I have not slept longer than 4 hours at a time in 15 MONTHS...please help me!

[SleeplessMamazzz]

So my baby has always been a pretty poor sleeper. At around 6 months I felt like I was onto something...put her to bed sleepy, she would fall asleep alone, and I would dream-feed her twice. Then, she started to wake up on her own for the dreamfeeds at those times since she had been programmed. So I would feed her when she woke up. Then we traveled for several weeks and she was back to waking 3-4 times a night. My husband and I travel a TON and I fully blame that for the fact that now, at 15 months my baby still wakes up 2-10 times a night and will only fall asleep by breastfeeding. We are currently stuck at my parents house for 3 months so I don't like to do sleep training away from home, but we haven't been in our home for 4 months already so it will be foreign to her when we come back regardless...So a week ago we tried the cry-it-out method. I was totally prepared to let her cry, and I sat outside her door the whole time and checked in in intervals like prescribed. She is a baby that vomits very easily when upset, she coughs when she cries and it makes her throw up everything in her tummy. This happens when she falls and gets hurt, scared, anything. Also when I refuse to breastfeed her for the upteenth time in the night. So after about 30 minutes of screaming I thought I was past the vomit danger zone, she was wearing herself out, although panicked, totally drenched in sweat and desperate. Then she projectile vomited all over everything. I cleaned her up, bathed her, and we had to hose down her travel bed, so she slept with me in bed for the night. I am at a total loss. I know she will vomit again if we try, plus every since then when we wakes in the night she screams rather than just babbling until I came in like before. I have not slept more than 4 hours at a time since she was born and my mental health is in the dirt. PLEASE HELP ME. I am afraid by now she knows how to manipulate us a bit to get what she wants, but vomiting is really the trump card....Thanks so much in advance for your help.

@CoconutPudding Thanks for your message. It sounds like we are in very similar situations. I know it will all pass, but it's hard especially when we try to plan on growing our family one day...it's hard to imagine another 2 years of no sleep in the beginning, especially when caring for two children, but I suppose every baby is different. Hope your little one starts to sleep better soon as well!

@AnneLovesGilbert Also as far as me "letting it get too far", I think we all can stop to recognize how contradicting sleep training advice is. On the one side (the one I hear the most), I gave up too easily, I need to be consistent and do it again the next night, others are so brazen to say (online, not people I know) that in this case you should clean the baby up with no speaking or cuddles and leave again, or they will learn that vomiting=reward. Others even say to let your child SLEEP IN THEIR VOMIT so that they learn. I would never in a million years do that, it broke my heart to see her distressed, that is why we will not pursue that method. Anyways, while one side says you can't give up on cry-it-out, others say you've gone too far to let your baby be so upset. There is literally no method that everyone will approve of. The idea is we all have to be as informed as possible, know our baby so we can know which method could best fit, and to react in the best way for the well-being of the baby. My baby was not harmed, she runs warm in general and sweats quite a bit, and she throws up after even light crying or coughing, but she was distressed to not have the immediate pick-up-and-fed response that she has grown accustomed to. My point was not that my baby suffered because I don't believe she did, my point was that she vomits very easily and cry-it-out is therefore not a suitable method for us, as we have learned. I don't want to make the situation sound worse than it was or for people to get the wrong idea. I just want us all to get some sleep.

This post brought back memories of DD1, she rarely slept longer than a few hours and I would say that if you cut me in half I'd have the words tired running though me. At 9 months I gave her her first ff and she slept the whole night. Never looked back after that. She 12 now, I can't get her out of bed!

First step is to stop breastfeeding her to sleep.

I think the pick up put down method is the one to go for but it will take time and you do not leave your baby to cry.

I would by hook or crook Male your sleeping space bigger... could you move out the bed frame and get a single mattress to put next to the double so you have more space, or you sleep in DDs room and your DH co sleep with DD in the double?