help with 25 week old sleep

[nervy555]

Hi, apologies for the length of this post- but I'm hoping someone will have had a similar experience amd can offer some advice or reassurance. My ds (first and only) had a very difficult birth- I was really poorly for a good month after he was born. He slept fitfully in his moses basket for six weeks at night and in the day slept on me or in a carry cot but never for very long in the carry cot.At around 7 weeks old he started to scream as soon as we tried to put him on his back- it took about three weeks for us to get silent redlux diagnosed and baby gaviscon prescribed. In that time the only way we got any sleep was with me sat up in bed and ds laid on my chest (on top of the covers-please don't judge). The gaviscon worked and we were able to start putting ds down in moses basket at night- but as a big baby- we found he had outgrown the basket and woke himself every 10-20minutes when his arms hit the side. We hadn't seen this coming and didn't have a cot for him. So it was only when he was about four months that we finally got round to buying a cot. We put it in our room to start with but he would still only sleep in it for up to 40 minutes before screaming. I'm ashamed to say I gave up and the middle of our enormous bed has become his bed. We have progressed from the early days of holding ds for every sleep and he now falls asleep by himself sometimes in the pushchair or his cot (now in his room) during the day. Last night I decided to move his bath story cuddle sleep bedtime routine into his bedroom- my aim being to slowly increase the time he sleeps in his cot at night (starting point being 0).He fell asleep in the cot at 7ish after picking up and putting down sleepy a few times. Between 7 and 10 he woke up and screamed in apparant terror about 3/4 times- each time he calmed as soon as I picked him up and settled reasonably quickly-in a few minutes. I gave up though at his dream feed at 10 though and took him up to our bed where he woke at 1am 4am and 6am- a fairly average night.So this morning I feel like a failure and don't understand how any sleep deprived parent manages to change their baby's sleep pattern. How do you do it? How do you stay awake?I'd welcome any advice or thoughts- mumsnet was so helpful during my pregnancy. Thanks in advance!

Sorry, I copy and pasted from behaviour and development and lost the paragraphs!

Hi, not much advice about sleeping but wanted to say you are not a failure! Sleep deprivation is hard , and I think you have to do whatever you can to get some sleep - DS (same age) would only sleep on us in the early days and I was just lucky that he transferred well to his basket and then cot.

What works for DS in term of settling is a Ewan the sheep that we use on white noise at every bedtime, and his bigger lunchtime nap which he usual has in his cot, so he knows it's his sleep signal. I feed on demand, so sometimes still a couple of times a night, but he settles well afterwards with Ewan. I can tell if he's still sleepy, as if something's woken him and he's still tired, he will try to grab the leg himself to put the noise on (and has succeeded a couple of times if I leave it in the right position for him!)

Hopefully someone will be in soon with some better advice for you!

Don't worry about what you've been doing up till now. You've been coping really well.
I think sleep at night requires good naps during the day. . I'd start in that. The problem with sleep training us that its conducted by sleep deprived people.
Is the cot warm , hot water bottle to heat it?, when you put him down?

No advice as such I'm afraid, just empathy.
We have an 18 week old. She sleeps about 6 broken hours in a 24 hour day! Never intended to co sleep but it is literally the only way I get ANY sleep. Out night last night was typical:
Finally asleep at 8.45pm
Awake again at 9pm
Asleep at 9.15pm
Awake at 10.15ish
Husband had dd downstairs til 1.15
Asleep in cot for 10 Mins or so, then came into our bed.
Then awake at 3, 5 and 6.

She's happy as Larry every day and we are shattered!!
Sorry this is not an answer but I just wanted to let you know you're not alone.

Thank you everyone. That's probably all I needed to hear really. When I look back at how hard it was at the start I should be grateful really!

Bump- 13 days into our new regime and the screams of terror have gone but ds still wakes up and grumbles every 35-45 minutes until 10pm when I invariably give up and take him to bed. He goes doen wide ish awake now and tosses and turns a bit until he's asleep but I do have to shush and pat a little still.

My question is what should I do when he wakes? I can't and won't leave him to cry. How can I stop him waking so often? It's hit and miss whether he sleeps well in our bed.

Havinganose, he's in a sleeping bag so I don't think temperature is an issue- and he does stay asleep for a while- thank you though!
Zippy and flopsy thank you for the advice/empathy- it does help a lot! Sorry for delayed reply xx

Bump?