8 week old won’t sleep!

[KirstyH91]

My little boy is 8 weeks old and up until a week ago was sleeping so well day & night (we even had a couple full nights) then all of a sudden he has stopped napping through the day, and if he does it’s for 10/15 minutes and wakes up crying because he’s still tired I try cuddle him back to sleep but it doesn’t work. This has resulted in a baby that cries ALL DAY!! And if this wasn’t bad enough he has now started waking every 2 hours at night and not going back to sleep. I am exhausted!!

HELP😩

Is he ill? Mine don't sleep well if they have a cold for example?

Have you tried a sling for daytime naps? A sling and a long walk might give him a chance to catch up on some sleep?

Sorry it's so bad for you at the moment, can you catch up on some sleep now and leave baby with dp?

No he’s not ill, he had his 8 week jags on Wednesday although the napping through the day stopped before that.

I have tried going out driving and with the pram even when doing that he is waking after 20 minutes.

He has been up since 4am this morning and my partner has had him since I have just taken over and let him sleep for a while, my mum is going to take him later to let us catch up on sleep. It’s so hard having a crying tired baby all day 😢

When my 2nd went through a phase of waking every 20 mins in the day someone told me babies can get over tired and then into a cycle of light sleep only (20/ 30 mins) but can't reach the deep sleep stage so they wake, theye over-tiredness increases and it becomes a vicious circle. I remember I spent a couple of days focusing on her day time sleeping- as soon as I saw tired cues I wrapped her up, dummy and rocker or walked her to sleep. I let her sleep for hours on my chest if she needed it. I kept things just a bit quieter (not silent, just not lots of sudden noises) and I didn't try going out lots etc so her sleep was disturbed by transitioning from buggy / car etc. Within a couple of days she went back to sleeping for 1-2 hour stretches. Then I started to keep a record of when she slept so I could preempt when when would need a nap and so managed to establish regular day naps (something I didn't manage with my 1st). My baby was more like 4 months when this happened but still, might help you x

Do you have a sling? Neither of mine slept anywhere else in the daytime. They liked the movement and the closeness.

Thanks for your replies. I think you are right it is a vicious circle of being over tired and not getting into a deep sleep. He had one long nap yesterday and seems to have managed to sleep a bit better since. Now just to try get him to stop wanting to get up at 4am!!! Haha

Have you tried your LO one just sleeping on you. By that age by DD could not settle for any length of time in a Moses basket but would sleep for lovely long stretches on me - watched all of Downton Abbey and then some!

I had a little of this at 8 weeks and was sure the jabs had “ruined my baby” 😂 ended up downloading the wonder weeks app which shows when your baby goes through any developmental changes (like at 8/9 weeks!).

Some people thinks it’s nonsense but it gave me the patience when my usually sleepy, non crying, easy going baby cried and was much more grisly and needy than usual.

I also needed to up her feeds at this time too which helped.