Need my baby taken away

[peaceloveandbiscuits]

Can't cope anymore. He's 21mo, has been in some sort of sleep regression for over a month. The past week in particular I've been getting snatches of an hour at a time, and now he has a cold so it's even worse. He won't respond to sleep training the way he has in the past. Nothing seems to work. I can't cope with being screamed at and hit all day because he's so tired, and then screamed at all night because he won't sleep. I'm so tired. I wish someone would take him away from me just for a while, so I could sleep and feel strong enough to deal with him.

Can you move him out of the cot into a single bed. We did it at 20 months with my eldest out of sheer desperation because of how horrific his sleeping was and it was the single most effective thing we did. He always slept so much better in our bed - turns out he just wanted the space.

Oooh, didn't see your last post! congratulations!

If it helps, my second was a much much better sleeper

Is there anyone that could have him for a night or two?

You don't have to be pregnant if you don't want to.
If you are barely coping as it is, is another baby the best plan?

You need to do shifts wi your DH. You go to sleep at 7pm until 1am and he then can sleep 1-7.

When we went through it I did until 11.30pm and then from 5am so that my other half could sleep either side of those times. We also got a childminder for a few hours, which meant naps for us.

You can pay nurses to come stay with your baby overnight. Don't know more i'm afraid. If I was in your situation again with no family I would get a babysitter or childminder or someone you trust to take baby for 5/6 hours during the day so you can get sleep. Sleep will make you feel a bit better and move you away from not being able to think straight. I also like what Monkey says. Get a bed rail for your bed second hand is fine or stack cushions on floor. Yes nursery will take him for small amounts of time. Do you have a children's centre near you? There you will find lots of lovely advice about all you ask on here and other mums you can talk too. In fact I would say this is your first step. I would take my baby in and they would hold him for ages and it felt like heaven having free arms :) Your doing a good job for your baby now you need some care for yourself. xx

Yeah we utilised the Children's Centre when he was a baby, and we also had a Homestart volunteer for about six months. I'm going to try and get a doctors appointment for him today to see if there's anything medical going on.

Oh OP! My child only just started sleeping properly very recently and they are nearly 4! I completely understand about the whole "I'm so sleep deprived I wish I was dead" feeling.

These are some tricks I picked up, I hope some of them help you?

Go to bed as soon as your partner gets home from work. Put ear plugs in.

When your child wakes up at around 11, leave this wake up to your partner too!

Ditto any wake ups after 5am, partner can deal with those. Make him help you.

Grave yard shift 11pm - 5am to deal with now. If you can have a couple of nights sleeping 6-11 and 5 - when your partner leaves for work you will feel so much better!

Things only really improved for us when we stopped cosleeping and enforced child sleeping in own cot. We also cut out day time naps for child. Final step ( and I think this is what cured my child's sleep problems at 3.5), was to tell child we had ran out of milk when they woke up in the night, so they only had water. Now they doesn't bother waking up at all. I also did rapid return to bed eg if child got out of bed (when they moved to a toddler bed that is), I took their hand, said nothing at all, and walked them back to bed.

Let me know if you think any of these ideas are feasible! If not I will have a rethink.

Oh I've just discovered I'm pregnant. Amazing timing.

Congratulations!

If it's just got worse, I would consider giving neurofen before bedtime just in case it's teeth. You have my sympathy. I had 3 rubbish sleepers. Brought me to my knees.

We do whole nights on or off with my DD. So the person who is not going to her gets ear plugs, which means that they aren't disturbed by the crying out. Agree you need to get a more comfy solution than the sofa.
Talk to your GP and HV about how bad things are. Home start is great.
Second the childminder (or nursery) option. Either two mornings or afternoons or a whole day.
A sleep consultant or maybe the millpond book maybe an option?
Thinking of you X

If it's any reassurance on your new pregnancy, DD1 still isn't sleeping through at 3.10. Dd2 is 5mo and was sleeping through (10.30-5.30, one feed then through to about 8) from 8 weeks. You won't necessarily end up with two terrible sleepers.

I know how you're feeling, I got to this point several times with DS in his first year. When it got really bad I left him with DH overnight and went to stay with a local (childless) friend to recover - I couldn't sleep in another room at home as he screamed when he woke up even when being comforted. Is this something you could do?

DS is now 2.5 and a fairly good sleeper and we've just had DC2, when you find a way through this you will feel so much better.

I struggle with the guilt of leaving DH to deal with him alone, especially when he's screaming the way he does. There's nowhere I can go in the house where I can't hear him.

I've just got him to sleep in my bed with me, which makes me wonder if he is quite poorly because he wouldn't usually nap so easily like this. Doctors this afternoon so we'll see.

I have managed to persuade my mother to take him on Thursday, though I'll have to pay her. It's something to aim towards - only two more nights.

Thanks for all your kind messages. I have read them all and am taking on board every thing you suggest.
Every time I get myself worked up enough to try hardcore sleep training again, he gets poorly and I can't.

I would work on easier co sleeping.

Get rid of cot, put a double mattered on his floor. Then a baby gate on door. That way he's safe and can't hurt himself rolling out, your safe to do sleep with him ( he's almost 2 so it's not newborn rolling on panic). And gate stops him leaving room. You and Dh can take turns sleeping with him whilst you get more sleep, then can work on him settling alone after.

Put some soft teddies and basic board books in his room so he can play a bit when he wakes and you or Dh can doze still

I'm so sorry you're going through this but hang in there. It WILL get better.

My first due to autism didn't sleep more than a couple of hours in 24 until she was 10. Dd3 who is 1 still doesn't sleep more than 2 hours at a time on a good night .

It does get easier if you except you're not going to sleep. I get myself a good movie or binge on box sets and the time passes easier. I also let her sleep where ever and whenever and try and catch some sleep then. I'm lucky I have family support though to help in the day.

Let your DH do at least a 4 hour shift. I feel like I've slept for days after 4 hours. It makes a difference to get hours straight.

It will get better. Try and rest where you can and at least try and enjoy (as much as possible!) the time when you're up.

Fingers crossed it'll pass soon and it's amazing how quickly you forget.

As PP suggested, definitely try Nurofen or Calpol if you haven't already. I remember DD1 was awful at sleeping for about 3 months at exactly this age and it was when a whole load of teeth came through. It's just a small thing, but it might help.

Work on dealing with the guilt

You have to be a team. YOU need to sleep, it's ok to handover while you get sleep. Really it is.

I had a 'high needs' baby. The ONLY way we coped was by being very strict about doing shifts, the 'on duty ' parent had one job, look after the child in such a way as to allow the resting partner to sleep. That included midnight walks if they were crying. Absolutely no hanging round in the house with the screamer. No waking up the sleeping parent to check something.. The sleepers sleep is to be respected!

Unless there is a medical reason or an underlying disability it will get better. Even if they still don't sleep as the get older, they can at least entertain themselves and can be taught not to wake you.

At the weekends also can you swap who gets a lie in? So every Saturday you get and Sunday Dh gets?

Whoever is not lieing in need to take child out if house small so no disturbing other

Toddler can be taken out in pjs, so just throw on some clothes at 7am, take child out in pjs with blanket in pram. Maybe take then swimming early if open ( can pack night before so they get dressed their after), so take for a long walk in park to feed ducks. Head to a cafe for coffee and crossiant or take a picnic breakfast ie hot drink in flask for you, warm milk for child, crossients or whatever from supermarket. Head back around 10am earliest.

Means every Saturday 7am-10am you can sleep or rest, and every Sunday husband can. Once back child also excericsed from swim or walk so hopefully they plays happily a few hours and ready for a nap

Artandco I think you're onto something there. We do swap lie-ins but I'm inevitably up by 8:30. Taking him out of the house is the answer.

Yes op, absolutely the most sleep for each of you has to be a priority. Any sleep, any how. Definitely have a proper lie in each at the weekends, as Artandco suggests just pack a bag the night before and whoever 'turn' it is gets up, gets dressed and takes the baby out somewhere, leaving the other free to sleep for a few hours. I would also remove the cot (given that he's not sleeping in it anyway)and replace it with a mattress on the floor, then you and dh take it in turns to sleep with the baby in there.

We I was pregnant with my second baby my first was waking every 90 minutes and needing 30-40 minutes of rocking to go back to sleep. The tiredness I felt ordinarily turned to absolute exhaustion when I became pregnant. Controlled crying worked for us (but I see you've tried sleep training)but if it hadn'twe would have tried anything else.

What is his routine now? When does he go to bed? How does he go to sleep(fed, rocked etc)? What exactly happens when he wakes?

Both his ears are infected so he has ABs. I'm going on a full Calpol and Nurofen assault this afternoon/evening so he's no excuse by bedtime.

Really not a troll and didn't mean to offend. My now 2 year old suffered terrible with colic when he was small and it was exhausting, not knowing what to do to help him was frustrating, all I was saying was this behaviour doesn't last forever he won't be small for long even back then how stressful it was I wouldn't of handed my baby over to a stranger, but looking through your post there is obviously more to it for you. Please don't think I'm being a funny bitch when really I'm not, I'm just trying to say look on the brighter side maybe, you have a healthy little boy, when yeah I know it is shit at times too, think we can all as mums relate to being sleep deprived. Congratulations as well btw routine is key

Peace - we're now in year 11 of this (son with autism has never slept properly) and I'd echo a pp that you need to take the stress out of the situation by expecting disruption. Don't feel guilt at DH doing his bit if you're both doing shifts. When DH is on shift use earplugs!

I really don't want to patronise but have you done the whole making night awake time as boring as possible, low eye contact, whilst not ignoring distress being low key about comfort etc? Might be worth another go once the ear infections have cleared up.

Good luck with it all

Oh poor thing... the ABs should kick in quite quickly so hopefully he will feel better. It might take a day or two for it to calm enough for him to feel ok so don't be too stressed if he's still bad tonight. Good on you for getting that diagnosed. Can you talk to the GP about possible ear issues? My brother had recurrent ear infections from being very young. Some kids just seem prone to them

Congratulations too :)

He has certainly inherited the bad ears from me I had loads of ENT operations as a kid.

I slept for about 2 hours this afternoon, which was really lovely. Fingers crossed for a less bad night