My 9months old won't go to bed

[mamatoizzywizzy]

Looking for any reassurance or advice .

My 9month old is generally a bad sleeper in terms of actually going to sleep. I seem to spend most of my evenings sat in the nursery with her trying to get her to go to sleep either by nursing , rocking , or sitting next to her. There isn't one fire thing that works it just depends on the night. We have the occasional good weeks and good nights which are a miracle but I don't do anything different to make them good. I stick to the same routine each night of bath story milk bed. But often she will fall asleep and then wake within the hour and then not settle for hours afterwards. She will be trying to crawl in her cot or thrash about rubbing her eyes, etc

Why is this happening ? Why won't she settle and why does she wake up ? She generally sleeps pretty well after midnight and I can get a good stretch from her . It's just the evenings which is awful because I feel like I spend my days with her and then the evenings I'm still with her , and then when she finally goes to sleep around 10 or 11pm it's bedtime for me too and I've had no "down time" or any quality time with my husband who I feel like I never see.

Is this normal behaviour. ? I am so desperate now for things to change and just get a break from the screaming

I have literally tried everything from putting her to bed later , earlier etc and nothing makes any difference . When we have good nights I literally could not tell you what I did differently .

I speak to the in-laws who reminisce on how they "lived for their evenings " and had their boys in bed by 7-7.30 - is that normal? Are they perhaps remembering times when their boys were toddlers and more settled ?!

I am so sad as I think I must be doing something awfully wrong but I literally don't know how to "fix" it .

I am sat next to her at the moment with music blaring in my ears as I just can't settle her and I can't listen to her cries. There is literally nothing wrong with her !!!
Help!!!

Bump !

Just to give a snapshot of this evening :

• put DD to bed in cot - BF to sleep
• an hour later she wakes
• Bf to sleep doesn't work , rocking doesn't work , offered water , changed nappy , winded and checked for any trapped toots ...but all was normal
• DD is just screaming and screaming and won't go back to sleep

In previous nights I've bought her down when I'm desperate and then she enjoys playing and laughing so I know there isn't anything wrong

Does anyone else have a similar thing ?

Oh my goodness I could have written this. I just got DS off to sleep. We have the same trouble I feel like he is crying from frustration and constantly trying to roll and stand up. Hitting his head on the bars. It's a nightmare.

Recently I've found sitting on the floor with my hand through the bars hiding him down on his chest and my other hand stroking his hair to work. 🙄 if he gets really upset I pick him up cuddle then put back down.

I don't know I can help at all but I really sympathise, particularly with your point about no evenings. And all these people who have 4 hours quality time together every night... I can't imagine it.

Hope someone comes along who can help

What's her nap schedule? My dd is a similar age and I've had to cut her afternoon nap to get her to be tired enough for bed at 8pm. She just has one nap per day that ends at the latest at 3pm, but often as early as 1 or 2pm. Unusual I know but it's working for us.

Sorry I just read your update. Again... I'm no expert! But...

I stopped feeding to sleep a while ago and intoduced a bottle as otherwise he wanted to breastfeed for an hour. We do it when reading his bedtime book which plays a soothing tune. I then put him in cot "sleepy" and keep soothing him till he goes off but I don't move him out of bed (unless to cuddle)

Maybe the changing etc is waking her up more

I know this is controversial but my advice is sleep train. We had similar at 7 months or so and just did cry it out. I was knackered, DD was knackered as not getting enough sleep and evenings were joyless dreaded affairs so I though f* it can’t make it worse. Nice bath, bottle, big cuddle, story. In bed- we went downstairs. Crying +++ for a couple of nights then went to sleeping 7-2am quick bottle then 2:30-7 until 15 months and slept through from 15 months. I can’t tell you how much happier we all were.

Maybe too late now but I never breast fed to sleep, DS had his last feed, then bath and then bed ... maybe it was just luck but it felt less like a ‘separation’, straight to bed, leave the room and shut the door ... but I know that isn’t popular these days, but DS was in bed at 7pm every night.

Nap schedule massively helped us with night time settling. At 9 months he would do about half an hour in the morning and two hours in the afternoon and awake by 2.30/3 at the very latest otherwise he would wake after an hour or he would not settle at all at night. In general the things that have always helped us is more sleep during the day but making sure there’s a solid 3-4 hour window between afternoon nap and bed.

Sorry, meant to add-if she is happy once you bring her down to play it sounds like the issue is that she is simply not tired which to me suggests tweaking naps could help. Definitely no expert though and I definitely know how frustrating it is as I’ve been there!

My 13 month old is quite bad. I couldn't get him to sleep in a moses basket, crib or next2me when he was a newborn. He'd scream blue murder if put down. So he lived in a wrap during the day and I basically gave up and just let him sleep with me at night. It wasn't until he was about 8 or 9 months old that I could actually put him down next to me.
He wakes up about every 2-4 hours now. So I'll breastfeed him to sleep about 7pm (I lie down with him in a dark room until he falls asleep, then I make my escape). He will wake up between 10 & 11pm when I'll then go to bed with him and breastfeed him back to sleep. Then he will wake up about 2am, breastfeed back to sleep. Then he will be up about 5-6am (sometimes he tries at 4am to get up).

I have tried recently to get him to sleep in a cot but he gets hysterical and takes ages to calm down. I gave up trying after the neighbour passively aggressively asked if everything was OK.

I've basically taken the "easy option" so that I can actually get some sleep - I literally just stick a boob in his mouth and go back to sleep at 2am. Lots of "negative" sleep habits, but it works for me. We both get sleep and the neighbours don't complain.

Do you have a wrap?
Have you tried co-sleeping? I have bed rails up now to stop him rolling off the bed when I'm not there (watch him on a baby monitor - he rolls all over the place in his sleep!).

I had similar issues with DS, do I spent a week more or less indoors to work out his nap schedule. Once I understood when he needed to nap it transformed the night time sleep.

I bored my little one to sleep..!! said good night etc.. kissed their head and tucked them in, and sat down in the same room... let them cry and moan till they realised that I wasn't going to get them back out...avoided eye contact and speaking oh and total blackout (no nightlight) I needed to take a kindle and settle in for the first few times (and do this also for night wakes... LO was sleeping through after a long and very tiring week. Now takes 10 -15 mins to get them to sleep.

I could have also written this! Dd is 9 months

Thank you for all the replies - for those saying they could have written this post - thank you so much!! It makes me feel less isolated and not alone !!

I keep trying to remind myself that this won't last forever and it's all just a phase but it's so hard when you're in the thick of it and you literally just want a break in the evenings!

I found from about 8-10 months her sleep was really hard. Similar issues - lots of climbing on the bars and refusal to settle. All I can say is hang in there, it all changed for us. Suddenly at 10 months ish she stopped wanting two naps a day and then towards a year old she became so knackered by bedtime she went down v easy. She’s 13 months now and is consistently sleeping 6.15pm(!!) to 5.30ish. I so don’t mind getting up early with her if I get my evenings back!!

Things I tried when it was bad was sitting in same room but reading my own book, kind of ignoring her and eventually she’s come down from bars herself and sleep, putting toys in her cot to amuse her, just getting her up and playing if really not going well, getting partner to do his share of the evenings with her, settle her to sleep in our bed then move into cot once asleep.

Good luck. It’s a tough phase

You’ve got 2 options really. You can wait it out and see how it goes, and her sleep may settle on its own. Unfortunately, it’s hard to know when - it could be days, weeks or months. It just depends on how you are managing. To make it a little easier on yourself you could try cosleeping.

If you want to try and do something about her sleep, I would suggest the following:

• look at her daytime / nap schedule to make sure she isn’t over or undertired at bedtime. You can easily google age appropriate nap guides.
• Whatever you do, don’t bring her downstairs once she has gone to bed. She needs to understand that bedtime is bedtime. Once she has had her bath, in PJs etc, that’s it, she is in her cot for the night. (Obviously this means you sitting up there)
• try and break the association with feeding and sleeping - this is likely your biggest issue. All babies rouse every 90 mins or so overnight, and if they aren’t asleep how they fell asleep, often this will unsettle them and that is when they wake. Stopping feeding to sleep will likely involve some crying, but it doesn’t mean you need to leave her. You can still give her comfort from next to the cot.
• sleep training as a last option. This doesn’t have to mean ‘cry it out’ and there are gentle (ish) ways of doing it. There is a mumsnet thread called ‘what worked for us’ which you can google, it may be helpful.

Massive sleep regression at 8-10 months.

As for your in-laws: I find everyone reminisces about the good sleep years and forgets the truth. My aunt was convinced her boys were good sleepers and roundly scolded me for my daughter's sleep (when she was a newborn!!), then sent me an apologetic letter admitting that she'd forgotten driving around for hours to get her children to nap. My dad fondly recalls "one or two sleepless nights" until I remind him of my night terrors phase and being in night nappies til I was 5. You just forget/rose tint the past, I think. Or the intense sleep deprivation prevents you forming long-term memories

Solidarity with the lack of evenings. I am frantically trying to tweak naps to get an evening back myself. Although DD wakes frequently so my evenings involve a lot of scurrying back into the dark bedroom to resettle (feed back to sleep, though occasionally her dad cuddling her works).

Can anyone help please.

Since day 1 my 4 month old DD will not sleep alone. She also won’t sit in her chair unless she is being rocked, she wants to be held constantly. When sleeping she has to be on me or co sleeping. We have a co sleeper crib (next to me crib) and she won’t even settle in that (even with white noise, Ewan the sheep on, a rocker on the cot, music playing and have even tried a hot water bottle)

It’s not even that I just want my evenings back, it’s that even when co-sleeping, she will sleep from about 11:00pm until 2:30am no problem but once she wakes for a feed she then wakes about every 20/30 minutes until I give up about 6:30am and come down stairs and stick the tv on.

Then about 7:30am she wants to go back to sleep but again only catnaps, so by the time
I’ve rocked her and she’s in a deep sleep and I fall asleep she wakes again.

Any help welcomed - please, I am a zombie!!

Thank you all for your suggestions it is much appreciated.
Just to give an update... .as if by magic , within the last week or so since posting this, my daughter has gone from the the baby described above to a baby who goes down at 9pm and then sleeps through the night until 9 or 10am!!!!!!!! she has also been resettling herself so much more in the last week and a bit and has been happy for me to leave the room and she doesn't scream blue murder , she just watches her light show and gets into a comfy position to close her eyes !!! I am shocked and can not believe what is happening! She has also miraculously been napping for 1-2 hours in her cot without me having to go out in the pram or car - which so rarely if never happened before! She turns 10months in a couple of weeks and my conclusion is that this was just a phase for her around 9months (as I hear so often but often chose not to believe or listen!)

I'm sure this will all change again but in the meantime I am getting so much sleep and quality time with my husband I am beyond happy !!

I think I should just chill out and go with the flow (I am saying this when not sleep deprived - I am sure my thought process wouldn't be the same if that changes !!!)

@Terianne1991 - my daughter was terrible at sleeping around 4 months . The 4th month sleep regression is meant to be a bad one so I hear. If it is any reassurance I lost so much sleep in month 4 and just as I thought I got my daughter off to sleep, she would wake again at least twice within the hour - every hour - ALL night !!!! It was awful and I thought it would never end . I hated everything about my life during that time and couldn't think it see straight at all. I argued so much with my husband because I was just so tired . As soon as she hit 5 months it settled again - she never slept through the night but at least she would go for a couple or few hours before waking again for a feed, so I was getting a few hours at a time .

My original post , I think now, was the 9 month regression as my daughter is brilliant now !! I literally don't know what to think other than it must be just a load of developmental phases. People keep on telling me that and in my sleep deprived state I get so infuriated by it !! But literally just as I think I can't go on any longer, suddenly things change and get better !!!!

This motherhood thing is a crazy journey !! And bloody hard work!

mamatoizzywizzy I’m glad to hear your DD has finally settled and you are getting some rest.
It’s just so frustrating with my DD as she is so tired but she fights it and is only cat napping especially in the day which in turn means I can’t sleep when she does because by the time I’ve rocked her to sleep and settled myself she wakes up. I’m literally trying everything an anything.
It’s just frustrating as three of my friends had babies around the same time and they all sleep fine and mostly through the night and may wake once, I just don’t know what I’m doing wrong.
Also, like you me and my partner have argued a few times just because we’re both so tired, which I obviously want to stop. I hope I don’t have to wait until she’s 9 months to settle haha I’m already a zombie.

@mamatoizzywizzy sorry it didn’t tag you above haha.

What I did with my son was sit next to him in a chair and read a book, I just kept laying him down but didn't even speak to him. The following week I sat on a chair in the middle of the room. Read, kept laying him down no talking.
The 3rd week I sat in the chair by the door and read. By this time no crying just was getting up looking so kept laying him down. The 4th week just left the chair there and kept popping in if standing up just lay down. Sat in chair for 1 min then left. I the end I just put the chair there and checked him when I wanted to. He seemed to think because the chair was there I was going to come back and sit on it. X