Help! At end of tether with non-sleeping 11mo

[Knoxie]

I have an 11 month old son who has never slept through the night. He wakes approx every two hours (on a good night) but doesn't seem to be properly awake. He awakes with a cry/shout and sometimes can be sent back to sleep with a shush and a pat of reassurance, but most times he will begin to scream/shout. It's not a scared or upset cry, more an angry one. We've tried co-sleeping but he doesn't like that either. We've now put him in a junior bed thinking he needed more room (he's a big lad), tried him on his own and have now put him in a bedroom with his 3 yr old sister thinking he might want 'company'!
We've tried controlled crying but he gets so angry he will scream for 4 or 5 hours or until he's sick. We did it for a full week but after that I couldn't stand any more.
Through the day he's really happy and placid and will sleep quite happily for an hour or two without waking at nap time on our bed and wake up naturally, not screaming.
We're going loopy with lack of sleep - please, can anyone help us?!!

Knoxie, are you sure your son isnt hungry? have you tried feeding him or giving him some water when he wakes? is he eating enough in the day?

Knoxie, snap! I have an 11 month old ds who does the same.

Obviously, I have no answers or I wouldn't be in this predicament either but LOTS of sympathy.

The ONLY thing to sometimes settle my ds is a drink of water, as suggested.

Good luck.

With my ds who is now 10 yrs, we tried calpol first to eliminate pian, teething is bad in some kids.
First night he slept, next night screamed so then we got tough, pick up put down (this was at 14 mths btw)
It took 22 days, and our Plunket nurse (NZ equiv of HV) said it was the most stubborn case she had ever heard of...
But do eliminate hunger and pain first to help you know that he is not "suffering" before you attempt any sort of controlled crying situation.

Knoxie, have you looked at 'The No Cry Sleep Solution' by E. Pantley? It helped us a lot. you can get it on Amazon. Our dd1 was the same - cc doesn't work for everyone and I wish people would stop saying it can! However, I have seen pick up/put down used on a t.v. programme and was impressed so that might be another option - it's notthe same as the sort of cc usually recommended as you stay with your child and don't let them cry alone. I think that Tracy Hogg recommends this method. Also re the hunger you could try giving your ds some porridge before bed as oats are supposed to be soporific.

Knoxie, have thought some more about this, just to let you know my dd (now 2 1/2 and a very good sleeper) was just the same. She had awful colic for 4 months, spent the rest of her first year with one or the other teeth coming through and then, a few days after her first birthday her molars popped through. She had another tough month or so and then really settled. I can see this in hindsight, at the time it was maddening and I couldn't understand her unwillingness to settle. She was OK during the day, as ds is.

I'm living in hope ds settles when he gets to the same age and always give him calpol/brufen if he seems in pain, just in case.

HTH.

I have an 11 mo old that has been a great sleeper for the past 4 mo, and just recently has started to wake several times at night, and not take very long naps for the day. I don't know what to do, either, but just wanted to offer sympathy. Will be watching this thread with interest.

Thanks for all the advice and sympathy! Yes, we've ensured he's not in pain, dosing out calpol/ibuprofen etc and as he seemed to get more angry with bottles of water we've gone back to giving him milk at night. It seems like he doesn't know how get himself back to sleep again when he 'surfaces' from light sleep. We've tried the 'no cry sleep solution' - which involved lots of crying, no sleep and no solution! - as he seems to get even more angry and frustrated if you pick him up. It's almost like he's annoyed at being awake - he wants to be asleep and so he gets really cheesed off with any attempt to soothe him!
Anyway... If I reach a solution I'll let you know. Thanks to everyone

Knoxie, my dd was the same with pu/pd stuff it just drove her nuts to be picked up and cuddled and then put back to bed again. I actually think it's probably the best method for very young babies who shouldn't be left to cry at all in my opinion but as they get older and that bit more aware of things I just don't see how it can work.

Has your ds always been the same? Has anything changed that you can pinpoint? Up until 15 months old my dd was a great sleeper then after a bout of illness and some anxiety things going on it all went downhill. It started with her refusing to be left in the cot at bedtimes so we got in the habit of sitting with her / cuddling her to sleep (which I swore I'd never do!) which was sort of ok at bed and nap times. But then that extended to night time too so we'd end up going to her about 3 times a night and soothing her back to sleep. I tried every single method going before trying cc (which I also swore I'd never do!!) and we followed a very gentle routine of it which involved much much less crying that the so-called 'kinder' methods and made much more sense to us as we got an idea of how / why dd's problem arose. Anyway after 2 nights of heartbreaking hell dd slowly reverted to her former good sleeping pattern. I know you've said you're against cc but I would recommend you read a good account of how best to do it and maybe give it another go, sticking firmly to the rules. It might not work of course, but it is the most tried and tested method. Before I did it I was afraid of 'leaving dd to cry' and all those things so I avoided it. But when I read about it properly I realised it didn't involve that much crying, the hardest part is sticking to it and not giving in at 4am in the morning! But, as you describe your son as being unable to get himself to sleep on his own, I can't think of a better method for doing that. If you do things like rock, cuddle, pat, pu/pd then he's still not getting to sleep on his own.

I hope things get better soon.

knoxie, our dd1 was exactly the same as your ds. Do you stay with him whilst he falls asleep at his first bedtime? We found that this was what we needed to crack. As we found the idea of leaving my dd to cry until she vomited unthinkable, which was what happened the one and only time I tried cc, we used a method called gradual withdrawl a.k.a the travelling chair! We really used this method in earnest when she was two and within two weeks she was going through the night. I know your ds is younger but I know that a friend of mine did this with her 10 month old, and my hv recommends it as a method from 6 mo. She also says that cc winds babies up... I guess it's just horses for courses and different methods work for different babies. Some babies do settle quickly with less fuss from mum & dad and like to grizzle a bit to sleep but others do get absolutely out of their box if left to cry. If you would like to know what we did let me know, and I will go into detail - am struggling to type at the mo as I have a sleeping dd2 in my arms - could I be starting a bad habit?

Knoxie, does your ds have a dummy? I know some people don't like them but our eight month old wakes occasionally and the dummy sends him back off. Without that I'd probably be up most of the night. He sleeps around 12 hours every night and has done from about 10 week old.

Strangerthanfiction - yes, ds has always been like this, and is quite (but not horrendously so) clingy - well, more like he just likes to know we're about. I think you may be right about cc but I don't know if I can face it again!

Flip - no he doesn't have a dummy and won't take one, not for my want of trying to give him one!

ionesmum - I would like to know more about your method please (and I know how you feel btw - I got to the stage where I could type one handed while b/feeding!)

Thanks to all.

You might have a totally different natured child Knoxie as my dd is the least clingy baby in town! She won't go to sleep if she knows we're around. If she's in the pram she has to not see me. She'll never ever sleep in bed with me even when I've occasionally wanted her to when she's ill or we're away. Now at nearly 22 months I have to put her in the cot standing up, give her a big cuddle and a kiss, she says 'night night mummy' and pushes me away and won't even lie down til I've left the room! I have to say I've sometimes longed for a clingy baby ...

I mean if she's in the pram and I want her to sleep she has to not see me, not generally when she's in the pram. I really would start to feel rejected if that were the case!

And I mentioned the other stuff to say that maybe it's true that cc is much harder with a clingy child than it is with an ardent independent like my dd has been from day one really.

Hi, Knoxie!

I am sure that you are doing loads of this stuff anyway. First,we made dd1's room as much to her liking as possible - horrid Thomas quilt cover etc. Then we put up a plastic holder full of photos of dd1 doing loads of fun things, plus pics of the rest of the family, where dd1 can see it from her bed. Then we let her bring her favourite toy to bed, even if that was a plastic Thomas. We also had lots of quite play sessions in her room e.g. reading stories, teddies picnic etc. (We already had a set routine and bedtime)

Then we started on the gradual withdrawl. We used to lay down with dd1 until she went to sleep,and she would hold our hand, so we started by giving her something else to hold and refusing to let her hold our hand. We then moved onto sitting up beside her whilst she lay down to fall asleep. After a couple of nights, we moved onto sitting on the end of the bed whilst she fell asleep. Next was a chair beside the bed. The idea is then to move the chair away from the bed a bit each night until the chair is outside the door, but dd's room is tiny so we went from beside the bed to outside the door in one move! we did this at bedtime and every waking time and it was totally pain free and took a fortnight, if that. I had only just had dd2 and yet dd1 took it in her stride. Now I kiss her goodnight, switch on a c.d. of soft music and leave her to drift off with no problems.

I think the key is to be consistent. We tried this several times before it worked but we'd always given in too easily. Having dd2 gave us the impetus to stick with it and get it sorted. My friend with the 10 mo dd had to spend more time sitting outside the door than we did but she got to that point sooner.

HTH! Good luck!

Thanks everyone. No computer for a few weeks so have not been on the board.

DS slept for a week with only one/two minor wakings without us doing any of the above - it seemed like a miracle! But of course it was too good to be true. He started cutting back teeth and now we are back to square one. V disappointing but at least makes me think he may eventually grow out of it ...or leave home eventually, whichever is the sooner...