Am I on my own?

[parkrunsandpinot]

15 month old has never slept through the night (breast fed co sleeper)
He has also never ever napped reliably. Every nap time is a battle and hit or miss whether I'm able to put him down or not without him waking and thinking nap time is over and then wanting to sleep before bed.

I envy friends who have to wake their child from a two hour nap it's never happened for us unless he is on me.

I don't want to sleep train and not looking for solutions just feel like we are the only ones in the world. Are we?

I honestly don't understand posts like this. You are wondering why things are the way they are yet you don't want to do anything to change it. I honestly don't mean to be rude or offend you but he is the way he is sleeping-wise because you Co-sleep and you've never done any sleep training. He needs you for comfort, to link sleep cycles and to nap. If you're ok with that then great but you can't expect him to do something else because you've never moved on from that. Infants and children don't normally just magically sleep well randomly (some small number do). For most people to get their child to sleep independently and well work goes into establishing a nap routine and they do some form of sleep training. Do what's best for you but you can't expect your child to do something without giving him the tools to be able to do it. My first DD was horrendous napper and would only nap in sling or pram until we did sleep training (took 2 nights and days) then she was a dream. If you want better naps, you'll need to sleep train IMO. Lots of gentle options out there for you to try

Wow

Thanks for your support!

I personally believe sleep is developmental and don't feel comfortable with most methods of sleep training. We tried Dr Jay Gordon's method recently but my baby has been in and out of hospital with repeated bronchiolitis so it's never been a good time. That's not too say I won't do it again in the future.

I just wondered if I was the only one and was looking for solidarity not a lecture

You're not alone OP. I'd recommend a group on Facebook called The Beyond Sleep Training Project. You will find a lot more like minded parents to yourself and won't have to deal with ridiculous responses like the above

Thanks @sunshine298 just joined - it's so exhausting. I try to follow my gut constantly and sleep training just isn't for me. But does that mean I'm not allowed to find it difficult? Sometimes it feels that way

I'm in the same boat with my 14 month old. We can't sleep train because of health issues and I wouldn't want to besides. You don't have to justify yourself. What a horrible poster. I believe they will get there when they can. Hang on in there, it is hard. I just think about how much he has changed already and how these days will fly by.

I hear you. My boy was the exact same and he is nearly 3 now and can't say we have progressed much at night tbh! I'm the same that I've never been comfortable with sleep training methods so I'm just meeting his needs until he grows out of it. Annoyingly once he started doing long naps he was already 2 and wouldn't then go to bed but at 15 months he would do 30 minutes at 12 and that would be it! Best thing I did was stop comparing and getting wound up about it and now I just do whatever gets us both enough sleep

@parkrunsandpinot it's not for me either and that doesn't mean you can't find it difficult. You should find that group really helpful.

How many naps a day is your LO having? I know you said you're struggling to get him to nap. Perhaps the timing needs tweaking and a set routine might really help.

My LB is 14 months and our routine is now

6am - wake
10:30/11am (depends how busy our morning has been) - go up to his nursery get him in his sleeping bag, turn off lights, put on white noise, sit in the rocking chair and give him a warm milk then once he's asleep I can now put him down within a few minutes with his blanket and his dummy and he stays asleep. He then naps for 1-2 hours
4:45pm - dinner
5:15pm - if the tv is on we turn it off at this point
5:45pm - upstairs for a bath
6:15pm - same routine as above
6:30pm - asleep

I think with babies/toddlers consistency is key! But it takes a long time to build up to this and we have been doing this bedtime routine since he was really small and now it helps with his naps too

Mumsnet is deleting out all the spaces of my comments so that is going to be so difficult to read. Sorry OP 🤦🏻‍♀️

I'm not lecturing you but you say you envy people who have to wake their child up from a 2 hour nap but I think many people who have kids who sleep long and reliably is because they've dedicated time and effort to sleep training and prioritised routine and sleep and worked really hard to get to that point. Some people are "lucky" but most people work hard to prioritise what they want to and if you want to change that then you have to do the changing

Within the first few lines (breast fed co sleeper). There's a clue there !

But have you ever thought meeting his needs is ensuring he has a decent nights sleep. We need to show them how to do it.

Thanks for this thread, OP, and the people who recommended the Facebook group which I've also joined. Also have a 15mo old. She naps great at nursery but not home and is terrible in the night. I haven't sleep trained her because she's tiny and I'm constantly being told she's so little that she might get diagnosed with failure to thrive even though she's healthy, just super small! OP I'm folding out for the day when they're old enough to understand that they can't have milk all night, but if they wait til it's light they can or whatever cue you choose. I get it though. It's exhausting. And people telling you that you haven't tried hard enough is them self congratulating for other reasons. Don't internalise it.

Thanks @sunshine298 ❤️
Our routine is similar. Sometimes he will nap at lunch for two hours other times just 30 mins and won't go back to sleep. Bedtime is normally pretty easy and he sleeps in his own bed til about 10pm. We have a solid routine every day but regardless of how consistent I make it he does what he wants!

It would appear I'm not alone. Thanks for the solidarity everyone xx