4mo thrashing and hitting herself in the head whilst asleep

[BookTart]

My 4mo DD has been waking herself up hourly for the past few weeks. Initially she was pulling her legs up and down, which I assume is wind, but for the last week she has also been hitting herself in the head and face quite hard. She actually throws her arm back as far as she can and then whacks herself. Eventually one or other of these things wakes her up.

Is this a standard thing to do? She's always been a terrible sleeper and has woken every two hours since birth, but this is even worse! We have co-slept/bed shared since day one, she's ebf, and has silent reflux. She's never self-settled for naps or at night and so is fed to sleep (every time she wakes up, which can't be helping her tummy). I'm utterly knackered as I do the nights on my own with her, as DH has a long commute and can't feed her anyway as she refuses bottles and dummies. Please help!

I can't help but my DD is exactly the same (she's 15 weeks)- so far advice I've had from other mums is just wait it out,whereas the professionals (public health nurse as I'm in Canada-they're like Health visitors) was to attempt some kind of sleep training. I don't know where to start with that and am worried that the consequence of even less sleep for me and more disruption for DH (who is sleeping in anothe room so as to be alive for work and helping me as much as posible) would tip us over the edge.

My 9 MO still does the leg thing, SO much! Am suprised she doesn't hurt herself. Doesn't interfere with her sleep though so may be unrelated...

Cheers, good to know she's not the only one!

Her paediatrician called today and thinks it could be related to a possible cows milk protein intolerance (she has other symptoms that make this seem possible) so I'll be dairy free for a month or so to see if it helps. Fingers crossed - if I'm giving up cheese it had better be worth it!

You're not alone with thinking sleep training seems impossible Halloumi. I keep getting worried that I should be doing it, but if she's this unsettled I don't see how making her upset and more unsettled will help!

Have you tried various dummies, my LO refuses most but the mam ones -cherry shaped? She accepts.

I was so desperate for her to take a dummy that I tried all sorts. I'll give the Mam ones a go, cheers Littlef00t.

I don't have any advice really, just an observation. I noticed that my ds started doing the same thing with kicking the legs up and down on his mattress all night long, round about the same time he started to learn how to roll over (at about 14 weeks). I noticed in the daytime that he does this when he is trying to turn himself to the side (legs up, then sideways). He did it a lot at night between 16-19 weeks, does it a bit now too at 21 weeks. I just figured it was a developmental thing (he still can't turn around).

FWIW, we also had an extremely rough patch between 15 and 20 weeks which I took to be a sleep regression related to all the new developmental things he was going through (google The Wonder Weeks).

Good point mepmep, it's a possibility although she doesn't roll over in the day yet. It would be typical for her to practice at night!