6 month old waking 30 mins after bedtime

[sunnyfields25]

Hi

DD is 6 months old and for the past couple of weeks has been waking after 30 mins of sleep at bedtime. She's not upset, just completely wide awake and ready for playtime! DH normally ends up rocking her back to sleep as she's too wired to drop off herself, but that's not sustainable as she's too heavy for me to do it.

I've tried increasing and shortening awake time before bed thinking it could be under or overtiredness, but no change.

I normally feed her to sleep... Not really intentionally, but I feed her in the dimly lit room before bed and she tends to fall asleep. It never used to be a problem but I'm wondering now if that could be causing it, given she's somewhere different when she stirs?

When DS was this age I'm pretty sure I had a proper little routine of stories, singing twinkle twinkle etc and then he would settle himself to sleep. But I so far haven't got round to that with DD and am now thinking I've messed up.

Has anyone else had experience of this waking after 30 mins, and any ideas what causes it?

Thanks

This is usually caused by over tiredness. So I'd look at your daytime sleep routine.

Also, after feeding baby at sleep time, try rousing slightly while winding and then put baby down.

Was years ago but iirc used to do keep lights off gentle shushing etc not taking out of cot.

Thanks for the replies. I'd wondered about DD being overtired as you mentioned. She often has a decent amount of sleep during the day (sometimes 3-3.5 hours spread over 3 naps). But maybe the awake window before bed is too long? It never feels like I have much control over it because it's dictated by the end of the last nap, but I'll try playing about with it again. DD has a cold at the moment though so sleep in general has gone out the window!

PS good idea about waking DD slightly before putting her down. Given that she's fallen asleep feeding I normally then hold her until she's in a deep sleep, but I need to try not doing that and see what happens.

We had this with DC for the longest time at that age. Every night after 30-45 mins, they would wake up screaming but then sit there absolutely fine, just not sleeping.

If I’m honest, they just grew out of it. We got longer and longer stretches, and weeks went by before we realised that we getting to watch 2 episodes of a box set before having to go up

Now we get at least a 3-4 hour stretch before a wake up, last night was 6 hours which I wouldn’t have thought was possible a couple of months ago.

DC is now 10 months but I would say from maybe 8 months we have had the longer stretches.

Thanks, it's good to know that your DC grew out of it after a while. I'd been looking forward to the 6 month mark, thinking I'd get a bit more freedom in an evening. That's how I remembered it with DS (possibly through rose-tinted glasses). But at the moment DH and I can barely have a conversation, never mind watch anything, as one of us is always darting upstairs to resettle DD.

We've got trapped in this horrible cycle where morning wake up is late as DD is catching up on sleep, so all naps are late, so third nap isn't happening until 5 or later, which pushes bedtime really late. DD sleeps badly all evening, and then it starts again the next day. So I'm thinking of trying to drop the third nap and see how we get on with just two naps. Problem is on school-run days I'll need to stop the second nap by 2.30/2.45 and that's an awful long gap until bedtime then.

Sorry, what a ramble!

My Dd did that, awake after 30 to 45 mins every night for ages. I never really solved, tried more naps, fewer naps etc etc. In the end I used to just lie next to her and leave her on the boob and read my book until that first wake. She'd have a little suck and straight back to sleep for a good few hours. 🤷

Forgot to add, she did grow out of it. One day just stopped.

@sunnyfields25 What is baby's current routine in the daytime
Is she sleeping through the night after the unsettled evening?

@Mattieandmummy I actually tried holding DD until we got past the 30 min point the other night, and when she stirred she then nodded straight back because I was holding her. Then put her in cot and it actually worked. Not sure I can be doing that every night, but on that occasion I couldn't face an evening of resettling.

Sounds like one of those things she might just grow out of...

@FATEdestiny the routine is a bit all over the place at the moment due to trips out at the weekend etc. But on a good day without disruptions, since I tried stopping the third nap, DD has been doing roughly:

7.00 - Wake
9.30 - 11.00 - Nap
1.45 - 3.15 - Nap
6.30/6.45 - Bed

It's a long hard slog getting to bedtime and I realise that awake time is probably too long, but it's also too late to fit in a third nap. On the days when I have to wake DD at 2.45 for the school run it's going to be even tougher as she'll be awake approx 4 hours until bedtime and won't be able to nap for as long as she might want

However, once we've got through the unsettled evening and the dream feed at 11ish (which is never very dreamy as she tends to wake up if I don't get to her in time), she does then sleep through until morning.

We actually moved DD to a bigger cot in her own room a few nights ago and, touch wood, she's been a bit more settled in the evenings. Don't want to jinx it though!

I maybe spoke too soon as DD has just woken early from her first nap so who knows how today will pan out!

Yup we had this, would wake up screaming after 45 minutes which I think is a sleep cycle. For us it happened if she skipped a nap.

Add it to the list 😉.

When you feed someone, they get a burst of energy from the food . And usually about thirty minutes afterwards, as the food has started to digest.
So I think you're right, feeding to sleep is doing it.
The composition of breastmilk changes as baby gets older: it has less fat, which makes them less sleepy. You body knows that your baby is ready for solid food so milk starts to change. Genius.