had to be breast milk in it to begin with, he moved to cows milk ok in due course I found though

DD was very flexible about bottle or breast, didn't realise how lucky I was at the time, being my first child.

You're doing great and if she goes straight to a cup then that's perfect really.

OMG!!

I thought she looked tired a little early today so I gave her a BF at 1.30 rather than 2.30 and by 1.45 she was asleep - and stayed that way until half 3!

1hr 45 min nap

Hoping for a rested and readily sleeping baby tonight and that the long naps will improve tonight's sleep rather than take from it.

Well she should be ok to go to bed at 7pm that's for sure and not do what she did yesterday

Sounds good

Forgot the blinking Bedtime milk again!!

Already had to resettle once since bedtime.

Hoping it's just a glitch while she gets properly settled.

Well, we resettled twice and she was finally, properly asleep by about 8pm and then she slept till.......

5.30am!!!

Not breaking out the champagne just yet as she has done one off nights like this before which is why I was so convinced that she can do full nights but it's certainly a good sign.

I did try feeding and resettling her this morning but she'd woken DS and he was up and about (and in her room grr) so we started the day at 6am. Still, I feel a lot more rested today even with the early start. I woke a couple of times between 2am and 3am waiting for her to wake but as we were in bed by 10pm, I've still had a lot more sleep that I have had in a while.

So - now to do it all again today. We're going to soft play with some friends today but I'm not going to go until DD has had a proper nap.

That's great news! Coincidentally, we had a great night too - asleep at 8.15pm and didn't hear a peep till 5.15am. Resettled with formula (6oz) and up at 7am. It's a record for DS2.

So, 2 steps forwards - sure they'll be 1 back soon enough. We're off to stay with friends on Saturday night which might upset everything, but at least you feel there's light at the end of the tunnel, and we're both feeling better today.

Hope you have a good weekend and are still feeling chipper on Monday.