6 month old suddenly won't sleep alone

[Cuppaqueen]

To add to the recent spate of threads about 6 month olds, my almost-6-month baby has recently stopped sleeping happily in his cot (as he had since birth!) and now seems to only settle in bed with us.

He will go down fine in the cot during the day and evening usually. I wake him for a dreamfeed at 10.30/11 ish and that's when the trouble starts. He either dozes off on the boob or I can rock him a little and he goes in the cot ok. But then 2-3 hours later he wakes crying and resists all attempts to put him back in the cot, to the extent of lying there screaming 😥

I usually try patting and stroking first, then if he won't settle, I pick up and rock him. If he roots for boob, I'll feed him and then rock him. But whatever I do, he gets increasingly worked up at being put down in the cot. The last two nights DH and I were up for 90 mins at 2-3am taking turns to resettle while he screamed constantly. The only thing that works is putting him in our bed. Then magically he falls asleep and (mostly) stays asleep. However, I then sleep badly because I'm in an awkward position with arm extended and hyper-anxious lest he roll in his sleep.

I don't want co-sleeping to be a habit and it's especially frustrating because he's always been fine in his cot until now. I do think he is teething although no sign of it on his gums. We are also weaning and he's up to 3 meals a day of veg/fruit or cereal plus same number of milk feeds as pre-weaning (BF). He loves his food and no digestive issues we can see.

Has anyone been through something like this? Is it a phase? Any advice on how we can help him get used to his cot again?

I dont suppose baby takes a dummy?

Without a dummy, I don't know of any way to get baby going to sleep independantly in the cot anytime soon without crying. How do you feel about sleep training methods that cause baby to cry? These need not mean leaving baby alone to cry, it would be you there comforting. But still some crying.

A short-term option that will not involve crying is feeding/rocking to sleep and then transferring an so ready asleep baby into the cot. Baby does need to learn to go to sleep where she stays asleep though, not doing so tends to be a cause of frequent night wakes. So doing this is only delaying the problem and it will be more difficult to tackle when an older baby.

Embracing safe cosleeping is another no-crying way to deal with this. For independant sleep in the cot, I cannot overstate the value of using a dummy in allowing that to happen without any crying.

Do you need to wake him for a dreamfeed? Especially if he's already on three meals a day.

@FATEdestiny He doesn't take a dummy, alas. I now regret we didn't try harder but he used to spit them out and since he slept fine without we never persevered.

The weird thing is I can get him to fall asleep in the cot from drowsy during the day/evening - it's just at night it's all gone to pot (so far). I'm willing to tolerate a little crying in my presence but PU/PD hasn't been working. As in, pick up and comfort, fine, but each time we put down, more rage. Any other suggestions welcome. He's still in our room.

@Unihorn I tried skipping the dreamfeed but he woke up before midnight every time so I'm guessing he still needs the calories. I am trying to give more calorific options during the day e.g. banana/ avocado but can't add dairy etc till 6 months.

I'm not a fan of PUPD. Exactly as you describe, I can just imagine the rage my child would express at being 'teased' (for want of a better word) with a cuddle. That said, it's entirely possible that my theoretic understanding of PUPD is not the right way of doing it, since I have no experience of using the method IRL.

Instead, I favour the use of a sidecar cot and gradual withdrawal.

The sidecar cot is just removing one side off the cot (or if it's a dropside cot having the side down) and wedging it up to your bed. This gives you a space in which to cuddle in and settle baby to sleep by close physical cuddles in the cot.

Then over time reduce the amount of reassurance needed until it just becomes put baby down awake and settle with a hand on the chest (and at that point, side goes back on the cot).

6 months is the beginnings of the mobile stage. Being able to physically hold baby still through this can help.