Sleep train - what else can I do?

[Pumpkinbumkin200]

10 month old. Breastfeeds to sleep/rocks to sleep if awake. Lately whenever she wakes in the night just screams if I attempt to put her back in the cot. Last night was it took 2.5 hours in the night of me rocking/feeding and trying to transfer her to the cot before she finally stayed asleep.
Can't co sleep due to space and also I never sleep well with her in the bed so wouldn't get anymore sleep anyway.
Is sleep training the only option? I'm not even sure that would work as soemtimes my back aches so much from rocking her that I've had to put her in her cot for 5 mins to lie down and she's just screamed the whole time. I have a toddler too and soemthing has to give now I'm exhausted. Partner helps where he can but baby only wants me at night.

Honestly I have been there and you must feel exhausted. I highly recommend reading "My sleepless baby" by Rowena. It has saved my life. My 5 month old baby would only nap on me and only for 30mins.
After reading the book and implementing "responsive settling" method, she was sleeping through + regular naps after 3 days

Any top tips from it?! I just don't have time to read a book right now 😂

Five people from my NCT class sleep trained. It hasn’t lasted for any of them. Three paid for sleep consultants, who have said it’s very normal that it’s grown out of at each change/leap/illness.

It is massively hard, I sympathise. We co-slept for a while at that age, even though there wasn’t much room in the bed and it did mean I didn’t sleep half as well… I did get more sleep than standing by his bed for hours at night, though. It really is just getting through it… he’s been back in his own cot for a little while now. He’s nearly one.

I wouldn’t go into sleep training with the idea that it’s a bit of trauma but it’ll then mean she sleeps through… it doesn’t seem to be the case for most babies, in my experience!

10 months was a tough age for my DD, it was peak separation anxiety for her.
Sleep training isn't my thing, I just persevered through it all and by 12 months she was sleeping through 8/9pm till 7:30/8:30am).
We have the odd night where she wakes now - illness, teething etc. but she would never have responded to sleep training and would have just screamed and screamed and then been impossible to settle.
It is very hard when you're in the thick of it but it will pass. I had to find a way to get her to sleep and that was co-sleeping. We actually put her cot sidecar next to the bed to ease her back into independent sleep and it really helped. The first few nights she stayed in with me but gradually she'd roll off into her own bed and is now happy being in her bed

It's so hard isn't it? I have a 13 month old and a 3 year old. The 13 month old is the most awful sleeper. Has been since day one. I decided around 10 months that I couldn't cope any more with the lack of sleep, as it was asking me depressed and not only affecting my work but also how good a parent I was being to my 3 year old.
Somebody recommended calm and bright sleep consultants. I paid the £50 and within 2 days they were sleeping 10/11 hours a night. No rocking to sleep, no singing and holding their hand. I couldn't believe it. Honestly I was like a different person.

Unfortunately they have been ill recently so their sleep has become terrible again. I am going to start the calm and bright training again though and hope it works just as well this time around, especially as I am trying to stop breast feeding now too.

Good luck xx

@Lauryna12 just jumping on to ask what the method was? Same with you @Santa24689claus - what are these magical techniques?!

@Pumpkinbumkin200 i really sympathise! My eldest was a nightmare sleeper. I night weaned and that helped massively. I know I need to do the same with my 8mo who is waking for really tiny feeds. I’m just building up the energy to deal with the really rough nights that I have to deal with while I do it! Just like you, they only want me at night (toddler accepts him sometimes now she’s older). And even if DH goes to them if they just scream for me it’s not like I can go back to sleep hearing my child screaming!

In the bleaker moments I find it helpful to remind myself that I will never have an eight month old again, and that ultimately if my eldest slept eventually my baby will as well. Sending strength and caffeine!

There are various methods of sleep training and it really does depend on babies age. In the book I've mentioned above responsive settling is similar to controlled crying but instead of attending child in set intervals you respond to them when you feel you need to (listening to the intensity of crying). The older the baby is the more they are going to protest. The first 5 minutes will be very intense and you can attend to the child to show you are there and calm them down by stroking her head etc but without picking them out of the cot. It does mean that you might need to keep entering and leaving the room for like 2 hours but eventually she will fall asleep. Worked for me in 4 nights and shes been sleeping 13 hours ever since (shes 3 now). I did the same with naps and always followed "eat play sleep" routine. Its also important to unsure she isn't overtired before you put her down (always put her down awake). If you rock baby to sleep, they won't learn to self soothe and fall back to sleep when they wake up because they are no longer being rocked.
I know I might get judged for letting baby cry but how is it better to let baby be exhausted, unhappy and cry every day instead. My baby had a heart operation when she was 9 weeks old so letting her cry for few days was hard however when she's learnt to sleep independently not only the whole family were happier but she started to put more weight on as she was no longer too exhausted to feed.

I also used Calm & Bright’s sleep training method after 6 months of pure hell- my baby was waking up every 45 minutes, sometimes more, the entire night. It would also take about an hour and a half and endless screaming to try and get them to sleep in the cot for naps, only for them to nap for half an hour max.

The training worked after the very first attempt and my baby has slept 11-12 hours through the night ever since, and naps in the cot for 90 minutes twice a day without fuss.

I was SO against any form of sleep training but I was honestly on the edge of a nervous breakdown. My biggest fear was that my baby would still wake but just wouldn’t cry out for me anymore, but he has an Owlet sock which records wake ups and it’s gone from literally 30+ a night to none. You can see him sleeping totally soundly too on the monitor whereas he was constantly tossing & turning previously.

It is the single best parenting decision I have made.

@AnnaTortoiseshell I suppose you would call it controlled crying maybe. It's about responding to different intensities of crying.

I was against any kind of crying, but the information they have, helped me see that it was for the best for me and him (it won't be for everybody though)

It was done in away that you can work out when his next nap would be due, and gives clear signs to look for and talks you through step by step.

@Santa24689claus
thanks for your reply. I’ll have a look at it :)