Tips on 12-month old waking and only sleeping again in our bed

[ilovethesunshine]

Our DC slept through the night from about 4.5 months until she was 9 months. For the last three months she has been waking in the night and will only settle if we bring her in to our bed. In the early days we think the waking was due to teething but now we think we've created a rod for our own backs and she wants to sleep with her parents. We have a routine at bed time and she goes to sleep fine in her cot from 19.30, normally sleeping through until about anywhere between 01.00 & 04.00 when she wakes up and we hear her crying. Normally when we go in to her room she's standing holding on to the bars. As soon as she is in our bed she's fast asleep and doesn't wake until 07.30/08.00. We'd really like to get our bed back and stop this habit now before she's much bigger (we're also expecting another child in 5 months). We have tried picking her up, putting her down again asleep or awake but she just cries and cries. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Many thanks in advance.

I don't think you will want to hear that we basically did CIO for a few days after 3 months of waking between 4 and 4.30 - for us not even bringing her in bed was reliable.

However in general our best sleep training technique involves just sitting there in silence til she calms down. You have to be persistent though!

I could have written this . No advice I'm afraid but I'd love to see your responses. My 10 mo DD has been doing exactly this for two weeks since she had a bad cold and just like you nothing will settle her in her cot after she wakes in the early hours, even if she's sound asleep in our arms when we put her down, but she'll sleep til morning in our bed. Hope someone can help!

Is she teething at the moment? At this age, waking & crying in the early hours can often be related to the 1yr molars coming in.

And what does her daytime routine look like? Sometimes if a routine change is needed, this can also cause wakings in the night.

Its better to rule out the above two first, & if you are sure its not related to these, then it may be that she is learning that you will put her in bed with you, & so when she wakes at night she cries until you come & get her. In which case you may need to use a sleep training technique to help her go back to sleep on her own. If CC isn't for you though, there are more gentle ways you can help a baby to settle which don't involve leaving your baby to cry on their own.

xx

DD2 is 5 mo and doing the same. She sleeps so soundly in our bed but won't go back in the cot. I think I've been too lenient as she also has severe eczema and wakes up scratching. I don't want to use the CIO as it probably means she will scratch until she bleeds. This means she's been in our bed for the last few weeks and will likely become a permanent fixture!

Ah, mamij we also had similar at 5 months, taught DD to self-settle in her cot at 5.5 months - no evil leaving baby then, just sit there in silence next to the cot til asleep, then after 2 weeks moved to outside the bedroom door. Night sleep improved dramatically after that. I think it is really common for sleep to get really bad at about 5 months but it does get better. Until the next time...

We found it impossible to gently deal with the 4.30am wakeups at 8-10 months. We had over a month of bringing her in bed. I fed her etc. I lay on the floor in her room. I sat with her with and without my hand on her. Upshot was she cried til 6 - or slept a bit, woke, slept a bit etc. Leaving her to it for a week was hard but it worked. She never screamed, just whinged. The only day she got really upset was when I kept popping in and out ie CC instead of grizzle-it-out. Anyway, she started sleeping through til 5-something after that - too early for my liking but better than not sleeping properly from 4am.

Thank you for your replies.

It probably was teething or illness in the early days but now I think she just likes the sleepover in her parents' bed.

We are going to move her cot next to the spare bed in her nursery and give that a whirl. At least then she'll be sleeping in her own bed.

If anyone knows of any good settling tips or books we could read on the subject please can you share? Perhaps we just need to toughen up and let her cry...

Thank you