13 mo waking in the night.... for hours

[skorpion]

My DD has developed a habit which has me close to losing the plot at times...

She goes to bed at 19.30 or thereabouts and sleeps like an angel until at least midnight. Then she wakes up and refuses to go back to sleep for anything up to 2.5 hrs. I feel I have tried anything: stay with her in her bedroom, take her into our bed, leave her to cry for a bit, hold her, boob her, on her back, on her tummy. When she is on her tummy she will stay there quietly for a few seconds, then get up and crawl a bit, lie down, get up again, this goes on and on.

She doesn't necessarily cry, just won't sleep. She does cry when I leave her on her own and I don't like to leave her to cry.

She has cut her third tooth recently but this doesn't seem to have helped.

It's like she just wants a break from all that sleeping at night.

I am close to losing it with her at night and feel awful about it.

I know everything is just a phase but is there anything I can do to shorten this particular one?

Sorry this is such a long post and thanks.

Is she hungry? You say she doesn't cry when left alone, could you set up a bed near her cot and go in to her but go to sleep in her room so you don't have to be awake the whole time?

I thiught of perhaps putting a camping mattress down next to her bed... Even if I do feed her this does not send her off to sleep straight away.

I do blw and she eats a lot during the day. She has a meal at six in the evening and I bf her to sleep. I may go back to trying to do a night feed as well. Thank you!

I hate to tell you this but DS was around 13 months when breastfeeding seemed to stop filling him up at night! He would still wake to feed but then after about an hour of on-off nursing he'd be up asking for toast

Maybe move tea half an hour later?

Ah, didn't realise this could be the case. She doesn't take milk in any other way but me at the moment, so will have to think how to fill her up more. Thanks again.

Is she walking?

Not yet, just trying to stand up. Are you thinking lots for the brain to process so waking up?

When they're ready to make the developmental leap to walking (and talking and a hundred other things), the first thing that goes is sleep. It's most noticeable with walking I think because it's so physical. They lose the ability to self settle. You often find them standing up in their cots, shuffling around, jiggling about. They get cross easily and become frustrated because they don't understand why they can't sleep. Nothing that used to work works anymore. No bfing to sleep, no soothing them. They just seem wide awake and ready to go.

It's normal. If I had a pound for every time somebody had started this thread with a baby between 11 and 16 months, exactly this behaviour, I'd have a really nice woodburner by now.

Not much you can do tbh. Just ride it out. Once they're more mobile they wear themselves out and their brain goes back to self settling.

It's like when you start a new job or have something stressful on, your lie in bed with your brain ticking and you just can't switch off.

All the above of course assumes no illness/teething/night terrors etc.

Skorpian - my DD is 14mo and is often (as in 3 or 4 nights a week) awake for at least an hour in the middle of the night and has been from about 11 mo. We've tried all sorts - leaving her (intermittent grizzling for an hour or so during which I get no sleep); going in every 10 mins (takes at least an hour); feeding her in her room (doesn't seem to achieve anything other than making me wide awake); getting up with her (again, achieved nothing other than me being wide awake and very grumpy the next day) - before realising that she was content to be awake provided she had company and something to do. So, we've now settled on stumbling to get her more or less as soon as she wakes turning on the hallway light in the process, bringing her and a couple of favourite soft toys into our bed, feeding her and, when she's had enough, rolling over myself and going back to sleep whilst she "chats" to her toys in the faint light cast by the hall way light. She eventually falls asleep herself and I'm often woken by her snoring in my ear! Ours is by no means a perfect solution and I do worry that she may still be in our bed in 10 years time and feel like a useless parent when I mention this to other mothers BUT I am only disturbed for the 15mins or so that it takes her to feed whereas everything else we tried involved me being awake for at least an hour.

Thank you Ladies, good to know I'm not alone.
I fed her back to sleep on Tuesday night - only took 20 mins and she then slept until 6.30. Not so good last night, feeding didn't settle her and she took about 45 mins after that in our bed to sleep.

I'll ride it out, doing what I'm doing - I suppose I just wanted to know I am not doing anything too wrong.

Here's to better sleep. Soon. Hopefully before she is 10