eyes and matchsticks

[veryendoftether]

My 5 month old boy wakes up every 2 hours throughout the night. Perfect baby during the day, feeds (BF) every three hours, has two decent naps though not rigorously routined, smiley and delightful as all hell. Goes to bed like a good boy as well, bath, song, last feed, cuddles routine etc, almost always goes to bed awake and settles himself in 5 mins or so. Then night falls, monster emerges. Wakes every two hours - at best. Have had half-hearted goes at trying to settle him without feeding but give up after 15 mins as just want it to stop, and feeding almost always works. Have started solids a week ago, not particularly enthusiastic. Can't remember now when it all started to unravel. Certainly at 4-6 weeks things were looking promising with a 4-6 hour stretch at the beginning of the night and three hours between feeds after that. As far as I can tell he's not teething yet, unless he is and the teeth just are taking an age to appear, but is not particularly dribbly, not at all red-cheeked. Not sick, only other problem is mild eczema. Periodically I tie myself in knots trying to figure out why this is happening (crimes in past life?) and what I should do though generally find I cope better in unquestioning survival mode. But just thought someone might come up with a killer suggestion (not literally). please don't tell me to give up chocolate though

Hmmm. bumping for you

Sorry this isn't ging to reassure you but it sounds like you are describing my dd at the same age. She did get gradually better but is now 15 months and has only just stopped having a night feed, but still doesn't sleep through. Not sure if this will make you feel better or worse about it...it's nice to know that other people also have nonsleepers but you'd probably prefer someone to tell you a failsafe cure. sorry!

It does make me feel better, thanks, in that you seem to be still standing! Actually i have a 2-year-old who didn't sleep through till 11 months, but was slightly less terrible at this age than his wee brother. It's obviously the way I breed em.

'The Baby Whisperer solves all your problems' by Tracy Hogg has lots of ideas for teaching babies to settle themselves to sleep, if you think that might be the issue, although if he can do it in the day i don't see why he can't do it at night.

Would he accept a dummy instead of a feed at night?

He doesn't do dummies, doesn't do bottles either. I guess I left it a bit late to introduce them, flattened on the tarmac as i was just letting the baby juggernaut hurtle over me. which i guess it's still doing. yes i must dig out my baby whisperer book, someone else suggested that to me today, spooky. mainly all books do is make me feel inadequate and guilty though. this afternoon he settled himself to sleep for a nap in his cot after 15 mins crying/grizzling (unusual to be in bed, usually do pushchair sleeps, bad habit) so maybe there is new hope. although woke 2 hours after bedtime as usual

Oh my goodness, you could be describing my DS who is also nearly 5 months and has begun waking in the night every 2-3 hours. He is lovely during the day also, naps well, puts himself to sleep and goes down well in the evening then wakes at 9, 10, 1, 4 etc.Am also pulling my hair out. Try not to feed him (BF) sometimes works sometimes settles, sometime I use the boob... its like he's forgotton how to get back to sleep... can hear him waking now i think. Has anyone any ideas?

I remember heading down this road with DS1! The good news is he's now nearly 3 sleeps like an angel, bedtime is 6.30 (his decision, can't keep him up longer), up at 7, he still wakes in the night occasionally but only needs me once in a blue moon, usually if he's poorly.

The not so good news, I had to introduce a really quite rigid sleep routine for him:

Strict bedtime, upstairs at 6, bath, bottle, story (started at 5 months, he loved it), big cuddles until drowsy then into bed

Gradually phased the night feeds out by replacing them with water

Limited his daytime naps, never let him sleep more than an hour, ALWAYS slept in his cot. From 6 months cut his daytime naps to one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Never let him sleep after 3.30 pm.

We were really strict until he was about 7 months (so for about 8 weeks) then started to loosen up a bit (let him sleep in the car if we were out etc). It was really restictive to begin with but we saw the benefits in a couple of weeks and now he sleeps really well, is happy and active in the day, had good concentration and is a very contented little boy.

It worked for us but I appreciate the rigidness wouldn't suit everyone.

A friend of mine had similar issues are took the other route and co-slept with her DD to about 18 months.

Good luck it does get better

Thanks for the advice, don't know about veryendoftether but we actually had a good night last night. He did stir in the evening but we got him off to sleep without feeding and then did dream feed at 11 and he slept through. I have been analysing what may have been different yesterday and I wonder if it was the shorter naps he had (i had to wake him to go out) and he didn't have the power nap he often has at 5 ish. He was tough to cope with at 6- really grumpy but that may have been why he slepy better. What do you think? I agree that I need a few weeks of structured routine and good nap pattern but it's tricky- especially since we fly to the states in 10 days...ahhhh!

Hi Jen

I'd definitely cut the 5pm nap. you'll be surprised how quickly they adjust to not having the daytime naps. A trip to the states will throw things out but if you stick to limiting how long he sleeps during the day you can put a structure in place once you're back.
Forgot to say, dream feeds are a must as well. We did ours from about 5 weeks at 10.30-11 and they definitely helped cutting out the early morning feeds.

Have a good trip

Have you tried offering a bottle of diluted EBM? I did this with my dd who was in a similar pattern of night waking - she was not impressed at all and after two nights decided it wasn't worth waking up for - has slept through every night since then except on the rare occasions when she's poorly.

Would love to try diluted EBM but the DS will not take a bottle! Thanks for the advice re naps will try and give it a go, though had injections today so probably in for a terrible night.

When my lo had his jabs, he slept like a log after both lots - I think it was one of the first times he slept through - so you may be in for a peaceful night, not a terrible one!!!

I have found that babies seem to need a good 20 mins to settle to sleep. He is still young at this point tho and not that bad for the waking up. If he's still doing it at 9 mths or a year I would worry. Some babies just do it.
He should gradually start to cut out the feeds. DD2 has taken ages to cut out all feeds. She will now go all night til at least 5, at 1yo. But only cos I started offering water, not taking her out of the cot, not talking, not making any eye contact.

Basically giving her nothing worth waking up for. Your ds is too young for tactics like that tho IMO.

See what the books say and then do what you feel is the right thing. Trust your instincts, you know him better than anyone.

oh this is my ds too! he is 4 months, exclusively bf, has always wanted to feed a lot at night, he is a big baby and so in the beginning I thought he just needed it, but now I'm wondering if he's just comfort feeding.

he has a good routine during the day, 3 naps of around an hour each, more or less at the same time each day and he feeds well every 2 and a half to 3 hours. He has a strict bedtime routine and always goes down well at 7 pm, then usually sleeps through until 11 or 12, when he has a feed, goes back to sleep well, but from then on he's waking every 2 hours or so, sometimes every hour, wanting to feed. Sometimes he has a lot, sometimes only a little. He usually goes back to sleep well. I'm reluctant to refuse him the feed at least until he's on solids as I don't want to deny it him if he needs it - but then again I feel he's just using the boob for comfort! have tried offering water, he drinks a bit but then continues to howl for the boob and will not be comforted by any other means. So of course I end up giving in! He goes down for naps fine during the day without needing to feed to sleep. am unsure whether to start getting strict - but this would ineveitably involve some crying and he seems too little for that! have tried to settle him with shushing, stroking etc - he just gets more and more upset until he gets the magic boob! what do people think? (oh and I tried dream feeding but didn't work - he woudn't wake up enough to take any and was still awake 2 hours later again)

Just a thought but for those of you with a DP, once you're starting to cut out the night feeds you could try sending them in to settle los in the night so they don't smell the milk...

No advice, but in the same boat with our 7mo ds2. He sleeps in the day, but only if I lie down with him to get him off to sleep, or in car, and then at night wakes every two hours at best, normally every hour or so. He's on three meals of solids a day and milk feeds about 3-4 times during the day, sweet little angel mostly during the day, but turns into a raving monster if I don't feed him on demand at night. Most of the time I'm pretty sure he's doing it to get back to sleep rather than because hungry. DP was able to settle him for a while but now he just wakes up completely and starts hollering if dp attempts to get him back down without a feed. Won't take a bottle. Won't sleep in his cot. It's ghastly and we don't know what to do. Like you veryendoftether we also have a toddler so really appreciate what you're going through: it's hideous, isn't it?

Do you co-sleep? I decided to when he was ill a couple of months ago, which on the one hand made matters worse because I think he now wakes more than he did and he won't sleep in his cot now, but on the other hand it does mean you can feed lying down and get a teeny bit more sleep.

All a bit of a shock to the system as ds1 slept through from 6mo and has been a dream sleeper ever since (ff )

Jen, good luck in US. Jetlagged baby, mmm, let us know how that goes.
Pheebe, I am convinced there is such a link between the daytime routine and the nights and I should have a go at being more organised. Quite hard with toddler as well to ferry about as ds always drops off in car or pushchair, can't really stop him. Must also try water again, mother-in-law suggested that, please don't let that be the thing that actually works!
Rony, dream feeding never works for me either.
Maybe the thing to do is stretch out feeds in the day and hope it has effect on nights? I have had two versions of events from health visitors. a) feed them as much as possible during the day so they get most of their calories in the day and therefore sleep at night or b) stretch out feeds to 3, 4 hours in the day and they will gradually be able to last longer at night too. No idea which is right

My dd at 5months was waking very regularly during the night (had a good day time routine, she settled herself for naps). I went for the path of least resistance at that stage. When she was still waking 3/4 times per night at 7 months despite being on 3 meals and 4/5 bf during the day I decided that she didn't 'need' feeding at night. She had never like the bottle but I decided that if she was hungry enough she would take it. I decided that for the 1st 4 nights I would send DH in to break the association with bf. The first night she woke about 10.30 as usual, screamed if DH offered her a bottle but was quite calm if he didn't and went back to sleep after 1.5 hours, ditto about 4 in the morning. Didn't bother offering her bottle after that. Same sort of pattern on night 2. Night 3 she only woke once. Ditto night 4. Night 5 regressed slightly. Then over the course of the next couple of weeks she seemed to alternate sleeping through and waking just once. After that slept through as consistently as you can hope for. It was hard work for the 1st week but it was worth it in the long run. HTH.

Thanks for all the tips, have to admit am dredding the trip and the jet lag. Generally at the moment he's settling well, only waking twice but always needs feeding to go back down. I think I'd be more comitted to pushing him through if I could convince myself it wasn't hunger or something else. Btw, he cut his first tooth today so that could have been the problem??!!