Sleep Nightmares Part III: At 3am No-One Can Hear You Scream

[CountBapula]

I've been moaning about documenting my 8 mo DS's 'challenging' sleep patterns on MN since he was three weeks old. He's still waking every 2-3 hours at least and the other thread's full, so here's a shiny new one for all you parents of hardcore sleep refusenik babies.

Who's with me?

Hi Raising. I got the Weissbluth book free (DH works on a baby mag so gets lots of review copies - not to mention free nappies ). Not sure I would have gone out and bought it, because I don't like his sleep training methods (basically, he recommends full-blown cry it out from four months ). However, if you ignore that whole facet of it, it is incredibly useful for understanding the science of baby sleep. He backs his assertions up with proper references to studies (including his own seven-year study into babies' naps). His is also the only baby sleep book that I've read that talks in detail about the fussy/high needs/colicky/wakeful baby type (though I think there is a Sears book about them which I keep meaning to get - probably the polar opposite of Weissbluth in terms of sleep training etc).

The bits I find interesting are about the emergence of the naps and the early bedtime, which he says are biological processes. Basically, he says that some kids are just short nappers, and there ain't much you can do about it until they grow out of it. This made me feel much better when DS was waking from naps after 45 minutes and nothing worked to resettle him.

I am more inclined to believe what he says than some of the self-styled parenting gurus - even though I would never follow his advice - because he is a scientist with extremely detailed knowledge and years of research behind him.

I do like theories backed up by scientific research! Apart from anything else I do like reading about what is actually happening and why and how the body just does what it's going to do and there's not really much you can do about it.

DD only sleeps 45 minutes too. She's occasionally gone longer but I've learnt the hard way not to get too excited by this.

RaisingMrC - I've got a copy, thank you. I had a quick read through about half of it last night. Then, I decided I would see what would happen if I put DD in her cot instead of feeding or rocking her to sleep. She cried for five minutes. It was a pretty full on cry but no worse when she's in the car and I can't get to her immediately. Interestingly though, she didn't seem to be crying because she wanted me to pick her up but because she was tired and wanted to go to sleep. I was patting her and singing to her but not really making eye contact. Then, for the first time since she's been born, she fell asleep, in her cot.

I was convinced this was a fluke but she did it again when she woke at 11.30. At 3am, literally the worst time in the world, she woke for another feed and was awake when I put her in the cot. This is normally the point in the night where I'm feeding her for hours trying to get her back to sleep or end up on the floor of her room or in the bed co-sleeping having kicked DH onto the sofa. She cried for about five minutes and obviously wanted me to hold her, so I did. When she was calm I put her back in and she kicked off again but wasn't indicating she wanted me to pick her up. She cried for about five minutes then gradually fell asleep. I was back in my bed by 4am, which is earlier than if I'd been holding her. She woke up crying again, by the time I got to her door she was asleep.

This morning for her nap I fed her and she got drowsy, put her in the cot, she cried then opened her eyes, saw me, closed them and went to sleep. It took five minutes.

I don't want to get my hopes up but I really hope she's learning to self settle. I'm absolutely against CC but there does seem to be a difference in her crying because she is tired and crying because she needs me. I'm about 30cm away from her and touching her and talking to her so I don't really feel as if it is CC.

The Sleep Sense program says go cold turkey on the feeding but I think that would be too traumatic. I think I'm going to try and see if I can get her to settle in the cot first, feeding her as I normally do. Once, if, we crack that, I'll look into having a little gap between feeding and sleep, or gradually reducing the length of the feeds.

missrose - sounds like you've got one of these

I've got one of these

CountBapula - I think last night we may have transferred from being a decreaser to an increaser! Does that mean you can't put your baby down to get to sleep by themselves? How do you get him/her to sleep generally? Sorry, I'm sure you've been through all of this on this and the previous thread.

Last night was hard. I think I may have accidentally started down a CC road which I do not want to do AT ALL. Bedtime was awful, she was hysterical and couldn't understand what was happening. I felt sick for hours aftwerwards and wanted to abandon the whole thing but I'm worried that to stop/start things like this would be even more traumatic for her. She eventually went to sleep, sobbing. Even writing about it makes me want to cry. I stayed with her the whole time, picking her up when she was very upset.

She woke at 1am, and we went through the whole thing again. She didn't settle until 2.30 and I'm sure it's only because she was exhausted. She didn't wake up until 6am, so we had one wake up for the whole evening. That has never happened before but if your baby is sleeping because they are traumatised and exhausted, that's not good, is it?

Fed her at 9am this morning, she almost fell asleep so I put her down, fell asleep almost immediately with minimum fuss and is still asleep now. DH says we continue with it but then it's not his boobs that start leaking when kicks off, is it?

Missrose sorry to hear about your painful night...its really hard to know what to do isn't it? Stop and it feels like you put them through all that for nothing, but then if you carry on you are still putting them through it, possibly for nothing if it doesn't work.

Things I've read seem to suggest you should start to see a change 3 nights in - so you could try tonight and see what happens, then make a decision based on that?

I tried some CC at bedtime a while ago, and DS just got worse night by night. Also tried nightweaning a few times before this current time and DS just screamed. So everytime I abandoned it, thinking he must just not be ready.

My DS is an increaser...gradually we are getting to a place where we can just comfort him with shh sounds, or some stroking etc. The last 3 nights he has been difficult to settle though. The night before last I only went into him once to resettle (think he woke a few other times but went back to sleep himself) but last night he woke three times, and his first wakeup he was awake off and on for 1 hour.

It does get very wearing.

I've pretty much stopped breastfeeding too, so no longer have the magic way of getting DS to sleep.

Count that is interesting about the short naps. DS can be resettled but has a sensitive period at 30 minutes into the nap. He's never grown out of it. I think his sleep cycle must be particularly short .

Oh when I say "change", I mean less crying and quicker to settle, not sleeping through!

Hi everyone. We're just back in Beijing after 3 weeks away when we fell out of every good habit and routine we had. It was HELL. Back now and trying to get back into the good habits, swap to formula and get solids into her. Plus my DSC are here. So an easy few weeks then.

DH is taking DD in two weeks for just under 36 hours so I've got to have her mostly on formula and in a really good routine by then. At the moment she is only going to sleep with me so it's kill or cure time.

No time to read the thread just now but I will tonight when I'm up at some horrid hour again

Hi everyone,

Well, DS2 will be 9 months on Wednesday and still will not sleep on his own until after 9. I've just managed to get him asleep out of my arms but now he's rolled onto the join between his bedside cot and my mattress. Not sure whether to wake him by moving him or leave him there. I'm sitting right next to him as I now can't be bothered to get off the bed! He can't be comfortable....

RaisingMrC - how old is your ds? Have you found that gradually, as he gets older, he's able to do things he couldn't do before, for example you can now settle him with patting or shushing?

I do still believe that when dd is ready she will be able to settle herself. The problem is that she needs to have learnt how to fall asleep without me breastfeeding her before I return to work. Last night dh had to go in as I couldn't bear another night of crying. I'm so over it. It just seems so cruel. Today she had her first swimming lesson so was exhausted and really hungry by 6.15. She was really calm and happy as we cuddled and she fed. I couldn't face forcing her to go from this relaxed, lovely state to one of high stress so I fed her until she fell asleep then put her down.

I suppose the idea is that she eventually gets used to it and it's not a high stress situation. Oh dear, I'm not doing very well with this!

Hi all. Hope you're OK. Good to see it's not just me stressing about going back to work! DS has always settled well for DH with rocking and shushing, but no idea whether the CM will be able to do it.

DS is up and down with sleep at the moment, but we've had a few nice long naps and in the last few days he's gone back to doing the odd 6/7 hour stretch, so we have bed at 8ish, one waking around 3 and up at 6. He seems to settle himself by rolling onto his side, which he only started to do a month or so ago, but it's making a huge difference to his sleep. Thing is, I am feeding to sleep more than ever at the moment - it's just so much easier, and DS wouldn't do it until about 8 months, so it's a bit of a novelty for me. I am trying to make sure DH settles him some of the time as well so he doesn't get used to it, but it doesn't seem to make any difference to how long he sleeps for, either for naps or night time, because his ability to settle himself between sleep cycles has come about naturally as a developmental thing.

It's quite liberating really, because I've realised with DS that the traditional wisdom of "they must fall asleep unassisted or they won't be able to settle themselves at night" simply isn't true. DS has never fallen asleep unassisted, and every attempt to get him to do so resulted in failure and much trauma for all of us. I am much happier now that I've realised that for him, sleep is largely developmental and he'll get there in his own time.

Don't know if this helps anyone, because I know every baby's different and I'm lucky that things are improving on their own. It's still tough though, and I'm still knackered

missrose he's almost one!!! It has been a very slow process and things are by no means sorted yet. I can't pretend that things have changed with absolutely no crying...but some things he seemed to "get", e.g falling asleep in the cot, relatively quickly (one painful night) and others not so...eg attempting to nightwean at 9 months (lots of painful nights and no change in a week).

I agree with Count about it being developmental. And I think that's probably why things sometimes work really quickly - because they were ready.

Now I just need DS to be ready to take some long naps in the day!!

Count good to hear things are imropving for you.

Just posting this link which talks about babies and napping at carers...scroll down a bit (titled "adjusting to naps with caregiver")

Hello everyone. We're on holiday this week - rented a cottage with my brother, SIL and niece. DS is sleeping ok while away though we've had the occasional hour of screaming. Most exciting news is that DH and I went out for dinner last night. DS didn't wake while we were away which was great but I almost would,have preferred it if he,had and my SIL had been able to resettle him.
We're having some good long stretches but he is still waking hourly from 3 or so. DH did a whole night on Tuesday though so apart from doing a feed around 5.30am I didn't get up! Best holiday ever.
Missrose - gradual retreat has worked pretty well for us in weaning DS off sucking my finger to dleep. I feed DS now before his bath and we've moved from rocking him to sleep while sucking my finger to having a hand on him in 3 weeks with not much crying. I didn't think it was possible. We've gone much slower than the plan and while we'll keep going gently I'm not too worried about him self settling if it gets too distressing for him. I too am starting to think.he'll do it when he's ready.

Count, Judys, glad things are improving again for you,

our big news is that at 9.5 mo the babies are finally switching to 2 nap days! it depends on not waking to early, which has improved with blackout blinds velcro'd to the window, then they'll sleep 9.30-10.30 and (on a very good day, like today) 2-4, with resettling. but then our evenings have gone to pot to compensate. neither baby seems able to do more than 1-2 hours any more. all through the night. and they're not even synchronised, so I amreally tired. (and at least here I know I'm talking to people who understand what that means).

I am desperately hoping this is a blip (that's been going for a week) associated with the change in napping. I can't keep this up.

Sorry I went awol again just finding it hard to keep up with threads these days. Been doing a skim through and seen a few people have some concerns about going back to work, I am back ft now and still bfing (expressing at work) so if anyone has any questions fire away!

Also wanted to reassure you about sleeping at childcare ? ds self settles for the CM he has always gone to sleep well for her (and bear in mind I had only just stopped feeding to sleep for ALL sleeps when he started with her)? she used to jiggle him in the bouncy chair, now she just sticks him in the pushchair. My friends ds who is just as bad a sleeper gets put on a beanbag at nursery and goes straight to sleep! The carers will find their own way to settle, don?t worry.

DS slept through last night! The 4th time he has done so. He also self settled last week completely on his own (ie I wasn?t in the room). But some nights, he is still needing a feed. He is also switching from 2 naps to 1 long one after lunch, which actually is making bedtime a lot easier somehow. I am just feeling zen about it at the moment and just trying to go with the flow because as far as I can see, nothing I do is actually making a difference and he is just getting there on his own.

Hi everyone,
Sounds as if progress is being made for some, which is great.

CountBapula, I know what you mean about feeding to sleep - it's just so easy yet everything you read is against it. The worry is what happens when you're not there. When my dd is tired she wants to feed rather than go to sleep in her cot. The association is so strong and it's hard to know whether it's a natural thing or something I've created.

RasingMrC, you're very brave attempting night weaning! I don't think I'm going there until I really can't cope anymore (although that may be sooner than I'd like to admit!). I went to a LLL meeting last week about sleep and the gist seemed to be that babies have a long sleep first, eg from 7pm until 1am and then it's not unusual for them to wake up several times until the morning.

I abandoned the CC/gradual retreat we were doing as I found it so stressful. I can't believe I put my dd through that. I guess she did stop crying relatively quickly - within 10 minutes most of the time - but she was putting her arms up to me and sobbing. I honestly don't know what I was thinking, not comforting her. The two days we were doing it she was falling asleep on her own in the cot and now she won't do that. My dh is pretty pissed off we didn't continue with it but the more upset she is the more I want to help her. Last night I had her in the bed with me which we haven't done for months. I'm probably making everything worse but she's teething and she has ezcema and when she wakes up at night she gets very distressed if she's on her own.

I've three months to sort it out before I return to work. Once this teething has calmed down I'm going to formulate a PLAN that has no crying but will teach her how to self-settle. Then I'm going to write a book all about it and retire. :)

Hello all!

Raising, that link was really helpful; thanks for posting that. I heart Moxie!

judys, glad you've had a good break - you deserve it!

Cosmosis, pleased for you that your DS is starting to sleep through.

missrose - my local LLL had a thing on sleep last week too - wonder if it's the same one and we live near each other? I didn't go because I was too knackered but it sounded interesting.

Mama, snap - DS has pretty much dropped his third nap, but night-time has gone tits up again - literally - I must have fed him back to sleep four or five times last night

DS is definitely teething again, and appears to be smack in the middle of a sleep regression according to the Wonder Weeks. It's odd though, because he's napping really well - it's just the nights that are crap. Have completely ruled out sleep training for the moment and am just going for the magic boob approach. I'm lucky because DS will settle being rocked (by either me or DH) as well as fed, so feeding to sleep doesn't restrict me in any way. It also doesn't seem to have any impact on DS's ability to self-soothe - I've heard him wake and cry quite loudly for a couple of seconds, then go back to sleep. Have abandoned all attempts at self-settling/settling in the cot at bedtime, though. DS just starts crawling round the cot or standing up in his sleeping bag and bouncing on the mattress

I am back at work at the end of September in a very full-on job with a tough, workaholic boss who isn't keen on flexible working, so that'll be ... interesting.

hello ladies!

havent had time to catch up, darling dd is no longer napping so well, her naps were the most predictable and reliable sleep she had, but no longer

nights are the same, soom good, some not so good but i have no idea what is going on with her naps, sometimes she goes down fine, others not and she is regularly waking screaming, she isnt always properly awake and will sometimes settle again if i rock the pram or pick her up, cuddle and rock her etc and then put her back down but more than often not.

she is therefore tired and grizzly during the day, needing to be held lots etc and she is quite a lump now 20lb ish so my back is a bit achey with carrying her around and trying to do housework etc at the same time. she is still a smiley little thing tho, is sitting well, rolling over, and doing little push ups, so will be trying to crawl soon i am betting..

she is 7mths, will be 8mths on the 5th aug, could it be the 8mths sleep regression, she is 32? wks i think?

right she is now coughing in her sleep, never a good sign, will try and read back if get the chance...

hope some of you ladies are getting some sleep?!!

Hi everyone

It seems we're all going through a two steps forward, one back time. My DS2 has started letting me put him into the cot now which is a step forward, and sometimes he will even deign to sleep there for an hour or two. However equally often he will wake screaming and clambering about looking for me after 40 minutes! Have given up stressing about it and just get him back to sleep however I can. I get enough sleep co-sleeping to get by and as long as I get a bit of evening I can manage. If he's still doing it at a year old I will reassess but have decided to go with the flow for now!

hanbee very much going with the flow here too. No idea how I'd go about sleep training DS now he's mobile

We've had good nights and bad nights here. We're sometimes having quite a bit of trouble getting DS to settle in the evenings - he's still up and bouncing around at 8, 9 or even 10 some nights.

He did sleep through earlier this week, though - 8:30 til 6:45 - however, it was because I'd inadvertently traumatised him with the hand mixer while making a cake. The noise really freaked him out and he was tearful and trembly all afternoon, then went to bed and slept for over 10 hours! I've heard that babies often sleep deeply after a traumatic experience though - one reason why cry it out often seems to work instantly I guess :(

The next night he was up every two hours. The night after that he only woke once. Goodness only knows what tonight will be like!

Hope everyone's surviving ...

Hi all, its two steps forward one step back here too. DS has been waking 1-2 (sometimes 3) times a night which is actually much improved so I feel okay about that. However naps have gone to pot. He's only just gone to sleep now after being awake since 5.45 (yes, we are having early wakings to contend with too). I'm sure he'll only sleep half an hour, which makes it even more frustrating.

I'm still doing his afternoon nap in the buggy but need to bite the bullet and get him in that cot!

Even less than half an hour!

well we are off camping with DS for 10 days, wish us luck! v nervous.

raising ds still has all his naps in the buggy, I don't intend to change that, it works for us. (don't have to walk him any more just jiggle it in the house). thats where he sleeps at the cms as well.

Good luck cosmosis - sure all the fresh air will do wonders!
We're back after being away for nearly 2 weeks. I spent the last 5 days visiting my family without DH. Unfortunately DS's sleep got worse and worse over those days as he was ill. On Wednesday night I did almost everything "wrong" according to our sleep plan but he was so upset and I was really tired and knew I would have a long day of travelling the next day. Last night was quite bad as well but I don't think we've set things back too much.
We're now just holding DS's hand to get him to sleep after 5 weeks of gradual retreat. I'm not sure if that is actually less intensive for him though than having a hand on his chest - I think the skin on skin is more comforting. I'm thinking of seeing if he will settle with me holding onto his foot through the sleeping bag instead.
DS still isn't crawling but he is always trying to hold our hands to walk around everywhere. The good spells he did on holiday started once he became more active so hopefully once he's completely better they'll return.

oh oh oh! I have just found this thread! I haven't read it all but I am just starting to try to sort out 9 mo DS2's sleep

My DS1 was an utter nightmare and didn't sleep through until he was four, I CANNOT go through that again. The sleep deprivation was horrendous, it affected my career, marriage and my parenting.

SO I am on the second night of PU/PD with my previously EPF co sleeping baby

He is currently trying to crawl over the cot bar and onto the bed so had better get back to the picking up and putting down bit of it