8 month old crappy sleeping & naps - any advice gratefully received!

[YouCanDanceIfYouWantTo]

Hello,
I have a wonderful 8 month old DD who is a super happy smiley baby in the day, but is very difficult at night.

She usually goes down at around 7-7.30, awake after massage, feed and story, and will usually fall asleep on her own after about 10-20 minutes quite peacefully (maybe a little yelp, but nothing too bad). But she has been waking up after an hour, or two hour, screaming, and is only really consoled by me going in and holding her - if DH tries it she screams harder and gets more distressed. But when she's relaxed and I try and put her in the cot she begins to cry and scream again. If I can get her back to sleeping in the cot at this point, she then usually wakes up two to three times more in the night with the same thing happening. I try and avoid feeding her until it's been four hours after her last feed, but sometimes I cave early and end up with her in our bed, which isn't ideal as DH doesn't feel safe sleeping with us and I'm beginning to worry about being so tired with her in bed.

I had managed to get her to only feed at 11 then 6.30am a couple of weeks ago but teething and a cold has made everything even worse. We've finally put her in her own room, and I'm trying not to rush in immediately when she wakes trying to give her some time on her own to self settle, but I almost always have to go in and try to calm her down, but she fights off me putting my hand on her, and trying to help her get the dummy back in.

She used to sleep through from 8/9 until 6.30 from 4 months up until 6 months when everything went pear shaped. So I called in a sleep consultant and I followed her advice which worked well initially, and then just stopped working.

I don't know if the problem is that she's trying to transition from 3 to 2 naps, a couple of weeks ago she would have two pretty chunky naps for an hour to an hour and a half each, but now she seems to want to have three naps again - and they can be short (30 minutes this morning) or longer (sometimes up to two hours).

I've tried to get her into a routine for napping, but it doesn't seem to work, she'll fight the naps, or only sleep for a small amount of time and I'm not sure what to do/ how the timings work.

In terms of other things her first teeth have just come through (they don't seem to be bothering her anymore), and she's just learned to crawl, which has made a difference as she's not trying to practice it in her cot at all times, and she's recovering from a pretty bad cold at the moment.

I don't want to do CC, but I'm all at a loss as to what I should be trying to do and the whole thing is making me really miserable (which is probably not helping her).

So, if you've managed to get to the end of this stupidly long post, and have any advice, even if it's just hang in there and it will pass, I'd be really very very grateful.

Hello!
Similar problem here! and i'm looking for help too!
You mention sleep consultant. Were they good? was it expensive? Would you recommend them?
So here is our story: my DD has been on on GF routine from around 1 weeks. Not to the letter, but we follow the principles of feed and nap times. Routine suits us, i find she is happier this way. I can fit social outings and baby classes in times when I now she is rested and well fed. She has a consistent bedtime routine between at 6pm (bath, massage, pjs, bottle, story) and settles generally well being put to the cot still awake. Sometimes i have to stay in the room and sing, but most nights i leave the room and she hums to herself.
However despite the GF routine she never slept through the night. Her best sleep was until she went through the 4 months sleep regression when she slept from 7pm (at 10.30 dream feed, sometimes awake, sometimes not) till 5am, drank a bottle and slept for another 2h till 7am. She never really went back to eating between the dream feed and 5-6am, but she wakes up now every 1,5-2h. It's usually dummy, a sip of water, help to turn on to the other side and she is back to sleep, but my sleep is regularly broken.
She sleeps in her cot in our bedroom. We tried ignoring her during these night time wakings, let her do controlled crying, but result was the opposite: if i don't get there early, she wakes up properly and than it takes up to 1,5h to get her back to sleep (sometimes in our bed, but it's not a rule). She uses dummy to soothe, so I suspect it could be the reason for wakings, but i'm never enough rested to gather up courage and energy for some sleepless nights and take it away.
So why does she wake? she refuses milk until around 5am? what to do? please help! I am considering paying for sleep consultant, but i feel we do all the tricks from the books and the consultant may not say anything new… Can you recommend a consultant? Thanks!

Sorry, we have been on GF routine from 12 weeks , not 1 week. She never does the long lunch time nap, so i still let her have the afternoon nap. Together its circa 3x40min or 50 min.

Hi i feel your pain my 7 month old baby girl wakes every night 3-4 hours after last feed screaming we try giving her water, putting her music box on, giving cuddles but 9 times out of 10 we end up feeding her as that is all that will settle her then 4 hours later she's awake crying again, it's exhausting isn't it and we have another little one due in July so i would be very interested in hearing any advice or tips anyone might have too :-)

I have a six month old baby, and similar problems. One thing I can add that may be of help if the dummy is a cause for waking is that we have a dummy our baby can find and put back in on his own. It's called a WubbaNub. They're popular in America, but you can get them imported. At this age maybe a small comforter toy other than a dummy may help if you can get your baby to accept it?

I have the same problems but there seems to be no solutions. My 6.5 month old wll settle happily at first but then wakes constantly through the night and I can't settle him without staying with him and rubbing his back. Can anyone help who has been through it please???