5 months terrible sleep

[Showgirl109]

Baby WAS a really good sleeper. By 4 months she had slept through a handful of times and was waking once between 7-7 for a feed a 3am. (Ebf if that makes a difference)
For the last month her sleep is so erratic some nights 2 wakes but for the past week she has woken at 10, 12, 3 and 5 and at 5 has not gone back to sleep until 7. Not crying just loud chat and babbling that is impossible to sleep through. She doesn't want to feed in the morning until 9.30. So I think it's more about comfort than anything.

I can't go on for the last week I have survived on 3 hours of broken sleep and it's killing me.

I am now contemplating either moving her out of our room (although we have people staying for Christmas who were going to sleep in her room) or some sort of sleep training.

Please help.

Sorry I have read no advice but just wanted to say I'm going through the exact same thing, last 3 nights my girl has been waking the early hours and taking 2 hours to go back!

Shattterd is an understatement, im off to bed in a bit in hope of getting maybe 3 hours before she wakes

So I think it's more about comfort than anything.

It is all about comfort.

Moving her out of your room therefore isn't going to solve it - that's less comfort at a time she wants more comfort.

The answer is to give her as many sources of comfort as possible.

• dummy to comfort suck
• nipple to comfort suck
• Patting, shushing, stroking, generally giving touch-contact for reassurance
• movement (bouncing, rocking, pushchair)
• Cosleeping or cuddling into co sleeper cot

At the moment she is comfort sucking on me. Thats the problem really, she won't take a dummy or a bottle.

She naps in the day without sucking or feeding to sleep, sometimes in the pushchair sometimes completely self setttling in her sidesleeper without so much of a whimper.

At night she will only go back to sleep using me as a human dummy. That's what's so exhausting.

Going through the exact same with my 4.5mo. We've been bed sharing for weeks now and it's so uncomfortable for me but is the best option (which is a depressing thought).

Health professionals tell us you're not supposed to use controlled crying or have them in another room until at least 6mo which is all fine and well but what's the alternative?? Mine screams unless he's in the bed with me but is such a light sleeper I can barely move without him waking.

I'm just rambling and not even helping you, sorry OP. But you're not alone

At night she will only go back to sleep using me as a human dummy. That's what's so exhausting.

Milk is likely to be only a tiny fraction of the reason she wants you in the night. Mostly it's about comfort and reassurance.

You really will need to establish alternate comfort if you dont want your breasts being her comfort. While many of the things you can do are aimed towards independant sleeping (primarily the dummy and in-cot reassurance like patting, stroking and tickling), it will be some months yet before baby has the physical dexterity skills to access that comfort themselves. Until them, you will need to help baby find her comfort. But if you wanted to, you could start with a view that you are working towards independant comfort.

8days it's awful isn't it. I've decided I need to make steps because she has a habit that she needs to suckle herself back to sleep which means only I can do ALL of the night wakings.

Last night I moved her crib to the other end of the room so she wasn't right next to me. Which helped last night, there seems to be no pattern to her feeds or wakes at all so I'm going to keep going with her there for a few days. Also is she is awake and chatty I'm going to leave her to chat to me penguin and hope she goes back to sleep.

light sleeper I can barely move without him waking.

Light sleeping is often a result of sustained over tiredness. It's a perverse correlation, but a baby getting lots of sleep over 24h will sleep more deeply so be even better well rested. The opposite is also true that a baby getting not enough sleep over 24h will be unsettled and light sleeping when she does sleep, so it spirals to give even worse sleep.

The way to break the over tiredness cycle is to use every possible trick in the book to make sleep as easy as possible for baby, so they sleep as frequently as possible through the daytime, for as long as possible, being resettled when waking as much as possible.

The mistake many parents make is they actively make sleep harder and more difficult for baby. Some parents wont consider a dummy, disturb a sleeping cosleeping or napping in arms baby by trying to move into the cot, worry about feeding to sleep so wake baby just as they drop off after a feed, worry about The Rod (for your back) so refuse to rock/bounce/pushchair to sleep.

The net result of making sleep so difficult is you have a super light sleeper on your hands who's now loads harder to get to sleep and doesn't really stay asleep.

Make sleep as easy and frequent as possible and it becomes easier to get to sleep, can often be moved around once asleep and then sleeps more deeply. So you can start reducing the dependence on props gradually.

FATE yep he is a classic overtired baby that's for sure. He definitely doesn't get enough sleep and that is probably because he's entirely dependent on ME getting him to sleep. That's a huge responsibility and I'm trying my best :( every nap time is in my bed with him attached to my boob almost constantly. I try to ensure he's not awake for more than an hour at a time. I don't know how to get him to nap longer than 20 minutes sometimes though. I haven't even tried putting him in his crib for naps because I know he won't sleep but I will admit to trying to transfer him into his snuzpod on occasion in the evenings. Another big issue is time of going to bed - he will rarely sleep anywhere other than the bed (eg on me when I'm one the couch downstairs) so do I have to go to bed at 7.30 with him every night?? I'm really gonna start resenting my husband if this continues! There's only so much my aching body can take :(

Showgirl DS has developed this habit too. I won't lie - my nipples are started to feel a bit tender with the constant attention!! He used to use a dummy but not anymore :(

Your DS is 4.5 months 8DaysAWeek?

That's still tiny, only just out of the newborn "fouth trimester" stage. If you are breastfeeding then evening cluster feeding (so just spending your evenings sitting on the sofa with baby in lap napping and feeding on and off) if normal. If you are formula feeding, feeds may still be frequent through the evening and baby may well need to comfort suck a dummy to help with the evening unsettledness.

he's entirely dependent on ME getting him to sleep

He is entirely dependant on you to get to sleep. He may well be for many months to come and that is a massive responsibility.

Yes, Dads can take a role. But assuming you are primary carer (ie the one who's Home with baby all the time) then in these early months it will be you who baby wants for comfort to sleep. That's likely to be the same if you didn't breastfeed, but obviously you could share the feeding responibilities more.

But a tiny baby (under 6 months, probably closer to 12 months) will indeed be imprinted on whoever their primary carer is and since usually it is Mothers who have the parental leave, that is usually mum.

That's a huge responsibility and I'm trying my best

No one here doubts you. It is hard.

Speaking personally the single thing I found hardest with my first child (I have four now) was the dawning realisation of the level of responsibility I had to bear. And the realisation that I had very little power or control, having to just accept the responsibilities for baby in whatever form the baby presented them to me, and cope. I suppose the "giving myself entirely over to being a mum" was what I struggled with.

I think it'd be easier to accept if all babies were like this, and every parent was going through the same. I really don't want to come across like I expect to have a baby that sleeps through/doesn't need me/my life should barely change because I give him my everything, believe me, but some days I feel it's not enough for him (in that he's still overtired/unsettled). If everything I was doing was working, regardless of how drained it made me, then I'd be happier. I think external pressure/judgement is tough too. I'm expected by now to be able to leave the house for an evening and even leave him with a family member other than dad but none of us are ready for that.

I think the biggest mental hurdle, and why I'm not just accepting that this is life for months to come, is that in a few months I'm going back to work full time (as the higher wage earner) and dad is taking over as SAHD. I'm struggling to see how all this is going to pan out then...

I'm expected by now to be able to leave the house for an evening and even leave him with a family member other than dad but none of us are ready for that.

You are not the first to have unrealistic expectations and you won't be the last.

It's not that you are doing anything wrong, it's that your expectations were wrong.

For reference, I couldn't have had a night out with DC4 in the first 12 months of her life. She needed me if she woke in the first year. Yes, DH could give settling a good go, but realistically it was me that needed to do it. So I just didn't expect to be going out in the evenings. As you are realising, none of us were ready before then.

That's not unusual. It is normal and it is especially pronounced when you breastfeed and/or cosleep.

If your DH is going to be primary carer in a few months, I'd be working on getting a dummy and bottles accepted asap.

I'm having similar issues with my 20 week old lad. From about 12 weeks he woke once in the night, then he went to sleeping 7-10 hour stretches. Then two days before he hit 16 weeks he woke every 20-40 minutes (think it was a growth spurt), and since then he's up every 1-3 hours - sometimes he stays awake for a couple of hours.

I'm trying to ensure that he sleeps during the day, but I have to make sure he's in the pram/in the car/in my arms, as he really struggles to sleep in his co-sleeper cot. I think the lack of sleep during the day is making him rubbish at sleeping at night - I have no problems feeding him to sleep or cosleeping (anything for sleep), but he tends to wake the second I put him down. I'd hoped to spend some time with my husband tonight, but I've instead spent nearly three hours trying to get the boy to sleep. He's now asleep on the boob, but I'm too scared to put him down. He used to go down fine. :(