Waking every twenty minutes... Why?

[Zaurak]

7 months old. No reflux, no allergies and apparently perfectly healthy.

But ...
Will not stay asleep for more than twenty minutes. Day or night. Has always been a crap sleeper but has deteriorated hugely over the past six weeks.

I know they can have issues with transitioning between sleep cycles but what the hell is going on here?? It was bad enough waking every 45 mins but this is a whole fresh hell.

Teething (although night waking to that extent is a bit extreme. Have you definitely ruled out food intolerance?

Teething, or hungry/thirsty, or food intolerance.

Are you weaning? Has your baby taken to solids? Try a bowl of porridge then warm milk before bedtime.

Calpol is good for teething pain before bed.

He's just had two teeth come through but doesn't look like any others are on their way (he had very obvious bumps for the two he has.)
Weaning since four months as he was losing weight (as advised by our doc.) he's eating three meals a day and Bf on demand. We're already doing the porridge and välling (Swedish sort of cross between milk and porridge) before bed. It hasn't helped.

His teeth are totally through (and boy it was hell while they were emerging...) I can't get bloody calpol into him! I've tried a spoon, the syringe thing, squirting in the back of the cheek... Now he seems to know what it is and just thrashes - if I do get any in he spits it out and gags. Dramatic little monkey...

I don't think he has any food intolerances. No signs of any.

Why won't he sleeeeep??

Poor sleep can be a sign of food intolerance.

Hmmm... We've introduced foods one by one with a few days between and not seen any indicators such as rash or hives etc.

I'm not sure how we'd even go about finding out if he was intolerant to something - they don't normally do testing in such little ones because the IgE response isn't developed enough.

I can't advise on anything but getting medicine in - I've found with all 3 of mine if you squirt it into the back left or right of their cheek and blow on their face they swallow :) they hate it but it goes down.
The rest - good luck. It's so crap.

No advice but went through similar with DS. I think it was linked to development in general, learning to crawl, stand etc. his brain was so heated processing it all it kept him awake before any major leap. Good luck op. DS was a really crap sleeper too...

I will try it! I've been battling to even get the syringe near him but haven't tried blowing on his face...

He's woken up eight times since bedtime.... Going to be another long night ....

So sorry for you, 2 of my DC were like this, my parents say it is payback as I was the same...
It's no conciliation but it does pass, just feels like forever.
When I struggled to administer Calpol and the like, I used the syringe and fired it into the back of their mouth. They now take it happily.
Good luck.

My 10 month old has just been doing this for 4 weeks (sorry, that probably doesn't give you hope).
The advice I got was:

• dip the syringe into some sugar so that's what they taste. DS was spitting medicine in my face or throwing up on me. Also better if they can hold it, but thrashing wont make that easy. Also maybe try a different medicine, could be a taste issue.
• You can get pain relief suppositories, if they wont take anything orally.
• HV said 'just hold him. Hold him, cuddle him, whatever he needs to get through this phase. It will pass. He wont sleep if he's in distress'. Not sure if you have the capacity for that? You might already be spending half the night doing this. I was co-sleeping during this phase to make the wake-sleep-wake transition less stressful, and also so I could lay down before I fell down.
• Have you had baby's ears checked? Might be worth a GP visit to rule out ear or throat infection. We ended up on anti-biotics here for suspected ear infections. Not sure if it was that or just a phase, but he is now pulling through it.

Also, be at baby's side as 20 minutes approaches and start rocking/stroking/whatever soothing action you use before they wake to help get them through the transition without waking fully. That doesn't help you get any rest though :(

Good luck!