My ten week old won't sleep, help!

[Hotdog78]

Hello, I need some advice please! My DS is just over ten weeks old and just won't settle at night no matter how hard I try.I bath him at 8pm every evening, change him into pjs, read him a story and put him in his basket. He'll then be awake until 3am on a good night or 4am on a bad night. He'll then sleep 4 hours and wake for a feed. Friends tell me their babies are sleeping the night. Do I believe them? Is there something I'm doing wrong here? Please help before the sleep deprivation sends me round the twist!

I'm sorry you are having an awful time. My first son was similar. The key for us was getting him to nap properly in the day and to have a much earlier bedtime. Have a look at sleep sense! We did this through a consultant and he slept through after 4 nights and has been an amazing sleeper since. X

And they may or not be telling the truth. But they are also lucky x

Thanks, is it a website? The problem isn't just that he won't sleep til 3am but that he cries when put down and wants to be walked around the room!

Yeah-that sounds like a sleep association. Sleep sense is a program for sleep training, you can pick up tips from website and also hire someone to write a plan specific to your baby. I did this with my son- life saver!

Thank you x

I followed easy/baby whisperer and it worked for ds. Not sleeping through but bed at 6.30/7 until 7 am with a feed at 11 & 3 from 9 weeks old.

Hotdog78

Your son is awake from 8pm until 3am?

So 7 hours without a sleep at all?

I am sorry to say, but there is something very wrong with that. Under 3 months and I would generally expect no longer than 2 hours awake between sleeps, more likely to be 60-90 minutes awake.

You need to help your son to sleep and work really hard at it.

Have you tried a dummy?

Oh gosh, really? What do you think could be wrong? I just presumed he'd picked up lots of bad habits?

It's very hard isn't it.
Max awake time for a 10 week old is around 90 min.
He is crying because he is desperately tired and needs to go to sleep.
I would say, swaddle him and put him in his bed and when he cries, leave him for 1 minute (you can time it as it will feel like an eternity), then lay your hand on him and say shhhhhh mummy's here shhhhhhhhhh. When he stops crying, move away. Then repeat as needed.
If he's still upset after a few minutes or the crying escalates then you could try (loud) White noise. I have the sound sleeper app on my phone and it' brilliant.

Thanks. Will do. First baby so sorry if I sound clueless! He's had bad colic since he was 3 weeks old and my DH and I were told to hold him close and walk him around the room when he got distressed and I think we've engendered lots of bad habits! Need to sort this out though. Can't really go on not sleeping!!

This chart worked with my DS www.mybabysleepguide.com/2013/02/average-sleep-charts-by-age.html

Don't worry too much about bad habits at 10 weeks old. New better habits are easily formed at this age.

I started doing naps in his cot at about that age and did the same routine of upstairs, grobag, book (the same one), curtains closed, quick kiss and cuddle and then put down. I would also do at least one pram nap every day to get out of the house.

I think it's so easy to miss the sweet spot when they're tired but not overtired and following the chart and clock watching just worked for us. Often by the time DS looked tired, he was way past his best and really hard to settle whereas settling him to sleep when he didn't seem tired was often much easier.

DS also cried before he fell to sleep but only very briefly. I didn't feel too bad about this as it was brief and there was less tears than if we were rocking and shushing and he was fighting it all as he was over stimulated.

It's mainly trial and error to see what works with your baby but it helps to follow the healthy sleep habits, if you can.

My first baby too....it's all trial and error don't worry! Good luck