Bedtime nightmare : 10 months - advice pls

[doadeer]

My 10.5 month old has always been a great napper but a terrible night sleeper. He is down to 2/3 night wake ups (I class this as 10pm -6am in my head) which is a huge improvement for us and I can deal with that but it's taking HOURS to get him off each night.

Our routine:
7.30ish wake up
8am Breakfast
9am-10am a baby group with lots of play
10.30 - 11.45 sleep in pram
Lunch
2.30pm short nap (20/30 mins)
4.45pm dinner
6.30pm bath
6.50pm book and give bottle when reading
7pm bed

.... But it often takes 2/3 hours till he is asleep. I sit on the floor with my hand through the bars on his chest in the dark. He constantly tries to get up, laughs, tries to dance. I know he is tired because he has all the ques. He will keep drifting off then waking himself constantly. I just don't get it.

I stopped breastfeeding to sleep months and months ago and intoduced a bottle but this still doesn't work.

I've tried putting him down and leaving but he just stands up headbanging against the cot and then starts getting hysterical. If I sit with him we don't have many tears but it's just hours.

What am I doing wrong?? (Sorry long post)

At 10 months I started sitting by the door where my DD couldn’t see me and doing a gentle shushing noise until she settled; If she could see me then she would try to interact with me and it seemed to make her worse but by being out of sight but knowing I was there and being able to hear me she could settle herself. If she got really upset I’d go and cuddle her and put her straight back down when she stopped. Over time I reduced how long I would do that for and eventually could just put her down to fall asleep. She’s a toddler now and I still do it every so often when she won’t settle.

Is he overtired? At that age mine napped longer in the day, and slept worse at night if they didn't get enough daytime sleep.
They generally had a morning nap around 9am for 45-60 minutes and then 2 hours from 1-3pm.

I just keep mine downstairs until 9pm. I just found it wasn’t worth the stressful evenings and he slept less the earlier we went to bed.

Hmmmm not sure how I can help him sleep longer in the day... He sometimes does 1.5 hours in the morning and 30 mins afternoon so that's two hours.... I'll try my best.

If I don't sit with hand on him he will just stand up constantly... What do I do about this?

What about earlier wake up? Ive just done this with my 11 month old as i was trying to get him to sleep for an hour or so at night.

Our routine is

6.30/7am wake up and bottle
8am brekfast
9am nap
10/10.30am wake up and snack
Some group or play
12pm lunch
Group or play
1.30/2.30 nap
Play
4pm bottle and dinner
5pm bath
Play
7pm bottle book bed
Asleep by 8pm

It does sound as though he might be overtired. It could be worth trying to shorten his morning nap and hope for a longer one early afternoon? Does he go down for naps ok?

Why try to force him to bed at 7 knowing he won't be ready to sleep until 9 earliest? Making hard work for yourself by the sound of it!

I also think it could potentially be overrtiredness but rather than worrying about getting him to nap longer during the day, I would try to get him in bed a bit earlier.

DD (my first) was a dream sleeper most of her baby hood and could be really flexible and still fall asleep if we had kept her up a bit later for whatever reason. With my son however, even now at 2 if he goes to bed too late he takes very long time to settle. Was surprised that 7:30 was too late and bringing his bed time forward really helped. He doesn't get up any earlier so clearly needed the sleep!

Conversely to thinking he doesn't need to be asleep til 9, I do think it would be best to first try even earlier. I think kids who are too tired lose their ability to self soothe, and I read an article by a child neuroscientist once who said that kids who sleep more sleep better, and kids who aren't getting enough sleep, sleep less. If that makes sense? I need to go to sleep myself..

Yes we moved our bedtime to 6.30pm for that reason.

Sorry I didn't mean keep him awake until 9, but maybe allow him a short nap after dinner, then brief awake time followed by bed, book etc to have him settled for the night at 9pm.

Understand more sleep = more sleep. I'm currently having better nights with my (albeit much younger) baby because I've been proactively encouraging him to nap so that's he's not awake during the day for more than 2 hours max in one stretch.

*bath, book, etc

He needs more daytime sleep, my 15 month old is still having more. she is only on one nap now but it's a long one. He's probably overtired. I would aim for a shorter morning nap and a longer afternoon one

I sit on the floor with my hand through the bars on his chest in the dark.

^^

Stop doing this immediately.

Rub his tummy, talk in a low, quiet voice, look in his eyes and smile and roll him onto his side, snuggling him into the bed.

Maybe put him to bed later?

By 10 months my two were both on one solid noon time nap.

Up at 7am, nap for 2 hours after lunch, bed at 7pm.

If I don't sit with hand on him he will just stand up constantly... What do I do about this?

^

Can he climb out of the cot? If not, leave him be. He needs down time too.

All babies are different. My DS was like this, he dropped down to 1 nap at 11 months and would sleep for 2-3 hours in the day and then would stay up until at least 9pm every night, usually was asleep by 10ish but sometimes was up until midnight!

Everyone told me to try getting him back onto 2 naps, bringing bedtime forward, pushing bedtime back. I gave up in the end and he would just chill downstairs with us until 10ish and then I'd take him to bed when I went up!

He dropped all naps at 18 months and now at 20 months sleeps amazingly (6-6.30 until 7-7.30am).

It was a long road to get here with a lot of stressing and worrying about whether he was over/under tired and wondering where I was going wrong! But actually if he napped, he just wasn't tired enough to go to bed early so I just had to push through the late bedtime until he was ready to drop his nap!

It makes me feel abit better as friends with babies the same age who were always amazing sleepers and slept through from 6 weeks have got awful toddler sleepers who are up at 4am whilst I am finally getting some decent sleep after 18 months of hard work, I'm enjoying it while it lasts

I had this and I had to harden my heart and leave her to cry. It was very tough, but as I had a new baby due imminently I really needed to sort this out. It only took one night thankfully. I did all the usual things, Bath bottle story bed and then went downstairs and left her to cry. It was one of the hardest things I'd done and I had to NOT go upstairs immediately she stopped crying because that was one of her little games and she would be wide awake and so happy to see me when I went in. Eventually when the quiet persisted I went up and she had basically plopped over from where she'd been stood at the end of the cot, flat out fast asleep. Very mixed emotions of course. I dreaded the following night but there was no protest at all from her and she settled quietly every night afterwards. It was well worth it, but so hard to do. I waited until a night my DH was away because we had always ended up arguing about it and feeling guilty/sad when she cried and fought sleeping.

I'd be the first to admit this would never have worked with our second one, she was made of sterner stuff, and insisted on sleeping with me and being EBF for her first year, then all of a sudden she would take a bottle and sleep in her cot. Absolute bliss. No way would there have been a 13 month gap if she'd been the PFB

Thank you all. I couldn't write everything in the post but I've tried later naps and later to bed. I often do bedtime at 6.30 as well he just constantly wakes himself up... He pulls himself to stand even in his sleep. I'm not sure how I can get him to sleep longer in the day... He is really tired at 10.30 so I have to let him sleep then.

I've tried going in repeatedly and just laying him down to sleep with shushing and patting etc - this takes about 25 times before he goes to sleep.

I can see his eyes closing and him drifting off then he just jerks himself awake

I don't want to leave him cry as we live in a flat and I'm so worried about the neighbours

I also would like to have him wake earlier but he is exhausted... I'm trying to get him up now and he is a zombie... He can't open his eyes.... 😢

If he just keeps getting up all the time in the cot do you advise:

1. I keep going in and laying him down
2. Stay next to cot and not let him get up
3. Leave him

I feel like I've tried all three 🙄