Having a horrible time sleep training, do I persevere?

[Liondemer]

DD is 10 months old and has never slept through the night, waking every 2 hours on average. This has now worsened to around 7-10 wake ups per night, until I put her in bed with me (usually at about 5am).

To get her back to sleep I've pretty much always fed her, but this has stopped working as she has fallen asleep feeding in my arms but then woken up immediately once I put her back in bed.

So I have started Dr Jay Gordon's method of night weaning in the hope that this will help her. I feed her if she wakes before midnight but then shush/pat/rock her to sleep (in her bed) between midnight and 5am. Then once she wakes up after 5am I will bring her to bed and feed her there.

It's only night three but it's awful. She woke up at 1:30 last night and I couldn't get her to sleep again until 3:30. She cried A LOT and was really upset. This has happened every night. I don't want to give in and feed her as then I feel she's suffered for nothing but I wonder if 2 hours of being upset is just too much for her and we should give up for the time being? I feel terrible and wonder if I'm doing it all wrong.

Bump...?

Didn't want to read and run but not sure I can be much help.

With my ds1 I tried to nightwean at 9 months (? - it was a while ago) and it was a disaster. He cried and cried and after a week I gave up.

I tried again at 11 months and he protested for 20 mins and then was fine with it.

So I definitely think there are times when they are ready and when they aren't.

One thing I would say is, I wonder if it would work better if your partner went to her - I imagine it might be confusing her to have you there but not feeding, especially as there are times when you do feed.

Thanks. Maybe it's not the right time for her. I might try feeding for less time instead of going cold turkey. It was heartbreaking hearing her cry last night.
DH isn't good with night wakings and has a strrssful job so they're unfortunately my responsibility...

Well. The question with sleep training is always, what's the alternative? if your / family wellbeing is being seriously affected, then you need to sleep train. If you're coping and would prefer not to, then don't. It's not just about the child. It's about you, and the rest of the family. It makes no sense to be driven to the wall by poor sleep. Many marriages never recover.

The irony is, for a long time you're actually too tired to sleep train. Then you're at the end of your tether and somehow manage to make it happen.

You're right about not giving in and feeding her - not because she'll have suffered for nothing, though of course that's valid, but because she's learning that she just needs to cry for a very long time to get what she's after, and that makes future sleep training an uphill struggle. If you're giving up, do it soon.

We used a sleep consultant and it took approximately 3 weeks to work, really hard initially but so worth persevering with as really works. Her website is www.sleepbabies.co.uk and tips on her website, I needed a consultant as was re ally struggling but you sound like you are doing well. Good luck

I thought the dr jay Gordon method was only for when they are over 1yo and if you bedshare? Why not just have her in your bed all night?

Dd1 woke every 2-3 hours until she was 2yo and night weaning attempts were horrible until suddenly she was ready to night wean at 2.5 - although by then she wasn't feeding much anyway. But having her in bed meant I slept through most of her feeding anyway

If you have her in bed you can feed her lying down and both just fall back to sleep, or even barely wake