So frustrated I want to cancel Christmas

[Cbell]

I have a beautiful DD 3.10 years who sleeps wonderfully, having done so from around 9 months.

I have a equally beautiful son 16 mo who hates sleep. He is driving me insane.

We've tried a raft of interventions with the best result being he goes to sleep at 7pm and wakes at 4am. Variations in daytime naps/ feeding don't seem to affect this pattern.

However, recently he's been mixing things up with frequent night wakings. We have NO METHOD TO GET HIM BACK TO SLEEP. It often means sitting with him for 2-3 hours or eventually giving up and getting up.

Right now I hate him a little. We're meant to be going to PIL for Christmas (I love them and this time of year but the thought of moving our crapness is just depressing.

Neighbours just banged the wall because of DS crying.

Hating it all at the moment as I see no light at the end of the tunnle.

That sounds really hard. The neighbours are morons - how is banging a wall going to change anything? Are your PILs lovely people? Do they look after you when you visit? It might be worth going because you get a relaxing day and then can cope better with the lack of sleep. Does DS ever sleep with you? Our first strategy to any night time disruption is to stick whichever child it is in our bed. Our DC generally sleep fine but do both go through phases of waking (one is 4 and one is 1). I'd rather have a squashed sleep than no sleep. FWIW this hasn't meant they only ever want to sleep in our bed. for you.

Understand how you're feeling, DD2 has just woken every 5-30 minutes all night, the culmination of several weeks of sleep getting gradually worse, and I'm feeling decidedly not in the holiday spirit and just want to hide in my house instead of going to in laws. Lets hope we get a Christmas miracle!

Thanks for replies, nice to know I'm not alone.

Yes PIL are lovely and will help with children but I get very anxious about them hearing my DS cry during the night. Pary because it wakes the but mostly because of the judgment. They are wonderful parent and ate firmly in the 'never ignore crying child' . I've been kicked out of this camp into needs must.

We are currently working on getting him to initially go to sleep independently (about 20 mins crying) no idea how to tackle the 4am wake up/ get up!

I am reminding myself how lucky I am to have such a beautiful happy family and...this too shall pass.

Sorry cbell that sounds so tough. I'm sure you've tried all the methods going but fwiw we found gradual retreat the most helpful. We're currently re-doing it with ds who has slipped into bad habits after a period of illness...he got used to being in our bed and still wants to be in there now he's better. We use gradual retreat for the night wake ups too, around 3/4am ish. Not as effective as when we do it at bedtime but we're hanging in there.