5 month old - self settling, night wakings, dummy

[MrsJW15]

Hi all, wonder if anyone can help with my 5 month old's sleep. She slept well as a newborn but we've had a rough time for the last six weeks or so.

She self settles for naps well, and she has 3 decent naps a day. If she's having a bad nap day or is overtired we occasionally put a 4th nap in. We work on nap gaps each day, so I put her down based on wake times and that seems to work well. We did some sleep training with her last week, and she is now going to sleep pretty easily on her own at a sensible time (big improvement on a couple of weeks ago!).

However, she is waking up a lot. After she goes to sleep, she wakes after 2 hours, and then can have anything between 2 and 4 further wake ups before the morning. I don't mind feeding her a couple of times during the night, but this seems a lot - some stretches are only 1.5 hours.

Any thoughts on any way to make this better? I'm wondering if I should get rid of her dummy, if she's waking and realising because it's gone. Or do I just need to be patient and wait for her sleep to improve?

I would be feeding her frequently in the night. There is a huge growth spurt plus the 4 month sleep regression at that age - and also I wouldn’t get rid of the dummy as it’s a very useful sleep tool it won’t last much longer, it's just a phase.

Thanks CrazyCatLady - it's definitely not the 4 month regression as we've had that (it was much worse) but she could be growing. She's pretty tiny so I'm not willing to give up night feeds entirely, but I know she can manage more than 2 hours without eating!

No advice but sympathies and watching with interest as she sounds exactly like my DD (minus the self settling ...)

If she can self settle I guess it might be the dummy, or else hunger? I’m sure you’ve tried giving her extra feeds or even some formula in the day if she’s breastfed ...Or, random thought could she be too cold??

That’s probably not that helpful, sorry.

Rebecca two nights ago she had a long-sleeved vest and grobag, last night I added PJ trousers and it was slightly better. So cold is a possibility. We spent all summer worrying about her overheating!

Hunger is of course possible. She's exclusively breastfed and is sooo distracted during the day. I'm trying to get her to feed as much as possible, but she sometimes pulls off to stare at the ceiling or her own hand. But on days where she's had an expressed bottle she doesn't seem less hungry. It's tricky.

Unless you have a really warm bedroom, I'd have a long sleeved vest plus full sleepsuit in a 2.5 tog sleeping bag. Nights have got very cold recently.

Try to maximise daytime calories. Feed baby when she is not tired, ideally having just woken up. Avoid distractions during the feed and try to ensure both breasts are emptied every daytime feed. If you are already doing these things, try reducing the time between feeds to make more feeds per day.

How was she going to sleep up until a week ago? And how is she going to sleep now?

Having exactly same problem with my baby, he is a few days off turning 5 months.
Goes down in cot awake with dummy and goes to sleep. First stretch does three hours, 7.30-10.30 and after that he will wake every 2-3 hours. Sometimes every 1.5.
Dummy will not settle him during these wakings. Only wants feeding (BF) Up until about 6 weeks ago, he was sleeping 8pm-4am and then back to sleep to 7.
No advice for you unfortunately but really hoping it passes as Dd2 was the worst sleeper ever and I just can't do it all again!!!
You have my sympathies!

My baby is super distracted in the day too and regularly stops feeding because he hears the other DC talking or a gust of wind or a feeling floorboard and so on!

Greylily it's hilarious but also frustrating! She catches sight of her own hand moving and that's it, she's distracted. I've had some success by constantly switching boobs during a feed, which appears to trick her into thinking she's getting something new.

Fate last night when we went to bed it was 20 degrees in our room! Our flat is pretty warm, so I'm keeping a constant eye on the various thermometers to try to work out what to dress her in. Previously we fed her to sleep most of the time. That was getting harder and harder actually, because she just wasn't falling asleep. Now we are putting her in her cot with a dummy and white noise (we've always used both) and letting her self-settle. It takes a bit of time still, but she is doing it.

Last night was (I think) better. She only had two wake ups, one at 10.45 and the other at 3.15. Both times she was awake for a while, but she did actually self-settle again, eventually, rather than being fed back to sleep. So I guess I may need to persevere.