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Sleep

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Original poster

1 year old hysterically crying for 2-3 hours every night

13 replies

Emsy1984 · 01/03/2015 10:09

Hi! Our 1 year was sleeping good through most nights, easy to put to bed, would fall asleep on his own after a couple of minutes...then he had a sickness bug two weeks ago. Since getting better from that, he wakes up between 11:30pm - 12:30pm and spends the next 2-3 hours screaming. The only time he is not screaming is when I am holding him or he's having milk. We didn't want to get him back in the habit of night feeding but we have had to resort to it after having hardly any sleep. Even if i let him fall asleep on me he will wake once I put him in his cot and start screaming again. He arches his back and throws his head back, can't tell if it's tummy pain or something else. He eats a lot through the day, 3 big bottles of milk so surely he can't be hungry. He is certainly not constipated!
Does anyone have any ideas or been through this at all?!
Thank you!

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Fugghetaboutit · 01/03/2015 10:14

Is it a night terror? Does he seem awake or not really?

My ds had terrible night terrors at 1 and would scream, arch back for ages. Putting music on, moving to another room seemed to stop it

Original poster

Emsy1984 · 01/03/2015 11:11

He's always stood up screaming so seems pretty awake.

We find even if we can stop him by comforting, he'll just start up again once back in his cot. I was sat next to him for a while last night and he had a strong grip on my finger and was calm, then all of a sudden started screaming and stood up again. We just don't know what to do!

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Patatas · 01/03/2015 11:16

Do you think it could be silent reflux? My ds behaved similarly around 12mths, coinciding with introducing cows milk, I think he also had an intolerance.

He would scream for hours, arching his back etc. At first I thought it was behavioural, then realised it was pain. We also reintroduced night feeds out of desperation, it soothed the reflux, but then we would pay for it a few hours later and the cycle started again.

Have a google of the symptoms and if you think it fits the gp will be able to help.

Original poster

Emsy1984 · 01/03/2015 11:29

We originally thought an intolerance as had tried introducing cow's milk, took Henry to doctors last week and she was no help to be honest, saying it was unlikely and basically acting like we were just worrying about nothing. We then also thought maybe a gluten intolerance but excluding gluten didn't seem to make a difference. He does get a hard tummy quite often and has eczema which I know are both signs of an intolerance. We are going to continue with no gluten and have gone back to formula. He has cow's milk in his porridge though so maybe we need to use soya milk in that to really see a difference. How did you go about working out if your son had an intolerance Patatas?

OP posts:

Iggly · 01/03/2015 11:31

Go back to formula and see how he fares.

Also he might be a bit hungry at night. Or be teething. Don't worry about habits - you can always undo these things.

Needsweetstosurvive · 01/03/2015 12:56

A temporary dairy intolerance is quite common after a sickness bug. I would go dairy free for a week or so until he seems better then slowly introduce dairy again.

calilark · 01/03/2015 13:09

we had this, and i put it down to molars in the end

Patatas · 01/03/2015 13:42

I just switched him to the soya plus one milk to see if it had an effect and it really helped, kept him on it until 3 and he seems fine with cows milk now.

Original poster

Emsy1984 · 01/03/2015 14:39

Thank you all for your comments. We are going to exclude cows milk and gluten for a week or so and see what happens, if no change we'll try excluding dairy. We're hoping it's down to teething but we can't see any new ones coming through yet. He already has four top and four bottom. So I assume molars are next.

OP posts:

Fugghetaboutit · 01/03/2015 16:21

They can stand up during a night terror. Read up as it's a classic age to start them. Hope he's ok tonight

BanKimoon · 01/03/2015 16:33

I think unfortunately some babies are just 'criers'. DS is, if he's awake and not getting attention he cries and gets increasingly worked up. He would cry on waking most mornings until about 15 months for 5-20 minutes for no reason I could think of. Eventually he just grew out of it (18 months now). I don't have any useful advice as DS's vice is early waking and he tends to sleep through but if you've eliminated pain etc I would say all you can do is ride it out and try to be consistent. We have done the odd bit of controlled crying which tends to work after a couple of nights. You have my sympathy, good luck!

Truffle40 · 01/03/2015 16:37

Have you checked for threadworms very itchy at night

Tafel · 15/11/2022 05:02

I have this right now. Calm, routine baby through the day. Eats anything you give him, naps well, has been weaned off night feeds for months now and sleeping 11 hour as standard. Then gets ill, and ever since we've been on 2 weeks of night wakes. Angry loud screaming. Inconsolable for 1 hour + each time.

@Emsy1984 what happened next with your little one??

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