8 month terrible sleeper & sleep training not working... help!

[Schwanengesang]

DS (8 months) is a big wee laddie, 99th centile height, 75th weight & into 18 month old clothes. He has always been a pretty bad sleeper, waking every hour or so (can't link sleep cycles), but it seems to be getting worse recently so he will often be awake for 3+ hours in the middle of the night and cluster feed for hours too.

I don't feed to sleep unless it happens by accident (then I just let him sleep). I usually gently disengage when he's sleepy and put him on my shoulder and pat his bottom. Obviously this doesn't help (bad habit) but I just cannot get him to sleep any other way.

We have been trying having DH resettle him at night other than a dream feed and another feed at about 3am, then DH going t bed & I take over. After 2 weeks, DS still wakes up all the time - it seems to have made no difference. DH is now just knackered and grumpy and refusing to do more nights after this week (he works, I don't, so it seems reasonable that he needs to get enough sleep to be able to work long hours).

The cot mattress is raised at the head end, and we are trying omeprazole for 2 weeks (again, seems to have made no difference). Heating is on 19 deg but room usually is colder, DS sleeps in about 3 layers on top/ just nappy & socks, under a sleeping bag (arms out), with a cellular blanket over the top. He seems neither too hot nor too cold.

Daytime naps are usually something like 9-9.30, 12.30-3, 4-4.45.

Dinner is 5.30 (usually grumpy by the end), then bath, then a feed, then I hand him to DH and he is asleep by 7. Then he wakes up screaming about 8.30-9, is resettled, wakes 9.30, 10, 11ish and stays awake grizzling, I go in for a feed at 11.30, DH then spends til 2am resettling him, he wakes at 3 screaming, I feed him, DH then goes to bed, and I spend the rest of the night trying to get DS to stop feeding and go to sleep but he shrieks if I stop the cluster feeding. It stops about 7am when he decides to get up for the day.

He eats something like the following:

Breakfast: 2 ice cubes (melted, obviously!) of stewed apple, 2 tablespoons of rice cereal, tablespoon of yoghurt. Breastfeed both sides about 9am, Lunch 11.30, 1 piece toast, egg, cucumber sticks, 1 ice cube eachof stewed pumpkin & apple to hide omeprazole. Breastfeed both sides before nap. Afternoon tea 1 pouch of rice pudding. Breastfeed before nap. Dinner is often 1 tablespoon wholegrain cereal, half a weetabix, 2 teaspoons nut paste; or chunkily-pureed peas, spinach, yoghurt, mint, cucumber. Then breastfeed before bed, feeds 11.30, 3, & cluster feed 3-7ish. I offer water at meals but he usually doesnt want any (sometimes does, so knows how o drink from sippy cup).

What are we doing wrong? How much should he be sleeping?
What about food?

Arrggggh...

20mins is gr8 first time isn't it Sounds like he will soon get the hang of things. From my experience it's hard to stick with it when they wake in the early hours, it's so tempting just to cave in and feed and get back to sleep! Stay strong

Thanks Polly. Just gone down in the cot for the 3rd time in 24 hours with just patting. He does seem to be getting the hang of it. Fingers crossed it may eventually lead to him bridging the gap between sleep cycles himself.

Just re the decision to settle in cot or in arms: hitherto he has got very distressed when I have tried to settle him in the cot, to the point where I have abandoned it as it's been 5 or 10 minutes of hysterics and then ages to settle after. Picking him up but not feeding resulted in some grizzling but he basically stayed asleep. Having cracked the picking up over the past week (I had only been trying for 6.5 months) , I felt confident to try the selttling in the cot last night- and he seems to be getting it this time.

That's what I did too. Picked up every wake but did not feed. Once he had done 3 nights of no feeding I moved onto in-cot settling. Night 5 last night slept 8pm-6:30 with 5min dummy and settle at 2am. So it works!

He really seems to be getting the hang of it!

Last night he went down awake and went to sleep with patting, AND STAYED IN THE COT with just patting back to sleep until being fed at 12.30, then did it again til being hungry at 4.45 (didn't feed, picked him up), a feed at 5.30, then slept til 7.30!!!!!

Fingers crossed this lasts!

Yay! It will! Keep up the good work! Once you drop that night feed he will start to sleep through...I'm night 6 of no night feeds now ...couple of dummy inserts last night at 11 & 3 but quick settle and still went 7pm-6am
Can't believe only 2 weeks ago I was feeding back to sleep 2 hourly! Regret not doing it sooner now!!

He's just gone to sleep in the cot with 3 minutes of patting. His sleep seems much deeper now than when he was feeding to sleep & waking every 10 min after being put to bed. He may have just learnt to sleep deeply enough not to rouse to waking between sleep cycles.

Of course now I will worry about arousal and SIDS...

Can't believe only 2 weeks ago I was feeding back to sleep 2 hourly! Regret not doing it sooner now!!

I get a bit cross at the rhetoric that 2h feeds all through the night are completely normal. You are see it fairly regularly on the sleep board. It just perpetuates this maryr mentality to not change things, because a mother shouldn't expect more sleep than this from baby. Which is completely rubbish.

I would expect longer than 2h between night breastfeds from a 8 week old, certainly from a 8 month old. But the suggestion is that mothers should not have such unrealistic expectations. Put up and shut up.

He may have just learnt to sleep deeply enough not to rouse to waking between sleep cycles.

This is just natural, normal sleep development. Babies tend to learn to actively link sleep cycles somewhere around 6 months, if given sleep conditions that help them learn.

The peak for SIDS death is 2-4 months old. Possibly due to arousal factors alongside lack of muscle control. The more muscle control baby has, the more they can get themself out of dangerous situations. This muscle developments run a inversely proportional to arousal - babies naturally slerp more deeply as they get older, and have better muscle control.

That's not to say there are no SIDS risks at 8 months, there are still recommendations to follow.

But nowhere in the SIDS recommendations does it suggest you stunt or slow down baby's natural sleep developments because of SIDS risk. Your baby is late to sleeping deeper. Many are doing it much, much sooner than 8 months, when their muscle control is far less developed.

10.45 here & just doing an early feed as nothing else would console him. However, he did get from 6.30 to 10.30 with just patting and even that was minimal.

Re SIDS yes. He has always been a mix of twitchy wiggle fidget sleeper and frighteningly deep sleeper - the former was overwhelmingly dominant from about 6 weeks old. He was born early by elCS because of the latter, heart rate not varying fir long periods (and complete wiggle fidget otherwise in utero). Thus his arousal has always been a bit weird. However, as you say, this will have less effect now than it would have had 4-6 months ago.

Massive pressure on breast feeding mums to feed on demand whether it be day or night 😔
I have to say though my supply has massively dropped now I'm not night feeding. Typical 8 month old is distracted in day too so not feeding much, think it could be the end of the road for us? Which I'm ok about actually, but some might not be? X

Well, the connection between supply and feeding on demand is clear. Too long between feeds does make supply drop, which may be irreversible. That's potentially ok at close to a year but somewhat less good earlier on, hence the pressure to feed on demand so that breastfeeding can continue rather than stopping at a few weeks old (which still happens way too much for a variety of reasons including the difficulty of feeding on demand). The issue here is not to argue against the biology, which is clear, but to see that it is a mismatch between modern life and biology.

That's not meant to come across as tetchy btw. Feeling a bit knackered after a less good night, and as though I have the beginnings of mastitis, which I guess is a risk with feeding less and him being sleepy enough at night to not empty both boobs twice over at every feed...

My baby didn't sleep for longer than 90 mins at a time
Until I stopped feeding at night at around 12 months - when she was having 3 full meals a day plus snacks and I knew she couldn't possibly be hungry. I feed her to sleep at bedtime and then every time she woke I used the method where go on every two mins to resettle but don't feed and don't pick up. I was at my wits end and this was the result of advice from a sleep clinic.
Having said all this as he is still weaning and is only 8 months I am reluctant to suggest the same course of action at this point.
But for what it's worth I doubt he is hungry from what you have described and it's likely to be a habit you have to break / good luck x

Totally agree. Sleep training/night weaning do not go together. In a week I have a baby that sleeps through, gr8! However supply is dropping and now this morning I am suffering with engorgement as he slept 6:30-6am with no wakes.
Mixed emotions of happiness that he now sleeps but sadness that the breast feeding is coming to an end . Hoping supply might adjust and I can continue with an Am and bed feed? But we will see. He's 9months now so he's has a good run

Supply is supposed to drop as weaning takes over. Gradually obviously, not a cliff edge.

The concern about supply and night feeds needs to be taken within the context of age.

It's also difficult for the first time mum (or first time breastfeeder) to properly appreciate what "on demand feeding" means. It is easy to feed at every mumour, which inhibits learning the different meaning of the cry communication. It's this that can lead to unnecessarily frequent night feeds. Fine in the first few weeks when establishing feeding. Fine for a few days here and there in the first 6 months to increase supply. But as an all night every night thing, that's just a sign that tired signs are being misread as hunger signs. In fact all methods of trying to communicate being misread as hunger - needing a cuddle, being in pain, needing help to sleep, having an uncomfy nappy, being too hot/cold. This isn't on demand feeding.

On demand feeding simply means always feeding baby when hungry. It doesn't mean offering milk to pacify every cry.

(As an aside, an attachment parent would offer the breast to pacify every cry. And that is fine because it matches this parenting style. Not to misundestand this with on demand feeding though)

Polly you may take heart from a friend of mine who does bedtime and morning feeds with her 3.5 year old - hasn't done other feeds except occasionally for about 1.5-2 years. Not sure how common this is - all sorts of factors will determine whether it's possible to keep lactating at such a low rate - might not be possible for everyone, I don't know.
FATE may well do though (@FATEdestiny are you actually a maternity nurse with 6 kids & 36 grandkids & 40 years' practice under your belt? How do you come to know such a lot & be able to speak such good sense? I realise not everyone is blessed with my triad of incoherent wittering, foot in mouth syndrome and ignorance, but you seem particularly non prone to such things )