4 month old - need help

[ProjectBaby87]

My 4 month old has started to wake every 2 hours at night and has become very difficult to settle for night sleep and naps. I've tried everything, read a lot of books. The only way I can get her to sleep is to feed her to sleep and work towards her wake cycles i.e 90 mins. I'm finding this exhausting trying to get her down so often. If I get her down she will only sleep for 30 mins. I tried the easy method and lots of other things but nothing is working. Bf with one bottle of formula at night.

I suppose I'm posting for advice from pure exhaustion.

TIA

Google or search for threads on the 4 month sleep regression. There'll be loads of info. Good luck :)

I've already done that 😞

It's the dreaded 4 month sleep regression. The only good thing to say about it is that it will pass! Can you arrange to catch up with some sleep during the day?

Completely normal for her age- exhausting I know! I drove myself insane trying to follow routines and schedules and my DS was having none of it. The only thing that helped was time…his naps gradually got longer and his night wakings VERY gradually got less. You could persevere with schedules but be reassured you aren’t doing anything wrong and neither is your baby - it is just a huge development point for them and it will definitely be a phase.

Thanks both x

The only way I can get her to sleep is to feed her to sleep

A dummy might be worth introducing. It's more conducive to independent sleep while still allowing baby to comfort suck to sleep.

I've tried giving her a dummy so many times. She keeps spitting it out tho 🙄

Sounds totally normal. This is just my opinion / experience but I found it a whole lot less stressful and upsetting when I stopped worrying about schedules and when they should be sleeping which frankly DD never conformed to. I just let her sleep when she was tired, fed to sleep alllllll night long and during the day, co-slept, never sleep trained - basically did all the things you 'should' never do because I needed to survive and everyone sleeps through the night now.

Totally agree with the previous poster, it's normal - women have been feeding to their babies to sleep for thousands of years and the human race is still here 😉

OP I know it's totally exhausting. My DS never ever slept more than 2 hours in a stretch until he was 15 months. He never had a sleep regression because he was already in it your body will adjust and you will gradually feel less tired. I understand right now you feel like you can't cope- unfortunately that's normal try co sleeping

Just echoing PP that is sounds like 4 month sleep regression. It's killer but does eventually pass (they last around 6 weeks if I remember rightly). Best thing I can advise is to keep with your normal bed time routine and just do whatever you can to get some sleep (easier said than done, I know) until its over - and will be over soon enough!

Thanks so much for these messages. Has made me feel a lot t better xx