Help 6months and it’s gone tits up

[Bloopbleep]

My lovely sleeper has turned into a monster the minute he hit 6months.

He’s never slept through which hasn’t ever been an issue because he didn’t cry. He wouldn’t feed to sleep either. Now he’s screaming and fighting sleep whether in his crib, our bed or being held. He pushes and grabs and punches and pulls hair/skin (not deliberately i’m sure) while getting more and more hysterical. It will appear as if he’s finally dropped off (on one of us) then out of nowhere he’s screaming again. He’s not staying asleep for longer than 60- 90mins before waking and crying. Through the night he’ll calm down with a breastfeed but I’ve gone from 1-2 feeds through the night to about 6 or 8 so I’m not getting a lot of sleep myself.

He’s not having obvious teething problems but we’ve given calpol tonight just in case. He’s not unwell and is happy during the day. He naps reasonably well and during the day will fall asleep in his pushchair when out or occasionally in the car but in -8 it’s not been the weather for going or driving outside at night. White noise isn’t helping. Sling makes it worse. I refuse to CIO. Baby Valium is too hard to find (joke)

Please help me get my lovely sleeping baby back.

There’s a huge growth spurt st 6 months which explains the extra night feedings (we had the same) but the screaming - it does sound like he might be in pain. Have you ruled out allergies?

Do you cosleep? It will be the way forward if you want your continue to feed to sleep. It's not a good idea to move a sleeping baby, much better for baby to go to sleep where he stays asleep. Baby will sleep longer that way.

If you want baby to sleep in the cot, that will mean baby going from awake to asleep in the cot. A dummy may well help with that, and removing one side off your cot to cuddle baby in the cot.

Bloop you're one of our May gang aren't you? I'm also one (although NC'd since it all went to FB!). I've had a very similar problem since DS was 5 months, through 6 and now 7 months. I think the start for us was a late '4 month' sleep regression dovetailing into 6 month growth spurt and now I don't really know what but sleep is tough! He goes down for daytime naps without a feed in bouncer or pram (we haven't tackled cot in the day yet). However we have recently started to put down awake at night a week ago to break the feed to bed habit. It's up and down, some good nights where he drops off peacefully after his bedtime story, and some awful nights with full protesting. Last night was as you describe - fighting, scratching, thumping, crying for 45 minutes...tried to pick up put down which made him worse, and I lay by the cot and soothe and cuddle as Fate suggests, but it didn't seem to make a difference last night. He still fought, then woke every 2 to 3 hours to feed.
On the good nights though, we've had 5-6 hour stretches which has been a long time absent...
I've noticed a couple of things which seem to be a factor for us. One is fear - he seems to get scared when tired now. After trying to unsuccessfully settle him in the dark I put the night light back on and it seemed to calm him down a bit. Never been a problem before. The other is timing of the last feed. If he's already tired (say if he get's tired before 7pm when I usually give him a last BF) he doesn't drink very much (or won't latch if I'm offering BF, as he's combi-fed), so he then gets more agitated because he's hungry and overtired, then fights sleep. If I catch him just 20 minutes earlier, he'll fill himself up and we avoid the meltdown.
The main thing I wanted to ask you though, is are you weaning? We had some awful screaming after introducing certain foods. I've actually cut back on all grains now including baby rice, and cut out dairy, as the real screamer nights tended to follow after having baby cereal/porridge or yoghurt. We're sticking to a mix of fruit and veg (high calorie avocado as a last meal) and it seems to have helped a lot. Also last solids meal no later than 5.30pm. I think some of the screaming for us was discomfort and constipation, so we're offering water after meals and in the night too before I BF. Doesn't work every night and he still seems to need boob to settle during the night, but it's better than where we were with the 1 to 1.5 hour wake ups that you describe. I have to admit I also don't persevere at night to resettle without a BF as I'm working and need to get back to sleep as quickly as possible! Will tackle that next once we've cracked the bedtime bit...
Don't know whether any of this is useful but thought it worth sharing.
I find this age so much harder than newborn as the variables are huge now - endless game of tweaking naps, meals, bedtime habits...a lot of (exhausting) trial and error it seems to find the right combination!

Not a useful comment from me but it’s very normal (and frustrating). Ride it out and baby will soon sleep again. Then there will be another issue and more wakings again. (Told you I wasn’t useful).

Same thing going on for my 6 month old too. I don't want to cosleep but keep giving into it at 3 am... it's the 9pm wake up that's really doing my head in as I have all my secret wrapping to do for the other kids who don't stop coming down until 9pm.... no tips but think it's hunger and I've also wondered if weaning food is affecting him but my first week of baby rice went really well and he slept through. Oh the contrast this week. I am dreading Christmas when 5 of us will be in 1 room.