How long do you wait before going in?

[ellsbellls]

DS1 (9 months) has always been a very poor sleeper but for the last three weeks we seem to have hit rock bottom and I am beyond exhausted. He's gone from 2/3 wake ups a night (brilliant night for us) to needing attention up to ten times.

I've lurked on these sleep boards obsessively since he was born and read about the 9 month sleep regression plus I know he's due some more teeth, and he's had a sore throat. So I am hoping that this is the explanation and in a few weeks this will all be a bad dream (or sort of since I haven't actually slept...)

My question is, when your DC cries in the night, how long do you give it before going in to attend? I have a feeling that I might have contributed to his long-standing sleep difficulties and am making this particular phase worse by attending to him too quickly and making him reliant on me to go back to sleep. At the moment in particular he seems to get worse when I pick him up, not better, almost like I'm disturbing him more (although he's already screaming). He arches his little back and kicks like there's no tomorrow. I put him back in his cot and he screams even louder. Doesn't want food. I can tell that he is just knackered and wants to be asleep. I am not asking about ccc or cio but how long do you give it before you know it's properly a wake up and not a bad dream or some other baby noise?!

Really grateful for advice.

Oh dear, ten times a night sounds tough.

I tend to wait 5 or 10 minutes and if the crying gets worse, I go in. If they are just whinging a bit it often dies down and we can all go back to sleep.

Arching backs I have heard is a sign that babies want to go to sleep. It's certainly been the case with my two. The first sign of an arching back means they are put in their cot and 9.5 times out of 10 will go to sleep.

Do you have any sort of comfort item for him? I don't mean just a dummy, maybe a cuddly toy or a cloth or a mobile? Both of mine have had these and it's really helped them to self-settle and go back to sleep if they wake in the night. Perhaps encourage him to adopt something by leaving it next to him for a few days? It sounds to me like he needs something like this to help him get back to sleep when he wakes up (rather than waking you).

10mins absolute min. Even if crying hard. It often just cuts off after 10 mins. Weird. If just grizzling with silences between we have been known to leave her considerably longer (40mins or so). We adopted this policy because after about 7mo we found attending to her at all tended to make things worse. If her cry is at all different from usual I go straight in, or if she's properly ill I'd leave her only a few mins to give her a chance (colds don' count as ill for us, they are business as usual unfortunately)

We are in the same situation - or we were because a week ago I decided that I couldn't carry on the way things were any more after 9 months of being woken several times a night (sounds exactly the same as you). I came to the conclusion that we were actually meddling too much in his sleep, going to him straight away and desperately trying to soothe him to back sleep when he woke in the middle of the night. I realised that we needed to take a step back and help him to go to sleep by himself.

We have always gone to him straight away, partly because I never really wanted him to cry for any length of time and partly because we have no soundproofing in our flat and an elderly couple live upstairs so I felt guilty making too much noise.

But the week before last was hell, 9 month sleep regression, extreme screaming and lots of waking and I spent most of the week sleeping (or not) on the nursery floor because I had to get up so much in the night there was no point in going back to bed.

We decided to use mild controlled crying so putting him down awake, leaving, waiting 3mins, going back in (soothing but not picking up), leaving, waiting 4mins, going back in etc etc but only going up to 5mins. That was the most I was willing to leave him. The first night he went to sleep in 15mins or so. We also ditched the dummy at the same time which I think has also made a massive difference (it has been like baby boot camp here). It was hard the first couple of days but I would say we saw almost immediate results and the most important thing for me was that I gained some control over the whole experience. In the night I wait 4mins now (that seems to be the magic time for us) and invariably he has gone to sleep by 3mins.

Last night he slept from 7pm to 5am and then I fed him and he went back to sleep until 7.30am. If you told me one week ago that he could do that I would not have believed you. More importantly he is much much happier in the day because he is getting the sleep he needs and I also feel so much better.

This has been a very long reply but it's because it sounds like we have exactly the same baby and I am so overwhelmed at the improvement we have seen in just one week. This is obviously until the next lot of teeth but at least we know he can do it.

Good luck - I really hope it improves for you!

Thank you all so much for your replies. It does sound like I've been going in too quickly. Even a few minutes seems like a long time in the middle of the night though!

chocolatemarzipan - he doesn't have a comforter and I've often wished we had introduced something. I'll try leaving something in his cot for the next few days and see if he takes to it.

fififrog - that's reassuring to hear. Sometimes I think I am anticipating the whingeing rising to fever pitch and trying to pre-empt it.

sarahmade - thank you. It does sound like we have similar boys! I too have been sleeping on the nursery floor for most of the last few weeks. Even tried co-sleeping again to see whether that would help - it didn't, neither of us get any sleep that way. I've also been concerned about neighbours and noise which is why I've been going in so quickly.

I think Easter weekend is going to be baby bootcamp time here too! Going to try the version of controlled crying you suggest. Fingers crossed!

Just another quick question on this:

My DS has never had a problem going to sleep (barring illness, developmental stuff). It's him staying asleep which is the big issue for us. For his naps and bedtime I can put him down awake and he can go off on his own, he just can't seem to do the same when he wakes at night.

Do people use the cc method for night wakings as well as for actually getting them to sleep in the first place?

Thanks

If he's teething and has a sore throat, have you give him anything eg calpol?

Yes we did it at night too although for us once we got less involved with the initial going to sleep he stayed asleep longer anyway. So when he woke up at night we would wait 4mins before going in etc etc. The main thing is to be consistant throughout and keep at it. Night wakings was also our big problem rather that getting him to sleep.

I don't leave DS to cry, I might be soft but that's me. Tossing and turning and making some crying noises is different. 9 months is a very hard time (that's when I adopted my nickname!), they have a massive sleep regression around that time. I chose the path of least resistance and co-slept when things got really bad, now I'm doing it if DS (13 months) is poorly. Which he has been for a month or so, now he has an ear and throat infection. However, I also did gradual withdrawal at bedtime and DS was sleeping from 7pm to about 4 or 5am, I could hear him self settle around 2am. Not sure how things will be when this spell of bad health is over...

I don't agree that colds don't count, every time DS is crying and has a cold he can hardly breathe and is coughing, so it must be very uncomfortable (I remember being congested when pregnant and not being able to have nose drops and finding it very hard to sleep). At the end of the day, I prefer not to sleep alone when poorly, so I can give him that.