Ready to cry

[Littleduck83]

Sorry, there’s no question here, I just need to vent, and do something to keep myself from dozing off in the rocking chair.

I came up to bed hours ago, already feeling exhausted, and I haven’t had even a minute of sleep yet. I’m ready to cry.

DS is 15 months and has never been a great sleeper. He’s never slept through and is usually up 3 / 4 times a night, sometimes more. (At one point he was up every hour or more).

He currently has a cot in our room while we wait for building work to be finished so that he can move into a room of his own. He has come into the big bed in the morning sometimes so that I can feed / try and get a bit more time to doze before getting up. Now it appears that he likes the big bed better and doesn’t want to be in the cot. He has taken to standing in the cot, pointing to our bed and shouting / crying until I give in. Tonight I really don’t feel like I can give in, I’m just too tired, it doesn’t feel safe to have him in the bed with me when I feel like I could drop into a really deep sleep. So instead I have spent the last few hours trying to get him to sleep in his cot. He’s having none of it.

He will snooze if I sit in the chair and hold him, but the second I put him in the cot, he screams. I’d be tempted to allow him a few minutes of temper tantrum in the cot, but he will disturb everyone else (DH / DD and the neighbours through our paper-thin walls.

We have been working on a more consistent bedtime routine lately, which seems to work. He goes to sleep at bedtime ok (in his cot), but it’s the millions of night wakings that are driving me nuts. Patting, soothing, shushing all have no impact. Holding hands worked for a couple of days but now he’s not interested.

Sorry for the rambling, my brain has gone to mush. If you’ve got any magic solutions that would be excellent, thank you. All of the sleep-training ideas I have seen seem to focus on bedtime, rather than middle of the night waking.

That sounds tough

My ds is only three months old so I don't have any advice but I am up too

I have no advice to give either but just know you're not alone in this - sending lots of love

Could you get into the cot with him? Settle him in there then quietly get out yourself once he is down again?

It’s a very very hard time for sleep. Know you aren’t doing anything ‘wrong’ and neither is your baby but I know how exhausting it is!

Can you DH take over for a short while? Can you get into bed with your baby but had DH sit up to check on you for half an hour or so then try and transfer baby once he’s really nodded off?

I think at that age we did just for in and co-sleep. For what it’s worth, it doesn’t last forever and our super crappy sleeper did eventually stay in his own bed, in his own room for the night. It was just a slow and gradual process.

I know others will say try some sleep training which of course is a choice. Take deep breaths, maybe pop some headphones in and concentrate on something else for ten minutes?

It WILL pass, by my goodness they know how to test us!

Hey OP
I could have written this. My little girl is 2.5 and never slept though the whole night, EVER. She's always had a good bedtime routine - bath, book etc. And she always goes to sleep okay - granted she is cuddled to sleep. However, it's the million night wakings that's the trouble. I used to fight and fight to get her back to sleep in her own cot / bed and within 10 minutes to an hour she would be awake again. I'll never forget having a conversation with a friend that had two kids, she said to me 'just get her in with you, stop the fight'. Her kids have co slept and are now happy and confident and sleep in their own beds through the night. It doesn't last forever.
Now ... once she wakes in the night she just gets out of bed and walks into out room and climbs in with us. But it means I get some lovely cuddles .., and that all important sleep. I know it won't be forever!

If you are happy to co sleep, can you follow the safe sleep guide (c shape/ no blankets etc), then if you do drop into a deep sleep your all safe ?

With your little one being 15 months he can technically have his own pillow and duvet. However I understand the worry of falling into a deep sleep. You need to get what sleep you can, once you have slept and feel more human, you can re tackle bedtime when your in a better frame of mind. Lack of sleep is absolute torture. Your doing amazing 🤩!

Nightmare! I follow Care It Out sleep consultants, No Milk Like Mamas and Mother Nourish Nurture on Instagram and they all acknowledge what's biologically normal and offer advice for making gentle changes not just on bedtime issues, so might be worth a look - tomorrow/ when you can face it!

Sarah Ockwell Smith is great.

Thanks all. Sorry, got too tired to reply last night. Bracing myself for round 2.

Haa haa @Sairafina I don’t think I’ll fit in the cot! (it’s not a full size one).

DH is out tonight so no spare hands.

Thanks @DP2019 I’m reluctant to move fully to co-sleeping as I don’t sleep particularly well when DS is in the bed, but this does seem to be his preference so he might win at this rate!

Thanks @WTF475878237NC I’ll have a look at those. I did speak to the health visitor today but she basically just said it’s normal for babies to wake in the night.

He’s just dropped off mid-feed so I’m going to attempt to get him in the cot at least long enough to have a cuppa. Wishing you all a restful night xx

I'd just go with what your Ds wants and have him in your bed.

3dc here, ds1&2 coslept till around 2yrs, DS3 is only 6m and I haven't bothered trying to move him out yet - I like my sleep.

Btw at 15m you're very unlikely to be a risk to your ds. He'll be strong enough to push a duvet off his face and he's big enough for you to not squash him by accident even if you're knackered

I have a 16 month old DS, and I do think it is a particularly difficult time for sleep because they are old enough to know what they want and be stubborn about it, but not old enough to reason with. I remember when my older daughter was about 2 1/2 we had a tricky stage with sleep when we took away her dummy, but I was able to say to her I would sit with her and hold her hand while she went to sleep but only if she lay still and quiet. But that stage seems impossibility far off with my DS.

One thing I have done that has definitely helped is when he wakes in the night (unless he is poorly or anything) I always time five minutes before I go in even if he is crying etc. Once I go to him I settle him as normal and don't do proper sleep training or anything, just give him that time to settle. I thought I was giving him time to settle before, but I think you always feel like you have left it longer than you actually have because once I actually timed it the five minutes felt like it went on forever!

I figured five minutes crying wouldn't traumatise him/disturb neighbours/wake DD too much. And I found immediately about 50% of the time he settled himself within the five minutes which really surprised me. Over time he has started waking less and being more likely to resettle himself within the five minutes. His sleep is still far from perfect, but it is much better.

Hope you can find something that makes it that bit better for you!

That’s reassuring thanks @User0ne.

I like that idea thanks @BaffledBerluga, will give that a try on his next wake up. I think I do go to him much too quickly.

Mattress on the floor and sleep with him. My eldest was like this- it's just a phase