7.5 month old sleep

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I'm struggling with my ds2 and sleep, he wakes several times during the night and has now taken to waking up at 5:25am everyday instead of 6:30/7 and it's killing me slowly!!
Last night for example he went to bed at 6:30 woke at 9:40, 1:38, 3:10 and then 5:25 and then wants to get up for the day
He struggles to nap for very long if we are out and about (which we are often out as ds1 needs to get out to stretch legs etc) I know he needs more sleep during the day.
He has a dummy and comforters and seems to be happy enough to go off to sleep.l but he struggles to stay asleep.
Will his night sleeps get better if his day naps improve?? How can I get him to nap longer? He has always only slept 30-40 mins naps and on rare occasions has slept longer.
Thanks

Is his bedtime too early?? Should I be trying to push him back to 7:15/30?? How would I do this??
Also he only takes 5oz bottles, since weaning he has dropped most bottles during the day - he only really takes full bottles at night now.

I don't have any advice sorry - but the clocks go forward next week! So hopefully it will then be 6.25...

I would suggest that the largest factor for those night wakes is lack of daytime sleep.

The time of bedtime only becomes relevant when you have a baby mostly sleeping through until morning. If you have a baby, like yours, having frequent wake ups in the night then really baby just wants as much sleep as possible, so nothing wrong with an earlier night.

Having said that, with a view to the longer term, you might want to move his routine to accommodate a later bedtime anyway, since once he is sleeping better at night, 11h would be a reasonable expectation so a 6.30pm bedtime would mean 5.30am wake is not unreasonable.

Having a dummy is great. Can baby put it in himself? You can practice this by doing things like handing him the dummy in his hand, for him to put in mouth himself. Put dummy on floor to get him to pick it up then put it in. Put dummy in his hand the wrong way around (holding the teat etc) so he has to turn it around before putting it in. Put on floor out of reach, wrong way around, behind him etc - so he has to move to get it, and turn it over before putting it in.

Also, put in place things to help him find a lost dummy in the night. Babies who can easily put their own dummy in may struggle to search for a lost dummy in the dark. I used to sew a ribbon on the sleeping bag with a press stud at the end for the dummy.

Daytime sleeps is ultimately what will do it though. With 40 minute naps, you need to make naps very frequent to stop baby getting over tired. I would say 60-90 minutes awake time between one nap and the next.

I appreciate you have a toddler too. Could you limit activities to specific times of the day. For example have mornings - 9am-12pm as toddler activity time every day and then establish that from lunchtime to bedtime every day will be playing at home, so baby can sleep better in the afternoons.

Thanks Fate, I have only just had time to come back to mn, been a long day!
I would prefer a later bedtime as it's such a rush to get everything done in time for his bedtime. He likes to eat at 5 and after dinner he will grizzle and moan until he goes to bed, today was another bad day and he went to bed at 6:15 although didn't fall asleep until 6:30 but he has just woken up and wanted milk so took 3oz and gone back to sleep. I can already see what sort of a night I am in for!

Yes he is able to put his dummy in himself and today I went out and brought him new ones that glow in the dark, he has four in his cot, 1 is attached to his sleeping bag and three attached to one of his comforters. I doubt it will make any difference as I suspect he may be using milk as his night comfort and I'm not sure how to over come this.

It's very clear during the day when he is tired and sometimes I do feel I am putting him back to bed not long after he woke. He doesn't sleep well in a buggy he prefers his cot which makes things difficult.

Luckily tomorrow and Thursday my eldest is at a childminder so I can focus on just ds2 and his naps and see how he gets on!

How do I encourage a later bedtime?

Given he's still having short, frequent naps, just add in an extra nap instead of bedtime. These are just example timings, not set in stone, but for example:

6am wake
Breakfast
7.30-8 nap
9-9.30 nap
11-11.30 nap
Lunch
12.30-1 nap
2.30-3 nap
4-4.30 nap
Dinner
5.30-6 nap
8pm bedtime

Well last night was awful, he woke at 8:15, 9:30, 11:44, 1 and then stayed awake until 3, although he has come out with a cold, then slept till 6:30 so we are feeling pretty tired!
I'm going to work on his naps today but fear the cold isn't going to make it easy for me!
Your schedule looks good so I will try to follow loosely as I have to factor in drop off and collections etc thank you for your advice so far it's very useful

Hi I don't really have any advice but my dd's nighttime sleep pattern is very similar at the moment. She went through an awful two months with the 4 month regression then it improved massively and now seems to be going backwards!

For me I think I need to try and get more milk into dd during the day, she's so nosey so will barely feed throughout the day and then wants to make up for it at night!

Hope things improve soon

Thanks Beans, yes I struggle getting him to drink milk too during the day! He has gone off his food too now so I'm not sure what to do. He had three hours yesterday nap wise but made no difference at night, he went to bed at 8 awake at 6 but woke 3/4 times in between. I'm just at a loss of how to help him, he is miserable as he is so tired

I remember the early weaning months (up to about 9 months) being like going back to the newborn days - when baby spends virtually all awake time feeding.

Because early weaning foods are low calorie (fruit, veg, lean meat) and it is calories baby needs - it means the amount of milk baby has in these early weaning months needs to be maintained. Indeed given the rate of growth and development for some babies, it is not unreasonable that a 7.5 month old weaned baby needs more milk than he was having as a 5.5 month old pre-weaned baby.

Obviously, if baby doesn't get the calories in during the daytime, more will be needed at night. Which results in a return or increase in night feeds.

I wasn't relishing the idea of disturbed nights, so I maintained 8 bottles a day, 2 to 2.5 hourly throughout the day. But then also had to fit in 3 proper meal times a day. This all happening in and around loads of daytime sleep.

So it ended up being and endless process of
wake, milk, solids meal, getting back to sleep, sleep...
wake, milk, solids meal, getting back to sleep, sleep...

(We were getting longer, less frequent naps by then though. So will be more complex for you op, with short frequent naps to fit in)

I try as much as I can to give him milk during the day but he just refuses and now refuses food. He has just dropped off but really struggled and I know it's because he is over tired but I can't seem to help him!
I felt today like I was right back when he was around 3 months old and he just cried through lack of decent sleep!
I'm happy to offer as much milk as possible but he just spits it out.
Maybe I just need to accept he is a poor sleeper!?

If you search you will find my post at pretty much the same point as you saying pretty much the same thing! You have my sympathy, it's hideous!

Ds is still a rubbish sleeper but things are slightly improved. I worked really hard on his daytime naps. It took a couple of weeks but he does now generally have 2 long naps a day. I found white noise helped a lot. If he woke with less than an hour's sleep I tried to resettle him. Quite often he would go back down. It did feel like I spent whole days trying to get him to sleep though!

He is now generally going down at 6.30 and waking at 10, 2ish then up for the day between 5 and 6. It's not great but it's more manageable.

He still goes to bed earlier and wakes earlier than I would like! If he goes to bed later he still wakes up early so I'm not fighting it at the moment. Once he's sleeping properly through I'll work on trying to shift it all a bit later!

Good luck with it, it's really hard!

Hi Sunshine, thanks for posting! Sleep deprivation is hideous isn't it!

I couldn't find your post but I'm not sure I searched correctly lol

I use white noise which initially did help him sleep longer and I have added more dummies to his cot in the hope he finds them and settles but when he wakes at night he wants milk.

I have tried to settle him if he wakes up early from naps but he just cries and gets hysterical so I have to get him up, how did you resettle??

He went to bed early again tonight, I just couldn't keep him up so I know it will be an early rise with numerous wakes tonight.

Yep, ds is a night time milk monster as well! I'm bf so it means it always has to be me that gets up as well, it's tough. I haven't tried to night wean, feeding him gets him to drop back off in the shortest time frame (usually!) so path of least resistance here! I also bring him in with me if its a night of frequent waking (DH in spare room, ds in sleepyhead on his side of the bed). He still wakes but at least I can stay in bed and don't have to sit in the nursery for hours!

I also struggle with getting him to take milk in the day. He loves his food and eats well but he's too distracted by everything! I offer all the time but he generally refuses. Another reason I haven't attempted night weaning is I feel I can't be sure he isn't hungry in the night, I'm probably too soft!

I did anything and everything to resettle, cuddled him, fed him, took him out in the car! Sometimes it would take half an hour or so to get him to drop back off but quite often he would go off eventually.

I actually found it was better when I relaxed about it a bit and stopped expecting it to get better! I focused on what I could do something about (getting daytime naps improved) and let the rest of it go a bit. It's still hard though! I hope you get some sleep tonight!

I wonder whether it's this age range then as our ds's sound very similar!
I bring ds into our room for feeding, he is bottle fed, but I darent co sleep. Our ds1 slept in our bed up until he was 2 years 3 months and it was hard until we did sleep training which was also really hard. I am trying my best not to go down the same road lol plus we don't have a spare room for dp and ds1 might get a bit jealous lol.
I had a sleepyhead for ds1 and I can't imagine using it for ds2 he would roll out of it - he is such a fidget. Does your ds not try to roll out?
I agree with you in that I feed hoping it's the quickest way for him to go back to sleep and like your ds it mostly works, sometimes not though!

Last night he woke at 9:30 ish but we had gone to bed (which is out of the norm for ds2 as I usually get him up at 9:15/30 change his bum feed and play a little until he is sleepy and pop him back) so I fed him in the dark popped him back and he wasn't having any of it, he just cried to I ended up putting the lights on the tv on and changing his bum etc played and then he went off to bed just after 11, he did then sleep until 5 which I thought was pretty good, dp fed and popped him back but then he was up for the day at 6!
I hope that makes sense I feel like I've rambled.

How was your night??

One other thing I have thought about is that he is crawling although not quite properly so maybe the lack of sleep is also a developmental thing?

I think its definitely a developmental thing, pretty common around eight months from what I've been reading. My dd was up every two hours on the dot last night, so frustrating as a couple of weeks ago we were getting an 8 hour stretch some nights!

For me I'm just going to go with the the flow and hope we come out the others side pretty soon! She was awful at four months and as she's my first I was panicking about doing this, not doing that etc and she seemed to improve on her own in the end with the help of a sleepyhead in her cot though. If she starts to improve then I'm going to tackle night feeds but if it's the easiest way to settle her right now, I'm going with it!

Also I've ditched the white noise, she has a slumber buddie which I always flicked on when she had a feed in the night but I didn't bother last night as I think that may actually now be disturbing her

Thanks Beans, it's so hard though isn't it! He is my second and I still find myself thinking what am I doing wrong, which is madness but I honestly feel it's me as both have been terrible sleepers lol!
I hope you have a better sleep tonight! I think the white noise helps ds2 but maybe I will try and remove it gradually and see if it helps!?
How old is your dd?

It is very hard! We had a slight improvement last night and she woke every 3 hours instead of two and settled quicker-probably won't get that again tonight though!

My dd is just 8 months and on the verge of crawling

Hope last night was better again for you, three hours is at least better than two!!
My mum had my ds last night so I managed a good night but she has just informed me he is poorly with his cold and won't eat so that will be fun later.
Seems ours about the same age then, my ds is also at crawling stage but he tends to pull himself along the floor rather than actual crawling yet lol.