please help. 15mo twins waking every hour. exhausted. can't do cc. is there anything else I can do?

[MamaChocoholic]

15mo dts never been great sleepers. currently things are really bad with dt2 waking hourly, dt1 every 2-3 hours. I'm still bf as that is the only thing that nearly always works to get them back to sleep. after midnight I end up co sleeping with them as it's the only way I get enough sleep to function. but I am so so tired.

can't do controlled crying - if one baby cries too much, it wakes the other and ds1 and I really really really cannot cope with three crying children in two rooms at once in the middle of the night.

is there something else, anything, I can do that will help me actually get 2-3 hours sleep in a block?

I agree with everything loveisagirlnameddaisy has said.

ah high calorific foods - porridge with full fat cow's milk is a very good one. My youngest gets this if he's fussy with what's been cooked for dinner. I always make a point of making sure he's 'fed to the gunnels' so he'll sleep as long as possible each night. Anything's worth a shot.

Happy birthday!

What saved my sanity was dh sometimes sleeping with the twins after they had had one night feed each. I slept on the sofa- not as arduous as it sounds as it is massive and comfy.

Do you have a regular double bed or have you the space to go bigger? That also makes a massive difference to quantity/quality of sleep imo.

We just did a lot of musical beds, as that worked for us. I thought about night weaning occasionally, but it wouldn't have been right for me.

Ds self weaned at 19 months, and dd at 3. They have both slept in their own beds since they were 3.

It has been blissful to get back to sleeping with dh in bed, but for me I am glad I gave them that lovely cuddly time in bed with us.

That's not supposed to sound preachy! Just what I did.

About sleeping positions. At the age of your twins I would feed to sleep at about 8pm (either one or both- but usually one while the other had stories with dh. Then they would sleep until I came to bed, then usually feed again. I found I could sleep on my front with one twin nestled into my side, and my hand on the one who was restless (if on was).

Agree that tackling night weaning would be my way forward - although I understand what you say about it not neccessarily making them sleep. My 15m old is night weaned but certainly doesn't always sleep and at present does seem to take about an hour to an hour and a half to settle if he does wake. I have a mattress next to his cot that I lie on and hold his hand or just shush him till he eventually falls asleep again. There doesn't seem to be any obvious reason for it - if he's in pain he cries more or wakes earlier in the night -so I'm putting it down to sleep regression. I hope that by not giving him too much assistance to get back to sleep he will eventually grow out of it. However I think if i was still feeding he would wake more frequently to get the extra help to settle. As it is he only does it once a night and not every night by any means.

I cannot imagine how I would settle two of them - unless by having a single mattress in the middle of two cots (!) so i could quietly settle the waking one without getting out of bed but still having my own space. I just wanted to say that I think at 15m sleep regression may well play a part.