9 month old sleep/separation anxiety?

[Ashmum0304]

My 9mo daughter was a pretty good sleeper until last week (sleeping through or waking once for a feed, sometimes an early waker, sometimes ok. Naps twice daily both an hour plus, in cot).
We never mastered true self settling but had got to the point where we cuddled for 5/10 mins then put into cot and if she woke up during the transition she would just have a little roll around then drop off to sleep again.

Now she wakes every night anytime between 9.30/11.30pm crying loudly. Falls asleep within seconds cuddling but will wake and scream as soon as she’s transferred to cot (even if allowed to get to deep relaxed sleep on me and then carefully transferred like a ninja to cot). We do this several times normally over about 90 mins or 2 hours when she’ll eventually stay asleep in cot (presumably exhausted?!).
Naps are a lottery now. Can do hour and a half, can do 10 mins followed by the same scenario as night wakes.
I just attempted to resettle her for a nap without lifting her out of the cot shhing with a hand on her all the time. 20 minutes of screaming later I gave up.
Also screaming often if I put her down/leave the room during the day. Not teething.

My question is do we just ride this out like we have other phases of poor sleep and it will improve again at some point or do we change tack, try and work on self settling by some method or other (wouldn’t rule out paying for a sleep consultant to help with this)?!?
I’m assuming it’s based around some degree of separation anxiety so wondering how much is possible sleep training-wise without making her distressed?
Thanks if you’ve made it this far 😂

She sounds like she's having sleep regression.
Baby's have this at stages. Have a google and read up about it.

My Little one did this around 9 months - he is nearly 2 and we're going through it again.

He's doing exactly the same as your little one

We have this, started slightly older at nearly 10 months. Evenings are getting slightly better now, but separation anxiety is difficult and they just need to grow a bit more before getting through it! You’re doing good.

Something we did do and seems to be working is switching up tea and milk times. Mostly did it to fit in with nursery timetable but it seemed to give better nights - DS has a good appetite and packed away quite a lot of food, but I think digestion might have contributed to waking him. So now:
Tea is around 4.45 (rather than 5.45) and quite light - toast, soup etc. Then milk at 6 (rather than 6.45) and around 7oz, slightly more than before. It seems to cut out the evening wake up and now if he does wake in the night, it’s rarely before midnight.