The 'newborn - sleep nightmare' continuation thread, Cosmosis, count, emo etc. Still a sleep nightmare?

[Bumperlicious]

Just thought I'd catch up with all of you from the last thread to see if now we've moved on from the newborn stage things are any better?

Dd2 is nearly 5 months and sleep is still hit and miss. She is not good at sleeping when out and about so mornings are either spent at home or I choose to socialise and spend the rest of the day fighting to get her to sleep.

She still rarely goes down in the evening despite me trying for 1.5 hours. Eventually goes down 11.30ish and still often wakes twice a night

Am knackered, no end in sight. How's everyone else doing?

Cosmosis how did he manage that? Did he lift your top up?!

Raising that did occur to me last night, yes! I REALLY HOPE DS DOESN'T SLEEP THROUGH TONIGHT

Nah, I'd just got out of be to get him (it was only 6am) so was only in my pants. He does try to pull my top down though

Cheeky so-and-so! :)

In the last couple of days, DS has taken to shouting, "Bra! Brrrra! BRRRRRAAAA!". I am studiously ignoring this. It is far too embarrassing to be his first word - am putting it down as a random gurgle

hi all, i know several people who EBF and had great sleepers so dont agree with the formula/weaning thing to help. im afraid [secretly thrilled emoticon] that DH does now sleep quite well at night, i finally managed to see a paediatrician who agreed he had problems and he is now on dairy free formula and omeprazole for the reflux. the first night after changing his feed, his sleeping improved 100%. unfortunately sleep during the day is hit and miss and we generally spend all day fighting cos he's really tired but wont sleep. its clear though that the reflux and lactose intolerance were impeding his sleeping as he was waking hourly most nights and just crying, so if you have any worries ladies definately insist on seeing someone, it took me 10 weeks to get them to listen but we got there in the end. quite frankly, if 1 more doctor patronisingly said 'is this your first child' i was going to kill them. just need to get DH to understand that 5am is not a good time to call morning and get those naps sorted...

Thanks 1lumpor2, I have found dr's and HVs to be spectacularly unhelpful so far! Going to start a food diary (I've been saying that for weeks though!).

Nothing good to report here. DH took pity on me and gave me two nights off. He offered more but I will wait till the weekend. He is shattered and realising just how hard it has been for me. DD2 randomly waking up a lot in the night, not necessarily for food. Oh and she is being sick again! Same deal, phlegmy, coughing, rubbing eyes (but that might be tiredness). Could hayfever cause the phlegm? I'm so fucked off with not knowing what is going on. And it's never the same thing. I can't say 'oh she has trouble self settling' 'she's waking up after a sleep cycle' 'she's hungry' because it seems as soon as I thing I have solved one thing she reverts back to crap sleeping. Current issues are sickness/coughing and rolling over. And we haven't even hit teeth yet...

Narmada I remembered your post offering a fleecy sleepsuit. I would be very grateful for it and will PM you. Didn't mean to ignore your offer. I am sleeping walking through life at the moment.

Count, did your reverse cosmic ordering work?

Anyone else got any good news?

Cosmosis, wrt to the cot, we are having similar issues. Do you feed to sleep? I've started feeding to sleep on a sheepskin then transferring her on the sheepskin into the cot. Been working well except she vomited on it this morning Otherwise I think you just have to hope the novelty will wear off.

Is DS in a gro bag? Might that stop him rolling around a bit.

My friend has a one year old who has always been a crap sleeper and she co-sleeps (out of necessity as she has another child and is not ready for them to share a room yet) and she was telling me she literally has to feed her DS in a headlock to get him to stay still and go off to sleep!

Nah, his sleep is as bad as ever. One 2-hour stint after we go to bed if we're lucky, then pretty much hourly wakings after that. And last two nights he's been really fidgety and excitable at bedtime, and hasn't settled until 8:30/9pm rather than 7.

I can see that there is so much going on with him development-wise. He's in the early stages of crawling, though it's not so much proper on-all-fours crawling as flinging himself hands-first towards the object of his desire (usually either a pack of baby wipes - his toy of choice ATM - or highly inappropriate/dangerous things like cables or radiator pipes). He's also constantly babbling and sing-songing to himself, and grinning from ear to ear at me. It's all very cute and, if I didn't know better, I'd assume he was manipulating me into forgiving him for all his night-time shenanigans. Anyway, what with all that, plus teeth and weaning-related fart issues, I'm not expecting things to improve anytime soon

We are having exactly the same behaviour count. But she also seems to have a cold now and back to being phlegmy. Only just getting her down. Been rubbing her back for the past half hour and as soon as I stopped and left her alone she went off! How long for I dont know. She seems to really like sleeping on her side, closes her eyes and relaxes but I think she is waking when she rolls onto her back. Aaarrrgggh!

Fuck she's just woken up again! It's going to be a looong night!

No, I stopped feeding to sleep a couple of months ago as I think it was causing more problems than it was solving. He either self settles, or we pat him to sleep in his bed, or we rock him to sleep in our arms if he's really fighting it. He's in a gro bag. hey ho.

Still, last night he slept from 12 till 5!!!!!!!!!!!

Sorry it's still tough going for people (though glad it's going well for you cosmosis). Bumper, have you tried putting your dd in a sleeping bag after she wakes in the night? When we were moving Ds into a bag I used to start the night with him swaddled and then put him in a bag after he first woke. Sounds like it's really difficult for you.
I've not been posting as it's just same as always for us. DS is sometimes waking every hour and sometimes doing a 3 hour stretch. He's been really bad in the evenings again but I think it might be separation anxiety. I still need to deal with him sucking to sleep but an terrified it'll make it worse. I might try tonight but it's tough because if I try and comfort him with my hands he just grabs them and tries to suck my fingers. I probably don't have a great attitude as I think it will fail so have decided i'll stop after 90 minutes - maybe sooner if he's hysterical. I don't think I can do naps as well though. Maybe i'll try and reintroduce a dummy for naps but he just chew on them now. DH is trying to settle him in the evenings sometimes which is good and sometimes it works.
See, same old, same old. Sure I could have written the same thing anytime in the last 3 months!

Same here judy - after a week or so of hourly wakings, DS did a 3- hour stretch last night. However, not sure if it's a) because he wouldn't go to sleep until 9pm because he was too busy babbling and crawling around in the cot or b) because he was in bed with us and I seem to remember sort of patting him at one point in my sleep. Anyway, DH and I got more sleep last night even if DS didn't (he still woke at 7).

I think we might be in 8-month sleep regression. DS seems to find it hard to sleep in the pushchair, is harder to settle for naps and completely hyper at bedtime. And nighttime sleep is all over the place. He actually crawled properly this morning so clearly there's been a lit going on in that little noggin.

a lot going on

Well done baby count (life suddenly gets even harder for you now!). I think we are at the same stage count. Dd2 is nearly crawling.

Sorry things aren't any better judy. I know it puts me off posting as it must seem so borrrring. But actually I am loving this thread, it makes me not feel so alone.

bumper, my boys liked to sleep on their side and to stop them rolling onto their backs i would put a rolled up blanket behind them, tucked right in and one in front of them if needed, it did help :)

SORRY you are all still suffering with lack of sleep :(

have to say dd's 4mth sleep regression has passed now touch wood and she is settling fine, unless she gets overtired and we get a good stretch in the evening and then another 3-4 hr stretch after her dream feed :) she can be unsettled from 4-5am onwards but is generally sleeping till after 7am now, tho some of that scooped in my arm but quite frankly as long as she sleeps i dont care!

well done baby count for the crawling! DS is nowhere near that yet, he has only just started being happy on his front for more than 30 seconds, Besides, I think he's too fat to bear his weight on his arms

DS also likes to sleep on his side, he does that when he's in the bed with us.

Hello, can I join?

I've lurked for a while and wondered if I could have a good whinge chat with people in a similar predicament.

I had ds1 nearly 5 yrs ago and he was a sleeper from day 1. Easy peasy. I was a smug git. I DESERVED ds2, the World's Shittest Sleeper. Even in my pissing arms he wakes frequently. He fights sleep too.

I am into fluffy wuffy baby care and though I have no prob with cc FOR OTHERS., it is not for me. Ds2 spent most of the first few months of his life screamong in pain due to health probs and I cannot bear hearing him cry. Plus he is one of these kids who gets hysterical rather then crying 'down', iyswim?

I am pretty knacked as he is almost a year. I feed him to ssleep - he literally will not sleep otherwise. Seriously, NCSS my arse.

Anyhoo, thanks for letting me offload.

Oh, yes, just read Bumper's post about friend with 1 yr old in a head lock. That is like ds2. I have to hold him so tight I feellike I am a living straight jacket.

re wriggling, crawling babies, when the boys were at this stage we would lie with them ie me or dp and they would be in a grobag and we would hold onto the bottom corner or the grobag so that they couldnt roll over, get up etc, sometimes this took a while as we would be doing shhh, pat at thesame time etc..... but it did work, particularly with ds2 who crawled at 5mths...

nethunsreject welcome - your post made me laugh. "Fluffy wuffy baby care" - love it. I sympathise with you on the hysteria front - my DS is like that. We would have done CC (very unwillingly) by now but it's pointless, he'd easily outlast us ...

Ooh Bumper - you made the talk roundup!

nethuns, hello

I also know what you mean re the hysteria, DS was very much like that, seems to have got a bit better now.

He did a weird thing last night, he woke at 11.45 and was relaly screaming. DH went in to him and he seemed soooo angry he was scratching DH and arching his back and all sorts. anyway, dh put him back in the bed as he didn't know what else to do and ds just went out like a light! odd.

Thanks for the welcome.

COngrats, bumper!

Cosmosis - strange little creatures, aren't they?!

Right, I am off to try to put an octopus in a string bag put ds2 in his sleeping bag and settle him. I may be some time...

Yy, count, he could outlast us easily. Ds1 would've given in (though thankfully we never had to do it) but cc is not for ds2, or me for that matter. Like I say though, no probs with others doing it - every family and every baby is different.

Hello nethuns and welcome.
Well, tried the no sucking thing and it didn't work. I put him in the cot and he was all smiley but tired (which made it worse) and went through the usual song and story then just sat by the cot. He was ok for a few minutes and then realised there were no fingers on offer and starting crying. Crying turned to screaming and after 20 mins there was no sign of it stopping. I was trying to comfort him with my head - rubbing my cheek against his - so there would be no fingers to tempt him, but it didn't really help. I then picked him up and tried to comfort him in my arms. He crying briefly but realised again there were no fingers for him so started again with the full on screaming. I gave in pretty quickly after that and he fell asleep in my arms. He's still hiccuping 10 minutes later and I feel awful. I felt physically sick when he was crying - it was just so intense . I don't think we could try full on CC though guess this probably wasn't much different.
Guess it's back to the not-really-acheiving-much-Pantley-Pull-Off. Thing is he had an ok night last night with a 3 hour stretch and no feeds until 1.30am. Think I have to accept the slow progress and hope he'll somehow sleep in the day at nursery without finger sucking....