Sooo tired, could do with some tips please?

[WickedWitchSouthWest]

I really don't know what I'm asking here. I just need to write it all out and see if anyone has a fabulous lightbulb moment and can help me out, or just reassure me that I need to keep muddling along...

DS is 9mo. He sleeps an hour in the morning and 45 mins in the afternoon. He eats a good lunch followed by bf an hour or so after, has a late afternoon feed too so goes 3-4 hours. He eats a good dinner in the evening and has a beaker of formula (rarely drinks more than 2oz), bath, bf and bed at 7-7:30. Then it all goes pear shaped! He'll wake 3-4 hours after going down. If I bf he goes back to sleep, if DH offers him formula he will have a mouthful and then drop back off, occasionally he can be rocked to sleep by DH with no milk. He will then wake another 3-4 hours later for a long bf and then again 2-3 hours after that wanting more milk and getting up for the day! Then he doesn't want breakfast (too full of milk I expect), lasts an hour or two and then wants more milk and back to bed for his morning nap.

I'm shattered. We didn't tackle the night feed with DD until she was 14 months and it was easy at that point! DH would go into her and tell her that mummy's milk didn't work at night anymore! I've told DH he's to go to DS at the late night waking from now on to try and break that habit.

We've tried a dummy but he spits it straight out. I'm not a fan of CC or CIO but I'm not sure if there is anything I can do to get more sleep!

Sorry for the ramble, I really don't know what I'm asking at all and well done for getting this far!

Was in a similar position myself not that long ago. We worked on trying to eliminate the first feed of the night so that there was only one feed. We spent a few nights doing whatever it took to get our DD back to sleep without a feed - I did not want to do CC so we did a combination of shushing and patting and picking her up for cuddles if she was too upset. It sounds like this might be best done by your DH.
After a few nights (of quite hard work) she started to not really wake at this time and we just gave her the second feed.

Gradually, over a period of a few weeks she has just started to wake later and later for the second feed and we are now at her waking ahout 4.30, 5 ish for a bottle and then back to sleep for a couple of hours.

Randomly she will still wake up but I dont offer milk until this early morning one.

I too feel as if I have rambled - hopefully there is something in there that might resonate with you!

B4 I start I haven't got the miracle you're after and am utterly shattered too but I might be able to help...

My ds is very similar to yours, needs to be fed to sleep and won't have a dummy. To help with the constant night wakenings we brought him into our bed. Dh was really against at first but it saved us getting up and down all rotten night.

I also stopped bfing at night and relied on popping the bottle in to get him back off to sleep. Dh and I could share the work that way and snatch a bit more precious sleep.

To lengthen his naps, as soon as he'd start to stir I'd pick him up and rock/feed him back off to sleep then put him back down once he's dropped off again - he'd always manage to sleep a bit extra that way.

Ds is now 12mo and I've stopped bfing (I found that really tired me out and since I've stopped am feeling less shattered). He has a sippy cup instead of the bottle now and when he's finished but before he's asleep I put him down to teach him how to "self settle". He jumps up but I just put him back down again and this can go on for a while but he eventually falls asleep on his own - average time now 10 mins. I do this at nap times now too. It has helped in that when he's not hungry during the night he can get back off to sleep on his own as opposed to us rocking him. I try to leave him a few minutes to see if he'll settle back down.

He still wakes up but it's getting easier.

I hope I've explained myself clearly enough!

Good luck xXx

Thank you so much ladies. Honestly, I'm so ditsy at the moment I'd forgotten I'd posted

DH is now home for the next 5 nights so we can start tackling that first wakening. I think that's the best place to start too bubbles. Then I think we'll try a beaker of milk as the first feed of the day, I'm inclined to go straight for cows milk with that one (I think I did that with dd but she may have been over a year at that point) and the whole point of bf is that I'm too lazy to make formula

rr16, thanks for that :) I like the idea of lengthening the naps! I have been having him in our bed after the second night waking so I can feed lying down when he wakes between 5 and 6 but that'll need tackling at some point too. Hmm.

Thank you for sharing what you've done. I do feel a bit clearer now! Sort out the late night waking, switch the first morning feed to a beaker :)