Help! Six months and sleep is just crazy

[AppleDoor]

I would be so grateful for any tips/ideas/anything you did that worked because after six months of interrupted sleep I'm going a little crazy

My DS is 6.5 months old and his sleep is just crackers. He goes to bed at about 7 after a whole bath, bottle, bed routine (sometimes he falls asleep feeding but often goes down awake) but without fail wakes up at 5am. He was going to bed between 6/6.30 but I moved it back a bit because of the 5am waking - it's made no difference. And then during the night he can wake up anything up to 3 times (so last night he was up at 11 and 3 and is now up for the day).

The trouble is every time he wakes up the only thing he wants is a feed - nothing else will settle him at all. He is FF so I'm thinking about reducing the amount I put in the bottle (at the moment he gets 200ml each feed, which he usually takes) but do I reduce every feed? Just one? In that case, which one, as he seems to wake up at different times every night? As an aside, we are doing BLW and he is definitely increasing his eating but not by much.

Any help on how to get him to stop waking for feeds and/or at 5am would be gratefully received - or even just to hear that someone else had the same situation, because at the moment I feel like I'm surrounded by friends' babies who sleep for 12 hours a night!

Exactly snap (6.5 mo). Although he's been worse the last couple of weeks (I've blamed crawling). We had a phase when he was 4 mo when he went 8-4 [feed]then through til 8/9. I miss that.

Then a few days this week he's gone until 3/4 for a feed but last night was 1230 and 4. He never (even in the day) takes more than 5 oz (150 ml,I think) probably part of the reason mine needs so many night feeds. So no idea of reducing feeds will help you, sorry.

But I honestly think it's normal.

Firstly, his sleep and what you're doing sounds tiring but not crackers. Most babies are NOT sleeping through at this age, no matter what your friends might be experiencing (/claiming)! IME this issue is harder with ff than bf, as over feeding is more of a risk... But that said, I know my ff ds1 was waking for 2 feeds (and multiple other times too) at the same age.

Cutting down bottle size sounds sensible, as does trying to make sure he is taking in enough during the day at the same time. Can you also focus on getting some protein heavyish bits at dinner, like tuna cakes with sweetcorn (a fave with mine). Would he ever happily sip water or suck on a dummy?

I'm not an expert as my last were bfed, so am sure more advice will be along soon...

OP I think we have the same child ! Ha ha

Also weaning, right now I'm feeding up during the day and reducing bottles at night with mixed results. Sometimes he just needs me to replace his dummy , tuck him back in and ' shhhh' , but it still disturbs my sleep . We are currently having occasional nights with 1 feed and a couple of wake ups. Most nights 2 feeds and up at 5 am ! This morning 6 am , what a lie in lol

Tonight he is staying with my mum :-)

Thanks, everyone - it's nice to know I'm not alone and that it's relatively normal, although I feel sorry for all of our sleep deprivation!

Tango sleeping until 8/9 must've been bliss, I hope it comes back to you soon

Custard I have been trying to get him to eat meat at dinner but with mixed success so I think I'll try the fishcake idea, thank you. And he's not interested in a dummy but will happily take water from a bottle, so I might give that a shot.

Brolly we definitely sound as though we're lucky enough to be experiencing the same thing - how are you reducing feeds in the night? Just giving him less milk each time or trying not to give him a bottle at all? I hope you enjoyed your uninterrupted night's sleep last night and didn't wake up at 5 even without him there!

Snap! Apart from my 7mo is mixed fed, with 2 FF a day at the moment, aiming to get up to 3 in the next week or so in anticipation of my going back to work in 3 weeks. But he has woken several times a night almost since he was born and if anything the waking is getting worse. I try not to talk too much to other mums about their sleeping through babies as it makes me feel terrible! We are going to try sleep training soon in desperation as I won't be able to cope with this little sleep when I am working, but I'm dreading it. We had exactly the same scenario with DD1 and I found all the crying just heart breaking. But what to do?...

I mean crying during sleep training - I'm just anticipating what's going to happen based on last time. DS is perfectly happy now - he doesn't mind waking his mummy up 3 - 5 times a night one bit, no sirree! I just feel so guilty about it all - somehow I feel it must be my fault. I don't know what I should / could've done differently though.

Op could you try gradually watering down a night feed rather than giving less?

Apple , hello !

I slept til 7.30 oh what luxury !

Well first when he wakes I'm tucking him back in , giving him his dummy and shushing him. Sometimes this works and he'll go back to sleep . Sometimes he isn't having any of it so I'm giving smaller bottles....5 oz rather than the 6 or 7 oz during the day .

He is eating loads during the day and getting his quota of milk also , so I'm not sure why he's still waking for milk during the night . ( ?)

I don't think there much else I can do as he doesn't cry in the night just babbles , shouts , kicks and rolls around . He's perfectly content with his wake ups even if I'm not lol

7.30 sounds amazing, Brolly Cool, it sounds like you're doing much the same as me - you're right, maybe we've just got babies who are happy with their wake ups! I'll get my revenge when he's sixteen and I'm waking him up at 6am...

Kent that sounds really tough but I honestly don't think there's anything you could've done. A friend if mine has 3 year old twin daughters and one slept through from about six months but the other took much, much longer. So I think some babies are just like it! Not much consolation though I know when you're knackered, so I wish you luck with the sleep training and hope it isn't too hard.

My 6 month old was similar to yours until about 3 weeks ago when I decided to do something about it.

Basically I moved him into his own room and stopped all night feeding. When he woke we decided we would do a version of controlled crying where he cries for a minute, then we calm him, then two minutes, and so on going up in one minute increments. Only once he got up to 4 minutes of crying (that was hard!) but the other times he cried for a minute or two before realising he wasn't going to get milk. It took maybe 2 or 3 nights and now he sleeps through.

We still give a dream feed at 10.30pm, but he no longer wakes in the night for milk.

We may have been lucky, and I know it's not for everyone, but it so worked for me.

If I've read your op correctly your 6 month old sleeps from 7pm to 5am? That is fantastic sleeping! Sorry if I've misread, but most 6 mo th olds in my experience wake a lot more that that.