I really hope someone has some advice for me.
My son, the light of my life and sunshine in my heart (honest!!), isn't much of a sleeper. He wakes up a few times a night every night and doesn't know how to self settle. I don't remember the last time I slept for more than 3 hours in a row.
He naps well in the day (once in the morning and once in the afternoon, approx 3.5-4 hours apart, for 2-2.5 hours in total) but can not fall asleep on his own. So every nap time and every bed time I have to feed him to sleep. Every time he wakes in the night I have to go to him and either feed or rock him back to sleep. Sometimes this takes up to an hour.
I have tried putting him down "drowsy but awake", I have tried going in to him and just stroking, shushing and patting him instead of picking him up, I've tried bedtime routines, night lights, bottle feeding instead of breast feeding. My son's dad (we're not together but he stays here sometimes) has tried going in to him with a bottle so he can't smell my boobs.
If I put him down in his crib when he's awake or don't pick him up when he cries, he gets really hysterical. It's not like a bit of crying and he shows any sign of settling down. He just gets more and more upset until he is really wailing.
In the day he's a happy, loving, adventurous little boy. I have taken an Attachment type approach to parenting, I suppose, although it wasn't deliberate. He's mostly breastfed (ebf. until 6 months) we co-slept until about a month ago when he moved into a nursery (his sleep hasn't really changed since then so it's not that...), we did baby wearing, etc. But he's not especially clingy. He eats well during the day and has a 200ml bottle and a breastfeed before bed. He used to have a dummy but has been rejecting it recently.
I am unwilling to leave him to cry, but something has to change as I am exhausted, not functioning well, and going back to work soon. Has anyone had any success with a gentler approach with a baby who is so utterly resistant to being left alone in his cot??