(blatant use of my name in thread title to elicit responses from regulars...): HELP pretty please Tutter is at the end of her tether. i know there's a magic answer out there just waiting to be discovered [desperate]

[Tutter]

ds2

5.5mo

bfed plus formula at bedtime, weaned a bit early a couple of weeks ago - now has a couple of smallish meals each day

have tried tummy, back and side to sleep

have tried co-sleeping and in his own room

is usually swaddled, on his back, with dummy

he might be teething, but no teeth have yet appeared. he drools and has his fingers in his mouth, but babies do that don't they, so who the chuff knows

gp has checked him over - all seems to be fine

has been "cranial-osteopathed"

SO WHY DOES HE WAKE ALL THE FECKING TIME???

cat naps of 30 mins in the day

wakes 5-10 times in the night. last night worst ever - didn't make an hour at a go once

the bottle of medised looms temptingly, but i have to resist - ha had it 10 nights in a row until recently - to start with due to a cold, then because i couldn't bear not to give it

am bloody shattered

well I think you're misguided rocking a baby to sleep .. dosy and drop IMO

He needs to learn how to settle himself off to sleep; if you settle him and put him down asleep he'll most likely wake wondering where you are.

Kind of like you waking up only to find somewone has whipped all your pillows and covers off.

I agree with what Twig has suggested; and would only add that CC would most likely sort this out within a week- he's at an ok age for this IMO.

well tutter you know the answer then - stop holding/rocking him to sleep!

yes twig, i did loads of research into swaddling for older babies as several people said it's Not Great but had no idea why

no evidence i can find to suggest any real problems

but agree it has to stop some time

his future girlfriends won't thank me if he's swadled in 20yrs time

maybe tonight i try Controlled Flapping (i.e. ditch the swadlled, go for grobag) and Dummy Removal all at once

and try not to respond immediately. you're right - ds1 seems to sleep through it, certainly earlier int he night. at 4 or 5am he'll wake but not in the evening

PU/PD should be really quite quick as he is still quite young and much kinder than cc

ok

i shall try a combination of:

grobag, not swaddle
no dummy
put him down tired but asleep (white noise?)
not responding immediately

can i have medised to help, just for tonight? [pleading]

DSs both swear blind that BabyDragon sleeps through regularly. They're wrong, she never has. They simply very rarely hear her.

Which doesn't help you get DS2 to sleep, nor does it reassure you given that BabyDragon is 22 months old...

what worked for my two was

1. co-sleeping between dh and myself
2. no swaddling - blankets draped over
3. no dummy to lose - both were thumbsuckers

but who knows which particular permutation is right for your ds?

and mine usually fell asleep on the breast - which is when the co-sleeping sort of happened - it wasn't planned as such.

good luck

Sorry if this has been answered but are you feeding him in the night? Is he hungry?

PU/PD does work (have heard miracle stories from friends and it did have limited success with BabyDragon). I also did a lot of back patting til she dropped off and then weaned her off that (patted her to "calm" rather than sleep).

iota, have tried bfing in bed but no good - he has to be winded afterwards, even with a sleepy feed

plus i struggle to get the position right. must be my very pert breasts

No medised!!

Also- and this is probably the most important thing to remember; DO make sure that you time yourself before going in. Even 30 seconds worth of hearing a baby cry can seem like an intolerable amount of time. If you time it you'll realise that short periods of time can seem an age.

Start off by going in every 5 minutes, then gradually increase times by a minute etc....
Find jobs to do during that time to keep yourself distracted.

I wouldn't take his dummy away at same time as swaddling to be honest

you need to steel yourself for 'the next few days to week will be hell' with no / little sleep .. on the premise that after that it will be much much better, and the hope that after 1 night he'll miraculously get it

huddle close tutter .. I'm going to whisper something to you I don't want the others to hear .. when DS was a baby we didn't know controlled crying was a 'bad thing' so DH and I decided in front of DS that tonight was the night we were going to do it (he was about 6 months old) .. that was the first night he slept through with nary a whimper[snigger] ... almost like he heard us and thought well it's not going to be worth it then is it (of course I kept waking up every hour thinking he was dead cos he was so quiet .. but that's pfb neurosis for you)

remind me about pu/pd

do i just pick up, no talking, just ssh-ing

then down when he stops crying

repeat

?

Tutter- you have my upmost sympathies. DS2 was exactly the same, looking back I dont know how I ever got through it. I was literally wandering around in a daze.

I have no answers im afraid, I wont even tell you how long it lasted in case it tips you over the edge. I would use Medised approx every 4/5 days just to get a decent amount of hours in sleep.

really am thinking of you- its bloody horrendous and awful to be so sleep deprived

yep pu/pd as you said you could still shhh if it really helps as you can then wean off shh at a later stage

Is he in a proper cot or moses basket or similar?

Just asking as my DD never slept for more than about an hour at a time in a moses basket, but once in a cot she slept for much longer periods, no idea why, but anything is worth a shot??

I breastfed in bed because I was too knackered to get up. I used to prop myself up on a v shaped pillow (I used to fall sleep feeding them too sometimes)

I can't remember how I winded them in bed or even if I was still winding at 5 months. Well ds1 was sleeping most of the night by 5 months so he went into his own room.

i know its contoversial but ds preffered to sleep on his front. at 5.5 months i'd say you were passed the danger zone anyway.

in a cotbed

and, for some of the night, a cot in our room

and, for other parts of the night, our bed

he was too big for his moses basket at about 3 weeks old

also you could swaddle but keep his arms out so he can find his thumb? ds only stopped being swaddled at 14 months.

medised away. Can I ask, if he isn't sleeping with swaddle then why not just put him in grobag. We didn't get dd2 out of swaddle till 4mths. Kept trying but her hands were constantly in her face, then one night tried it again and she was fine.

Agree about the little sucky animals, dd has a little frog that we just lay on her chest and she shoves it in her mouth. Also the older dc's do sleep through, you would be surprised.

Shush pat? That way you don't pick him up, which enraged mine further - "ooh, Mummy's picked me up, yay!" "Er, wtf? You'd just picked me up, what do you think you're playing at?!!"

I used to get DS1 to sleep when he was about 6mo by lying him down, stroking and patting his chest firmly to begin with, then more softly, then as he drifted off, patting the mattress next to him.

Ooh, also, have you a lullaby light show? We have the VTech ugly bear one from Mothercare - it's about £20. Worked a treat with DS1.

I won't talk about DS2 because you want positive stories... Let's just say it got better when he walked - that pretty much coincided with him sleeping through. Of course he was walking at six months, so you have barely any time to go (I'm lying through my teeth - he was 14mo and slept through fairly reliably from 15mo).

And Dentinox teething gel - DS1 got a bit hooked on that though... He used to have a dab before he went to sleep each night.

Two things are key here - consistency and the daytime nap, imo.

Try mimicking your bedtime routine at naptime (if you don't already)

If he sleeps 30 mins at a time, try putting him down for several 30 min sleeps. Even if you try this all morning and half the afternoon, he might have an extra nap.

You can hold/rock him with his hand up to his mouth, to help him find his fingers.

Always have a muslin near him, put it in the bed with him. Let him rub his face against it or chew it.

Whatever you try, stick to it for 4 nights on the trot. Do not vary the routine, let him get used to it. Keep him in his cot or in your bed all night. Try the Gaviscon again.

If your plan makes no difference after 4 days, alter the bits you think aren't working.

You could try a different cranial osteopath.

Dummies are great for babies who can find them in the dark and put them back in - alas this takes ages to master. You may want to cold turkey the dummy now.

Most of all, much sympathy and buy lots of coffee!