10 month old will not settle in cot

[hardboiledpossum]

DS is 10 months old. He was a good sleeper before 6 months, sleeping through the night mostly from around 15 weeks. He has become increasingly more difficult to settle at night now, needing us to stay with him whilst he falls asleep and wakes up hourly throughout the night if in his cot. I have tried all of the gentler sleep training methods without success. I do not want try CC or CIO. Due to this I have been mostly co-sleeping for the past couple of months. I am very happy to co-sleep as it means we all get much more sleep. My partner doesn't want to co-sleep and would like to use CC or CIO. Every time we see or speak to my relatives or his they all tell us how that we should be putting him in his cot and leaving him to cry, even when I say I'm happy to co-sleep. This really gets me down as I feel like everyone is judging me and that i'm just failing as a mum. I feel like I can never defend my reasons to co-sleep as they al left their babies to CIO so don't want to offend them. I find it harder because I know DP doesn't support my decision to co-sleep and agrees with them. I've been feeling pretty down anyway for the past few months and my relationship isn't great with DP at the moment, every time someone comments on this I just seem to end up in tears later at home. Co-sleeping isn't ideal as DS needs someone to stay with him constantly or be re-settled every hour, so we can't really have friends over or go out together. Last night we put him in his cot and were going to see how he was after 10 minutes, he was screaming and crying and seemed so distressed (I peeked through the gap in the door) and after 5 minutes he had thrown himself over the cot bars and got a nasty bump on his head so that put an end to that. I was so angry with DP after that and I'm not sure why. I feel angry and upset so much at the moment and it scares me. I absoloutely love being a mum but I'm finding it really hard to cope and my relationship with DP is falling apart.

I didn't really know where to put this topic.

Hi, I didn't want to leave this unanswered as you seem so upset. I don't have any good advice though - my DD is the same, in fact I just started my own thread looking for help! I wanted you to know that you're not alone, and that it's completely normal. My DD is almost 10 months and wakes every 2 hours and needs fed to sleep. Until a few days ago we were co-sleeping too. We've put her in her own room now and she is waking up with exactly the same frequency. I have to feed her back to sleep to avoid hours of screaming.

I'm not going to do CC or CIO either. It doesn't sit comfortably with me at all and isn't something I'd inflict on a baby OR myself, to be honest. When my DS was about 8 months I tried letting him cry himself to sleep once. After 90 minutes he went quiet, I sneaked through and right enough, he was asleep. What I couldn't see in the dark was that him and his cot were soaked in vomit and sweat. When I saw the state he was in later on I was just about floored by guilt. There's no way I'm ever doing that again.

Don't let family push you into doing anything you don't want to - YOUR baby YOUR way. Everyone always has great advice, but remember, they are telling you a very slanted version of how they got through things with their kids. My SIL has 2 older DCs and when DS was born she constantly told me how she 'sorted out' all the problems with her DC (sleep, feeding, behaviour)- she made me feel really shit as I was obviously failing and not as great as her. She's since had another 2 DC and I now know she was talking out her arse most of the time .

Thank you peaches, that made me feel a lot better. I think everything is just getting too much for me at the moment and I'm so fed up of feeling like a failure all of the time. I just wish I didn't feel so sad and angry all of the time.

I'm on MN trawling for inspiration myself with DS at nearly 9 months - we seem to have used every 'bad' sleep association going. But then I read through so many threads of us all doing the same thing and have actually reassured myself that our society's approach to babies is the weird thing, not me. I am just giving my baby what he needs, comfort. If that's not my job then what am I good for? Yes it's hugely tiring, no doubt about that. And for you it's terrible that it's now causing a rift with your DP.

I don't have a magic wand but just wanted to share my feeling that mothers have slept with their babies and rocked, sang and fed them to sleep for millennia. As well as my DS I have a DD who is 6.5 and sleeps (now) like a dream. You'll get there in the end but remember how relatively little he is. You will go out again one day! You would only be a failure if you didn't care about your little boy. Chin up, I hope you get a better night and maybe even enjoy some of those nocturnal cuddles. They won't last forever, remind your DP about that too.

Totally agree with the positives about co-sleeping - it is a totally natural approach in my opinion but it can be exhausting. Having had 6 months of blissful nights with 2nd son, it's been a battle ever since we attempted to put him in his own room. Would have returned him to our room but the wriggling and noise was keeping me awake! After several difficult months, swapped bedtime formula feed for full fat cows milk (only because we'd run out of formula) - he is just under 11 months - and am astonished that he has slept through for past 2 nights. Very early days but am so delighted that I had to share in the hope it might help someone - never read this suggestion anywhere.
Good luck xxxx

Thank you both. That has made me feel a bit more positive!

Similar problems here but just a point about throwing himself out of the cot... Did I read that right? If so, have you checked if there's a lower setting for the base of the cot?

Same here! 10mo DD does not know how to settle herself at all as she is used to being fed to sleep. I did do the CC with DS at 11 months and it was horrendous, and I had to do it again with him at 2. It is not something I am keen to repeat I have to admit.

I do feed her to sleep downstairs and then transfer her to her cot and have found though that when she wakes up (normally after half hour to an hour) she sits up and all I have to do is lie her back down and she will go off to sleep. Sometimes she needs a bit of encouragement with the hush hush, pat pat on her back or bum! Unfortunately DD will not take any form of milk from a bottle or beaker so I think I am going to just continue feeding her at night until she hits the 12 month stage and then relook at the situation then.