Has anyone genuinely not coped?

[SaltK]

Hi all. Feeling like a total failure this morning. My 9 month old's sleep is and always has been horrendous. We are trying to sleep train with little success. Tried giving in and co-sleeping - doesn't work. Only thing we haven't tried is controlled crying, and tbh that is partly because I'm so scared it wouldn't work and we'd be left with no options.

Everything you read, people just say "it's hard but it ends, you cope, you just have to" etc. But I honestly don't know if I can. Has anybody not coped? Is it even an option? Feel like I'm headed for a nervous breakdown. Not sure what I'm looking for from this post, just feeling hopeless this morning.

If you really can't cope you need to outsource, be that grandparents, daytime childcare while you nap, night nanny, taking it in turns to have a night in a motel. You have to find ways to get through it.

Thanks Cole, it never even crossed my mind to put him in daycare while I'm at home.

I'm right there with you. I have 8 month old DS who has also never slept well and I'm not sure how much more sleep deprivation I can cope with. A few of my friends have had babies recently, some older and some younger than mine, and not a single one of them has this problem. Dreading going back to work full time in a few weeks.

Sorry I can't offer advice, just that you're not alone in feeling like this! I'm also feeling pretty hopeless this morning.

With DD1, it got to a point where I couldn't cope. DH and I were so tired that neither of us were safe to drive and I already had PND.

We did as the PP suggested - we out sourced childcare, in the form that a couple of times a week my Mum would have her in the afternoon and I'd sleep.

We also chose to sleep train using CC, and it really was the best decision we made. Within 3 nights she was sleeping through and the fog started to lift.

Wishing you all the best of luck OP. It really sucks.

Not personally, but a friend of mine has two terrible sleepers (1 and 3) and she will genuinely admit she often can't cope. Luckily there are two sets of grandparents local who will take the DC one next each week, so she gets by with having those two uninterrupted nights most weeks. Do you have anyone who can take over for a night?

You poor thing - it’s grim, isn’t it? If CC is something that you’re considering (and I fully understand it’s not for everyone) then I wouldn’t leave it in your back pocket for too much longer. Nine months is a good age for it as it tends to get harder the older the child is. If you go for CC though then it has to be 100% consistent, which is hard when you’re so sleep deprived. It worked for our DS who was a terrible sleeper until eight months or so. Took about three nights and was tried in desperation - I really didn’t think it would work but it did.

Best of luck whatever you do. Sleep deprivation is the absolute worst.

Ds was a horrible sleeper never slept more than an hour until 9 months old. When I returned to work he started going longer, he was in childcare and was getting used to sleeping without having me put him down which helped and without the breast snacking.

He slept even better again when I put him in his own room ( I had refused as I didnt want to spend all night going back and forth).

I don't have any real advice but a lot of sympathy

Well I’m back to work already and I’m not coping. I’ve slept one night through in 8 mo. It’s truly hellish isn’t it.

CC is also worth a shit IMO. We did controlled crying around 9 months with DS1 and it worked like magic only took two nights. DS2 is only 5 months so too young (but luckily he is usually settled enough as long as he is cosleeping), will try CC with him at 9 months too.

Thank you so much for the replies and sympathy. HoneyBee and SleepDeprived, I'm sorry you are going through it as well! I'm the same, some of my friends have not great sleepers, but nothing like my DS. At first, we were all in the same boat, then one by one all the other babies seemed to start going longer and longer stretches...

It makes me hopeful to hear that CC worked for some of you. I feel awful, I know so many people think its horrible, but tbh my poor DS isn't having very nice nights now. He gets so frustrated and even if I'm cuddling him can just be pushing me away and sobbing, trying to get back to sleep. I'll probably give it a go, and will also try to outsource some childcare, as some of you have said. I've got a Drs appointment this morning to rule out anything physical, then might just go for it. Gentler approaches have been pretty useless.

It's just grim, isn't it? You lose all sense of perspective and hope!

There's a reason why sleep deprivation is used as a torture technique

My DD didn't sleep until we did CC at 14 months. It was absolute hell, we were up every 45 mins in the night, or only once but for three hours. Everyone told me to co-sleep but she wouldnt, she'd just lay there trying to get up and/or crying. I resented her, resented being a Mum... I hated it. The CC changed our lives. She's 5 and sleeps like an angel, only wakes up if there's an actual problem.

Now we have 8 month old DS. His sleep was so so good then all of a sudden it changed, like it does, and now he's horrendous as well. He WILL sleep in our bed but he wakes up constantly to look for me and pull my hair. I hate that too! He won't self settle at all, he won't sleep in his cot for naps, he only does 30 mins in the buggy/car and we have to be constantly moving or he wakes up immediately.

So after two weeks of no sleep for anybody, we're doing CC tonight. I nearly lost my mind with DD and I can't afford to do that this time. So it's getting sorted.

I sympathise completely OP. You're not alone

Mine was a terrible sleeper until about 10 months old. 9 months was the peak for us.

Are you breastfeeding? Reason I ask is because I did a gentler version of controlled crying which really helped. Baby is breastfeed until they come off, instead of then holding them to sleep, you then put baby down in the cot for 6 mins. In this time, you can pick up put down or sing to them or put a hand on them or just leave the room. Once the 6 mins is up, you return and breastfeed until they come off again and repeat for 8 mins. Repeat this each time with 2 extra minutes until they fall asleep. We found this worked after only 2 nights and she now self settles. We never got to more than 10 minutes and I was there to settle her so she wasn't too upset. It's really depends on the child though as I tried it at 8 months and she got too upset and just wasn't ready.

The other option is to speak with your heath visitor. I'm luck in my area that they sent a sleep specialist nursery nurse out to me. She suggested pick up put down though and it just made my baby more upset.

I should add that for us, during those 6, 8, 10 minute intervals it worked best to leave the room as she was too upset with me in it. It was the breastfeeding in between that helped calm her back down. I was also advised that if you don't breastfeed then you can use whatever method you usually use to get them to sleep in between, such as rocking.

my poor DS isn't having nice nights right now

This is what I always think when people say they won't do any (even gentle) sleep training. It's horrible for the adults to not be getting any sleep, and it must be horrible for the kid as well!

My DD was a different child when she started sleeping properly - happy to go to bed, happy when she woke up, happy most of the day. Before we did CC she was miserable, and so were we, and we didn't enjoy those precious months.

Not helping a baby/child to learn how to fall and stay asleep is just as "cruel" as doing CC, I think.

We were very close to total breakdown. 8 months in and we never got more than 20 minutes in a row without a wake up and naps were a disaster.
We used a sleep consultant (which was really to make us feel reassured in the method and support us) and it was the best thing ever. We did small intervals of controlled crying, never leaving longer than 3 minutes. Night 2 there was 9 minutes of crying in total (so 3 x 3 mins) then they bloody SLEPT ALL NIGHT apart from one feed. We dropped the night feed a month or so after and they've been pretty much a great sleeper ever since. Rarely hear from them in the night. They do 11 hours straight with a 2 hour nap (now 20 months).

I feelnfor you, it's horrendous and people with good/great sleepers just do not get it. I don't think it's as simple as getting some help twice a week so you can have a nap- when it's really bad that just doesn't make a difference overall.

It's truly awful but it does get better, it's just hard to imagine when you are so tired.
I did CC with my little one as he was impossible to settle. He didn't want to be held, would push me away in frustration. The first night of CC he basically cried for 45 minutes. I went in after 3, 5, 7, 10 etc to reassure but just patted him and left the room. It was heartbreaking but you get used to the types of cries and he was basically shouting and frustrated. After 45 minutes of this he went to sleep for about 8 hours. From waking every 45 minutes. I couldn't believe it. The next night he cried out for about 5 minutes and then slept for 10 hours. We have the odd blip but he sleeps so much better since he's learnt to self settle and is so much happier in the day.
Now I just put him in the cot for bed and naps and say goodnight and walk out. He protests for about a minute and then goes off to sleep and consistently sleeps for 12 hours.
You start feeling so much better when you realise you're having more good nights than bad.

My two are dd4.5 and ds2yrs 9m. Both have been terrible sleepers. Dd was bf until I just could not cope anymore. Lack of sleep and snacking bf all night was making me feel ill. I used to regularly call my mum to drop work and rescue me because I couldn't talk or walk straight. I even had blood tests at the doc which all came back clear, I was just exhausted. After a horrible stomach bug i switched to ff cold turkey and did cio at 6mo. The first night she cried for an hour 20. The second 20mins. The third she slept through.

Ds on the other hand was a whole new level of crap. He was ff from 8wks, which in hindsight I regret. His big thing was spilt sleeping, so he'd settle to sleep no bother at all, but wake at 1ish and wouldn't go back down for about 3hrs. Dd was up at 6am every day so it was just killing me. Especially when I returned to work. At 1yo we ended up working with a sleep consultant. She advised he was overtired and running a sleep debt, which was leading to release of stress hormone and waking him. We got a lot more structure in the day, including a set nap window, put him to bed a lot earlier (5pm a few times!), pulled him out of nursery because he wouldn't sleep there and put him with a childminder, and he gradually came good. We did have to be extremely firm and do some controlled crying at various points.

My Dd lost it big style with her sleep at age 4, related to anxiety of changing to preschool. She was up 30 times a night most nights. We worked with the sleep consultant again, and over-tiredness and needing to go to bed really early was a common factor here too. Might be worth thinking about.

The sleep consultant we used was sleepy moonkeeper. She saved my sanity and marriage really.

Sleep deprivation is the worst, big sympathy.

My two would never co-sleep either, they both hated it. Once ds got over the 3hrs wide awake thing, he Wanted to be asleep, not to be held or rocked or shushed. But he didn't know how to make it happen. He needed to sort it out for himself, anything I did just made it worse and woke him up more and gave him the rage! Hence we did controlled crying with intervals. It really sounds like you're in the same camp, so I would Steel yourself and just do it, before he gets much older and it gets more difficult! No one wants to do controlled crying, but there are reasons why people do.

I somehow got through DS2 barely sleeping until well over a year old. He didn't even nap during the day! Reflux made life horrendous and I would say I existed, not coped. I couldn't drive, it would have been so dangerous. I was so clumsy I injured myself a few times. I fainted and dropped him when he was 8m old, I was so tired! Thankfully he was fine. I even fell asleep standing up whilst waiting at DS1's school reception desk once. I split up with his father as I was too damn tired to even argue let alone resolve our problems.

I just gritted my teeth and told myself it wouldn't last forever. And it didn't, by 2 DS was only waking me briefly twice a night and by 3 he even slept through occasionally! I coslept, napped when I could, refused to take on anything extra and did anything that made life easier. I aged about ten years in DS's first year, but he's such an easy, joyful boy now (he's 6.5) and I wouldn't swap him for anything. Of course I can say that now with the luxury of hindsight, at the time I often thought 'what the hell have I done???' and cried because I was a shit, knackered parent to my eldest DS (who remembers nothing of it now despite being 6 at the time).

Apparently I was an awful sleeper as a baby too. My mother tells me her GP told her, 'If it's any consolation, Mrs X, they often turn out to be highly intelligent children'. Probably total bollocks but it made her feel slightly better at the time. DS is doing extremely well at school despite being the youngest in his class, so you never know!

Hi I'm in the exact same position as you, so interested to see peoples advice and how they coped. I am currently just coping. But longing for a full 6 hour sleep with no interruptions at night, that would be a dream come true. @Sandsnake how did you go about training and CC I'm getting so frustrated with rocking my son to sleep it's killing my back any advice and how you did it would be great xxx

God, thank you so much, everyone, for your stories. It has really helped get me through the day to know it's not just me, and to have some hope that things could change.

He's teething so doesn't seem like the best night to start full on CC, so just going to try to keep him in his cot tonight. Good luck, CoodleMoodle, hope your first night goes well!

DD was a horrendous sleeper, up every 45 mins for the first 18 months or so. She is finally sleeping better now at 2.5 but still gets up once or twice a night most nights. It broke me to be quite honest, I feel like half of my brain power has just gone forever. I now have insomnia so even when she does miraculously sleep through the night, I am still awake. It's so tough OP, and so frustrating, but it will end eventually.

OP there’s a website that saved my sanity, might be worth a look. Very sensible approach to sleep issues: www.preciouslittlesleep.com/baby-sleep-guides/