Still not getting sleep. I am fearful deprivation is going to make me really ill. Struggling

[chocciechip]

I started a thread on here titled 'Utterly Desperate. DS refusing cot totally ...' on 7 April and I received a lot of support. Since then we've bought a Sleepyhead and tried DS back in his cot. He's allowing us to put him down now, not instantly waking as before, but he doesn't sleep for proper stretches of time. This is his sleep pattern (I'm tracking it in on an app) between 12am - 12pm yesterday including feeds (he is EBF). The feeds at night are longer and sleepy intermittent suckling.

12:30 - 12-51 : 12mins
-- feed to sleep 7mins

00.57 - 02:59 : 2hr 1min

02.59 - 04.32 : 1hr 33min
-- feed to sleep 10mins

04.45 - 06.29 : 1hr 43min

-- feed mins at 7am

09.17 - 10.05 : 48 mins (morning nap)
-- feed to sleep 11mins

12:59 - 14.24 : 1hr 25mins
-- feed 8mins before nap in car

15.52 - 16.25 : 32min nap in car
-- feed 7mins at 17.00

-- feed to sleep 18mins
19.28 - 20.39 : 1hr 11mins, woke up coughing

-- feed to sleep 18mins
21.10 - 22.23 : 1hr 13mins

22.28 - 23.38 : 1hr 10mins

-- feed to sleep 9mins
23.49 - 01.53 : 2hrs 4mins

-- feed 14 mins
03.07 - 05.15 : 2hrs 8mins

-- feed to sleep 9mins
05.25 - 06.27 : 1hr 1min

Between 2am and 3am he pooed twice while dozing on DH - so two nappy changes.

DH thinks he might be cold. Room temp is 18'C when he goes to bed and he is in long sleeved body suit, baby gro and a 2.5tog sleeping bag. We put a open weave cotton blanket folded double over him.

Last night temps dropped to 16'C - his cot is against an exterior wall but I measured the temp in cot and it was 16'c - and we added another double cotton open weave and a knitted shawl at about 3am. How much warmer should we go bearing in mind he's in a sleepyhead as well now? And SIDS.

I got one hour sleep before two am but didn't sleep again until after5am and then only dozing. I have a stabbing headache, ears ringing and feel like I'm in a fog. Can't sleep during the day because I have a pre schooler and no family support. I feel this could make me very ill. I can't survive day after day on two hours at night. I am really struggling and would appreciate advice.

You don't mention how old?

Have you considered hunger? I would give the baby some formula.

What about a sidecar cot - with one side taken off and butted up to you bed?

Also stop clock watching no acutely - this in itself must be doing your well being no good at all.

Sounds tough going - how old?

Apologies - sleep deprived. DS is 5+1 week. We tried formula one night and he went mental. Will take it during the day though.

No clock watching - the app does it all.

I've recently started this with the idea we might get expert help, and feeling I needed to see if there was a pattern that could be logically explained. I don't manage a full record most nights because I am so shattered I forget to press the sleep button.

DS slept way better than this as a newborn. This is the last six weeks or so.

To my that seems a fairly normal pattern for a baby of that age, what concerns me is that by the sound of it you're not sleeping much yourself even in the 90min+ stretches - are you struggling to fall asleep, or kept awake by holding him/anticipating him waking up? I don't mean that to be unsympathetic as sleep deprivation is truly horrible, but babies naturally have short sleep cycles and it will probably be easier to work on getting better sleep for you than trying to change his pattern. If you're often lying awake when the baby's asleep in his cot, a doctor may be able to help.

For context my 8mo still very rarely sleeps more than 2 hours and often much less - I cope by going to bed early, sidecar sleeping, avoiding screen time in the night, using audio books to help relax if I'm stressed and getting my husband to take him for an hour or so in the morning if it's been a particularly rough night.

Hope you have some better nights soon.

I thought you meant 5 weeks old but I see from your other thread that you mean 5 months (and a bit).

What's with the 2.59 wake up and immediately back to sleep. Was that just a cry and then straight back off? I wouldn't be calling that a wake up at all, which means a 3 1/2 hour stretch of sleep. I point that out just so you can see that there are some longer stretches of sleep in there.

With 11 feeds in 24 hours I maintain hunger is a factor here.

Have you tried establishing a comforter for baby to suck, like a toy, muslin, dummy etc.

The 2.59 was me cheating. DH picked him up and I re started the app as if he was asleep because I didn't want to wait until he actually slept. I hoped I would sleep. I didn't.

Yes, we've tried a dummy numerous times. Worked well for DD but he's not interested. He's not taken to a toy yet either - which also worked for DD.

I don't know why I'm not sleeping. I don't think there's enough time between feed, hold, settle back down and next wakening. If I put him down awake he screams and frankly I can't cope with that when I'm so exhausted.

DS was a terrible sleeper - have you ruled out allergies?

I agree with the possibility baby might be hungry and also to stop clock watching, that is bound to make you feel worse.

Chocchie, have you tried swaddling? So after he's been asleep for 10 mins lay him down and do a quick swaddle in a large muslin, cuddle him for another 5 or so mins and then gently into sleepyhead maybe slightly on his side. That's what we did before dd outgrew sleepyhead. It's not a long term solution but it may mean 2/3 hour blocks.

I really sympathise. I agree that hunger may be a factor, just because unless you think he's a really efficient feeder, your feeding times don't seem very long. I was looking at 40 mins at that age, both sides. Can you wake him up when he falls asleep and feed him some more? (I know that sounds ridiculous, but it might help!)

When my DS went through a phase of waking every 1 - 2 hours I was able to sleep as soon as my head hit the pillow until next wake up. Even when he was waking hourly I managed 45 minutes of sleep between wake ups. Obviously this is easier to do if baby is easier to settle. jessplus has some great suggestions to try and relax and snatch as much sleep as you are able. It does get better eventually, but it is hard when you are living it.

Also, although I'm not a proponent of co-sleeping myself, a friend said it completely put a stop to her clock-watching, as she didn't even know how many times her baby woke in the night. She'd just feed and then go back to sleep.

I EBF mine, and the length/frequency of feeds doesn't seem that unusual to me, fwiw. You could, perhaps, try feeding him more frequently during the daytime hours in case it is a hunger thing, and maybe read up on reverse cycling in case there might be an element of that going on. I agree with PPs that the biggest issue seems, to me, to be that you aren't able to sleep even when he is sleeping. How do you feel about cosleeping? Some women find that if they feed lying down, they feel more rested, but also that the BFing hormones help them get back to sleep again. (Do read up on guidelines for safe cosleeping if you are considering it.)

Honestly Do whatever you need to do to get enough sleep. Co sleeping would be my first choice here. My eldest stopped sleeping at 14 months one month before the birth of DC2. It went on for 14 months and nearly finished me. I went back to work at 13 weeks.
I only felt normalish after the youngest was 4. Divorce helped as at least I got EOW off. And the kids could come into me and not vice versa.
I had a bed in with the cot. And I did 12 to 6. Exh did after 6 and before midnight in theory.
Honestly do whatever it takes to survive. Ear plugs and a night off somewhere away from baby.
It is the toughest thing and no-one gets it if they haven't been there. Do what you need to survive. Sod any advice that sounds good but doesn't add hours to your sleep.

I'm really not keen on co-sleeping at all.

I asked the HV to come by last week and she felt his short feeds were fine. I feed him on demand whenever wherever. He has always been very quick and his weight (recently weighed) tracks his curve perfectly. I had thought hunger, because we had issues with DD around the same age, but I'd have assumed his weight might have been affected as hers was. Also she stopped pooing - absorbing everything. He still poos several times a day and started pooing at night again. With her I thought my milk might not be up to scratch because she fed as often but for much much longer.

I'm giving him a bottle of formula now (3pm) to supplement feeds in case it's hunger. DH wants to give him another at night. Will this affect my supply? My intention is to supplement if he is hungry rather than replace feeds.

Allergies - he has seen a paediatrician and she thinks not. But he does have a constantly runny noses so I wondered. How would you get that ruled out?

The thing is, this isn't 'normal' for him. We used to get two stretches of 3.5 to 4 hrs in a night. And a few times he slept through. This is in last few weeks and I'm assuming 4 month sleep regression, but haven't got a clue how to get past it.

When I look at length of sleeps he seems to wake consistently at just after one hour or just after two hours, so I wondered if this is him hitting a light sleep phase and waking because he can't self-settle ... And if so how to navigate that.

Cross post wallypops. My co sleeping remark looks like a curt response when it wasn't a response at all.

Thanks everyone for your thoughts. He just flattened 140ml of formula. Will see if he rejects bm later.

I wouldn't worry too muh about your supply, it should be well established by now. worst case scenario for supply is that 1 bottle of formula improves sleep, u keep giving 1 bottle of formula and ur supply drops, affecting feeding around that time only. fwiw, i never wanted to Co sleep, but putting cot to bed with a cot side off is brilliant. I can feed and settle while staying in bed, and we all have our own space.

If cosleeping is out and if you don't want to try a bedside cot either, would it be possible for you to sleep somewhere else? Your DH could bring your DS to you for feeds, and then take him away again to settle. Hopefully if you were trying to go back to sleep straight after feeding, the hormones might still help you a bit, plus it might help that you don't feel like you need to be listening out? I appreciate that if DH is working, this won't be possible every night, but even if you just did it once or twice a week, it might help a bit?

We may get to that. Just given DS formula (10pm) but all he took was 100ml and then fell asleep and we couldn't wake him up.

But he's been waking already tonight, and always at just a few minutes past one hour sleep. It is odd. I can't help thinking there must be some sleep cycle thing going on. If he wakes again (he will) we're going to put him back in his Moses basket and see if he sleeps a bit longer again.

I am shattered.

Elizabeth Pantley has some suggestions for dealing with a feed to sleep association . There are more suggestions in No Cry Sleep Solution. These didn't work for me at all! My 2 DCs would go to sleep without feeding to sleep at the beginning of the night, but still woke frequently. Just mentioning in case there is anything there that looks useful to you.

I think it must be something like this going on. But with DS I feed him until he's very sleepy then I pass him to DH who hold him for ten minutes before putting him back in his cot. Last night he woke up every hour except for one stretch of 2.5hours. I only fed him myself twice after 12pm. So I'm wondering if we literally have to stop picking him up. That's going to be very hard to do and involve a lot of screaming.

Also, his day time naps aren't as great as DDs were and I don't know if this could be a problem. Yesterday he napped for 1hr in the morning (fine), 30mins at lunch and then was extremely cranky around 3.30 so had two short close together naps of 30mins each up till 5pm. Is that too late?

On the naps, I've heard that anything below 45-60 minutes isn't a full sleep cycle so is less restful - though very common post 4 month regression. We've been trying to anticipate his waking up and being there to soothe him back to sleep before he sully wakes up, or immediately feeding him back to sleep if he wakes. After a week or so of this he's starting to take longer naps. As for late naps, some people say avoid them but I find it's better to have a rested but slightly less sleepy post nap baby than one who's overtired and fighting sleep.

As for night time, it does sound like he's waking at the end of each sleep cycle and needing help to go to sleep again. I think he's a bit young not to pick him up; can you make his waking and falling asleep environment more similar? We had some success with getting him to fall asleep in his crib while holding him, so he still had the comfort of touch when falling asleep but woke up in the same place. Are you getting any more sleep while he's sleeping.