Baby doesn't sleep and I don't know how to cope

[evertonmint]

DS (DC3) is 6.5mo and his sleep is appalling. Between 9pm and now I have fed him to sleep 6 times. I have given up and given him to DH and and am now alone and raging in the dark when I should be sleeping. So miserable as it never gets better :(

I co sleep with him in the spare room. It's away from the older 2 who DH deals with if they wake but the reality is he usually gets 7 hours solid in a comfy lovely bed. I get severely broken sleep in a less nice bed in a less nice room with a baby who won't even sleep in the cot rammed right up next to my bed with the side down so it's basically the same bed. I find it v hard not to resent DH - sleep envy is a terrible thing - even though this arrangement makes sense. DH has a 12 hour day in a busy job and it's pointless for both of us to be disturbed every 60-90 mins by DS but I can't help but hate that I have to do it every night because DS will only sleep after breastfeed (if I'm lucky) and refuses bottles, dummies, thumbs, fingers etc.

I have a temporary contract starting next week. WFH 3 days so not horrendous but I have no idea how I will return to work with such a crap nights sleep.

DS is gorgeous during the day, unbelievably content (but only sleeps in buggy or sling) so it clearly works for him but I am in bits and cannot cope like this.

What do I do? How do I get through this? How do I convince myself it will get better when we appear to be heading back downhill to the dark days of November when I was at the end of my tether (things improved slightly but are getting worse again.

TBH I'm not expecting answers. I just need to get this out so I have half a chance of sleeping before DH brings back the baby I've abandoned on him when he needs his next feed which could be anything from 45 mins to 3 hours away.

Oh gosh, you poor thing. It sounds utterly dreadful. You have my sympathy, sleep deprivation is so hard, and I know very well that feeling of seething quietly into the night when you should really just sleep.

One suggestion: could you maybe switch bedrooms with DH? If you do have to be up so much, at least maybe you can do it in the comfort of your own bedroom? If DH is going to be sleeping anyway, might not matter so much if he's in the less nice spare room?

You know already twice over it doesn't last forever, but it does suck when you're in the middle of it.

Good luck. It will all turn out fine in the end, it never stays this way for too long.

Ds1 was exactly like this. He eventually grew out of it. No solutions but lots of sympathy.

I sympathise. Ds1 has never slept well and has regular periods of waking 12-15 times a night. It's soul destroying. He screams if I try and put him in the co-sleeper cot, cries and wriggles on me and cries and wriggles lying next to me. It's so frustrating.

Can you go to bed very early on some nights? Have a nap at the weekend? Does he have a period of time where he will sleep for a couple if hours straight?

If you can't swap bedrooms would swapping beds be possible?

You have my sympathy too. Both mine were like this. Can you rope dh in to help at the weekend? Will your baby sleep cuddled on dh's chest? maybe if he could sit up like that for part of the night you could get some sleep. That could also get him used to more spaced out feeds. I hope you got some sleep.

Slightly different perspective but here goes... He's 6 mths old. He doesn't need to feed every 3 hrs at night- certainly not every 45 mins. He might want to but that's not the same thing. Just stop doing it. Put him down at 7.30, dream feed at 10, then commit to a minimum time during which time you will not feed him- say 4 hrs. Once you've done that, stretch it to 5. Few tough nights and it'll be done.

It's awful and I have been there. I'm still in the process of fixing it. Dc3 is 10 months. At about the same point as you I had had enough. So these are the things I did:
Changed the bedtime routine to feed before bath so he was going to bed awake and not feeding to sleep. This worked surprisingly well.
Took away the dummy.

That was the first step to get him to self settle. After about a month of that I started to cut down the night feeds until I was refusing completely. We have only had one sleep through but the wakings did get less and less and he settled much more quickly.

We have been through a recent bad patch where he has been poorly and out of sorts and I ended up stupidly feeding him in the night again. So last night I felt able to re settle without feeding again and just lay him back down every time he stood up and gave him his comforter. Last night was hideous, lots of screaming, standing up and laying back down. Tonight he has woken twice and settled quickly.

I have tried pick up put down and shush pat but the interaction seems to stimulate him more so simply laying him back down works best for us.

As you can see I have done this slowly and gradually to make things easier for the baby. And I am confident he eats enough, and has 3 bfs during the day, so he isn't waking from hunger.

I don't understand why it 'makes sense' for one person in a house to be sleep deprived to the point of insanity, and one to be well rested.

Sorry to be brutal OP, but you are (supposed to be) partners, and both parents. Even if you are the only one who can settle DS to sleep, your DH can be up with you at least once in the night. Emotional support and recognition is hugely important.

I also think you need to sleep train. Feeding six times a night at 6 months is categorically unnecessary and going to push you to the brink.

OP, you need to sleep train, it'll be really tough for a couple of nights but it will be worth it in the end. To put it in perspective, my 5 week old is waking 4 times a night in comparison but he needs to be fed! A 6.5 month old can go through the night or should only need one feed max. I know how hard sleep training can be (I did it with my 2 year old ds at 5 months) but agree with pp that you being this sleep deprived isn't really an option anymore.

Best of luck.

I so feel for you. We've had a very similar situation with DD, although instead she would feed to sleep easily but then wake every time I tried to put her in the cot - taking up to 3 hours to finally succeed. She was going about 3 hours between feeds but when I took so long to get her down often she was ready for a feed again by the time I managed it.

She was exclusively BF (just started solids) and I really didnt want to sleep train. But it got to the point where it was becoming impossible and so we did a very gentle version two weeks ago, the difference has been significant.

I fed her (often to sleep still) and put her down in the cot but rather than me staying in the room, we swapped and my husband did the first two hours. The first night she SCREAMED for half an hour but she's brilliant with him in the day and we knew she wasn't hungry/cold/hot - just tired and wanting to cuddle Mummy like she was used to. He sat next to her the whole time and patted her for reassurance every few minutes. She eventually fell asleep that night after an hour, then woke 45 mins later and he did the same - she went back to sleep after 15 mins. When she woke in the night I did the same too - put her down and sat there with her but didnt pick up, just patted when she got really distressed.

Well now she sleeps SO much better. And it happened so very quickly - even that first night she slept longer than normal. Now she wakes twice, or sometimes three times, and normally I'm alseep again within 45 mins. For us this is incredible - and I think probably quite normal for a breastfed baby of this age (I'm not sure many will go through the night).

Sorry for a long post but I completely understand your position and gentle sleep training really has worked for us - much as I was against it. My DD was really struggling in the daytime too though because she was so tired, so that made our decision to start easier. If you do sleep train, I really think you'll need your DH's help as she'll at least not expect a feed from him. Good luck whatever you decide, sleep deprivation is awful.

He hideous OP, my second was like this and when you're that tired you'll do anything to get back to sleep. I agree with others, sounds like he's just using you as a human dummy to resettle after he gets to the lightest part of his sleep cycle. I think you do need to some sort of sleep training. If only to break being the human dummy.

Mine did this - this is why I night weaned both at six months! They we're fine and it made an enormous difference!

If it helps at all, out will get better! Both of mine were a bit like this at this age and it was me returning to work full time. :(

It was crap but I think it started to get better

Sorry, hit post somehow!

I didn't do any kind of sleep training and although DH was a SAHD (! ) he slept like a stone at night and they mostly wanted bf anyway.

I did use some techniques from the No Cry Sleep Solution, like the "pull-off" which is meant to help then not need to have the boob in their mouth quite so long. :)

DS2 was an awful sleeper, but we got there eventually!

Hope you get some rest soon, I agree you should get the comfy bed!

Oh also going to bed early definitely helps.

I do think that 6 months is pretty tiny to be getting tough and cutting out feeds as some posters suggested. Even Dr Ferber recommended sleep training techniques for >12 months did he not?

I'm in your position OP and i start back at work FT tomorrow!

DD is my third so as much of a killer as it is, I do know it's not forever. She only feeds once over night but wakes maybe 4 or 5 times and wants comforting, sometimes for up to an hour.

I've started trying not to pick her up but she will roar the place down and wake the other 2 up which would cause all sorts of problems!

I've not got any magic solutions, just wanted to let you know you're not alone!

Cutting out feeds is different to leaving to cry - I night weaned but never left mine to cry.

If you can spare £300 op I recommend Andrea Grace - she got my six month old sleeping all night in the space of a month, without doing cc.

Agree with MrsA, sleep training does NOT mean leaving your baby in a room and shutting the door. It can mean staying with them and reassuring them while they find a better way to get back to sleep.....

Swap bedrooms.

I had to for my own sanity when dealing with my dd who's sleep was dreadful (she was my second).

Before embarking on sleep training, you need to rule out any causes of the frequent wakings. For us it was tongue tie (dd) and reflux (both ds and dd).

Putting ds on his tummy meant he started to sleep much better but introducing solids causes a world of pain (literally for ds) so I had to be careful. Also he reacted badly to some food groups (they both still do aged 5&3).

How's his day sleep? Again mine didn't sleep very well at home in a cot unless it was in a pitch black room with white noise from 5-6 months. Before that it was the sling and pushchair.

Thank you all. DH had him for 4 hours - baby napped on and off, DH didn't, I got 3 blissful consecutive hours. So nice to wake to such supportive comments rather than it just being an empty cry in the dark (which was what I expected it to be at that time of night!)

DH will willingly take him if I ask but most of the time there's no point if a 5-10 min feed will solve it, and sometimes I do just go and sit with him to feed DS if I need to feel less alone. But I envy every extra minute he gets and some nights when he's had 7 hours that feels so unfair :( I dream of 3 at the moment (which I've just got - hurray for small victories!)

We need to do some sort of training but I will not let him CIO. Not keen at all in the long run, but def way too little now IMO. Good to hear different ideas on how to train more gently.

Is Andrea grace a sleep consultant? We have the money for one, or say a week of a night nanny, but I don't want to CIO and figured that would be the only approach a non-parent would take. Interesting that a gentler consultant may be possible.

Thank you for the suggestions, support, sympathy, empathy. It means a lot when the nights can be so dark, cold and lonely!

I do feel I've brought this on myself - was a bit more disciplined with the other 2 and never co-slept - but DS had hip dysplasia, in harness for 3 months from 6 weeks which made him very uncomfortable at night, then freaked at the freedom once he was out of it 2 months ago, so he really needed all the comfort I could give. And now he knows nothing else which makes it hard to take it away. Poor mite! But I now need some sleep!

Day sleep - excellent in buggy, now has Pavlovian responses which means if not overtired he has been known to drift off in it before I even get out of the doorand usually within a few minutes.

Sling - takes longer to sleep, a bit more hit and miss, but can get 45-60 mins.

Home - cot no way! Recent success with feeding to sleep while cocooned on a v shaped pillow. Mostly just 45 mins but did get one 2 hour nap that way.

He needs external comfort basically. This is fair enough at 6m I think, esp given what he experienced with hip harness, but I need it to be not just me that provides it, but all transitional objects, dummies, music have so far not hit the spot.

there's no point if a 5-10 min feed will solve it

Except that, as you're discovering, those feeds often get more frequent as time goes on.

I would recommend reading the first third of Ferber (yes, Ferber!) Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems, which gave me the understanding of sleep I needed to devise my own plan (which involved little crying and no leaving DD alone in distress, which I would never do, and have never done).

I co slept with DD when it was needed to get some sleep - initially, and then through later disturbances. I think recommitting to the idea of a cot now would help your sanity and probably help you both sleep. What that amounted to for me was screwing up the energy to try to get DD to sleep in her cot. As MrsA says, even making small changes, whatever you can manage, consistently, will help. Most parents look back on their kid's sleep problem from a more well rested place (!) with the benefit of hind sight, and see that it was straightforward enough in the end. (That is not intended as criticism, I spent a good few months going in circles until my GP directed me to Ferber, which was sanity saving.)

And keep going with your husband doing the early shift, or middle shift, or something. If you carry on shouldering the load this way, both you and your marriage will suffer for it.

Ds1 did this. He is using you as a dummy when he goes into a lighter sleep cycle.

I did controlled crying and it was easy and worked. Put down awake, go back if he cries and pat. Don't feed to sleep, always put down awake. He doesn't need feeding that often - offer water if you think he's thirsty.

Cross post. Get him sleeping in his cot in the day. That response he has to the pram? he needs to have it to his bed!

Rootypig - I have also come to the conclusion that we just have to crack the cot and am in 2nd week of working on this. He will now sleep in it from 8pm when he goes down until I go to bed at say 10.30-11. He was waking every hour without fail throughout the evening but now might go 2 hours without waking and occasionally 3, though last night was every hour. Once I'm in the room sleeping near him he won't settle back in the cot. Light bulb moment right now this minute while typing - if he will sleep in the cot but not when I'm in the room, then he probably needs to go into his own room.

And then worry about breaking night feeds once he's consistently sleeping in the place he needs to be sleeping?

DH takes on lots of the other normally split burdens to compensate but until we have a sleep plan to implement he can only patch over things when needed (like the night we've just had - sitting up patting DS to sleep and cuddling him the whole time is an emergency measure to give me more sleep rather than anything that will really help him self settle successfully)

Feeling galvanised by morning tea, sleeping baby (for now) and older children (never normally sleep this late!), 3 hours uninterrupted and your support. This can be fixed, will be fixed. Just got to think of the approach. Andrew Grace might be useful - just read some threads on her and think I need the accountability of somebody asking how we're doing and pushing me to be consistent. I'm so tired that when I try to get him in cot, settle without feeds I just quickly give in so I can get to sleep myself.