Oh God I am trying to do PUPD as advised by HV and I hate it already - I'm panicking!!

[PassionKiss]

DD is 6.5 months - I can't go on having her wake every 40mins - 1 hour for BF. Dh and I are soooo tired.

She is crying right now - I hate it

I'm just going to go in and pick her up but I know she will root for boob.

Have no confidence this will work!! Will it work??

no, probably not! but i think they can be hungry a couple of times.
i def agree that there is nothing wrong with cutting down the night wakings, but she is still quite small to be sleeping through totally IMO

that's why we found the no-cry sleep solution helped, because when ds2 was genunely hungry he would just keep waking every time he was settled back down
if he wasn't hungry we could settle him and he would stay asleep

i feel there is a risk with things like CC and PUPD where you basically train your child NOT to wake or rather, not to expect you to come, even if they are hungry. It seems like an all or nothing approach to me iyswim?

i take your point about possibly being hungry thisisyesterday. in our situation, ds2 (8mths) has cut down the number of night wakings (he was waking every 2 hours, so not quite as frequent as passionkiss's little one).

BUT when he wakes for the day, he is never hungry, refuses milk and his breakfast pretty much. i am trying to encourage him to not feed at 2 and 4am, so that he can wake up a bit more hungry in the morning. he is also cutting down on his daytime BFs, so for us, it's a case of trying to readjust his feeding times a bit. i fully accept he may still be hungry once or maybe even twice a night at 8 months old, but as he is refusing milk at other times, i would like to 'test' whether the night feeds are really necessary.

i've also found that when i do just latch him straight on in the night, he starts to wake up more frequently. when i try to settle him in other ways, he then starts sleeping for longer stretches.

it's my inner paranoia though that maybe he is hungry

Hello! OP here. Hope everyone is having a good evening so far.

So, tonight I have steeled my nerves with a glass of wine and tried PUPD again.

She went happily down at 7 (fell asleep on the boob though). Then woke up at 7.30. I have had to go in and out about 5 times to pick her up but she is now asleep! (the test will be if she can stay asleep for longer than 1 hour though!)

A quick PUPD question. When I was holding her, waiting for her to calm down I did sway slightly - is rocking against the rules? Am thinking now that she didn't really self-settle . . . although I am hoping if she realises boob isn't forthcoming she won't bother waking up??

hi PK, found your thread! we had a good start to the night too, dd went straight to sleep too...finger crossed for a quiet one tonight!!! with you bf, would it be easier if you dh did the pupd as if she can smell your milk she will be more likly to want to feed??

Hi whatsleep Glad you're having a good night so far too!

Unfortunately DH works most evenings so it's just me a lot of the time. I could send him in to settle her for the 3am onwards wake ups but he works such long hours I feel like I should do it . . .

Anyway - fingers crossed for tonight being better than last night!

Sometimes they cry because their teeth are hurting or because they want comfort. It isn't all about food.

I think if you are finding this tough then it is absolutely fine to cuddle or feed your baby as much as you want. Trust me, eventually they start sleeping through.

DD is 8 months and has always fed to sleep at every waking. I've halfheartedly tried PUPD but couldn't stomach the crying so abandoned it. We feed to sleep for all naps and nighttime sleep, or she goes to sleep in the sling or sometimes the car. She's gone from waking every 45 mins at 3 months to now reliably doing 6 hour stretches every night at 8 months. She's done this on her own with no training from me at all.

I think sleep is totally a developmental thing and it actually doesn't matter whether you do PUPD or not as they all get there eventually, its just a matter of getting through the tough bits.

Be kind to yourself and remember that your instincts are there for a reason. If you are finding the crying tough don't do it!

Hey it's tough.

I always fed to sleep and hit a big wall at 8 months. Waking hourly, sometimes more for bf / comfort.

It was awful.

So the first step was to help him fall asleep without boob. Which you have done which is great. And keep ploughing on with that. If you can separate boob and falling to sleep it will help massively.

I didn't want to do cc so it has been slow.

Thisisyesterday what sort of cues did you introduce?

Hi everyone!

We've been through elements of this too - trying to stop the breast-for-sleep-dependence.

I suspect if you've decided to try PU/PD and you've got this far and are seeing some improvement, then stick with it - if you can stand it! There's a lot to be said for consistency.

My DD was in a similar situation to yours, so at 7.5 months I eventually went for the bed-time put down awake solution. So I fed her, then put her down before she fell asleep. First night we had intermittent protesting for 25mins, but because it was protest crying rather than all-out distress, I let her cry and was surprised by how quickly she fell asleep. Ditto when she woke a couple of hours later. Third time, she didn't cry, just fidgeted a bit, then went back to sleep. I fed her eventually. The second night was similar, but with less protesting overnight. The third night, she went down at bedtime without a murmur and immediately her night wakings went down from a minimum of 5 to 2.

Now I feed her on the two occasions she wakes overnight as I figure that's acceptable (for the time being). But the bedtime settle a la Pantley made all the difference.

So that's another approach you can try if the PU/PD doesn't do what you want.

I'll be interested to hear how it goes, though, as I'm considering PU/PD as a technique to get DD napping in her cot....

OP here, thanks very much for all your advice.

I am too depressed to go into detail about last night but lets just say it was horrendous I did eventually get 3 hours sleep from 4am when I took her into my bed.

Well - will try again tonight. PUPD is not going well as I keep caving in and feeding her - lost the energy to keep going in and out while she cried. Will try to put her down awake at bedtime tonight.

Have ordered No cry sleep solution off Amazon.

Ah, bless you, PK....

Hi PK hope your ok, I know how shitty it is when you just need a good nights sleep. ok, so this worked for me so maybe give it will work for you too, cant find the website i watched it on but it was a sleep expert woman who had videos of different tecniques. basically you roll baby onto her side so she is facing you, use your right arm and place it with your hand cupping the side of her face which is touching the matress and rest your arm (up to your elbow)along the front of her body. Use your other hand to stroke, rub or pat her back. I think it kind of feels like they are being held. Dont know if this will help or even if you can understand what i am trying to describe?!! hope you have a better night