Hi, I'm sorry for what is sure to be a long post. I've also only just signed up so apologies if anything is wrong here.
I guess I'll start by saying that my (now 6.5 month) baby girl has always had very short naps straight after coming out of that brand new baby type of sleep. As soon as her life wasn't just sleeping and eating she's only done 30 minute naps (contact or cot - didn't matter), almost on the dot. Despite this, her night sleep was fantastic, usually consisting of 2x 4 hour stretches in her cot.
Then she hit 3.5 months and I guess we got a regression. She started waking every 30 minutes at night, most often crying the moment her eyes opened. We persisted with this until coming up to 5 months, and lo and behold, we started seeing an improvement. She began sleeping for 1 hour stretches at night (naps still remained the same 30 mins). This lasted for about a week, after which she hit an all time low and began waking every 15 minutes at night, nearly always crying.
This 15 minutes lasted until about a week ago. Since then she has been waking in roughly the time it takes to put her in her cot, walk downstairs, and sit down. Still crying upon waking.
That's the problem summed up, so I'll try to give as much info on everything else as I can.
We get up for the morning at 7am (was 7:30 at 5 mo), she usually takes 4 or 5 naps a day but can do three if she takes longer naps. She can stay asleep on well timed car journeys or quite often with a contact nap on dad (only dad though and he's usually at work).
We put her down for naps based on sleepy cues which come after 2 hours pretty consistently and they're very obvious. She does not do well staying up past these and many tears ensue. We've tried putting her down straight after one sleepy cue, we've tried a couple, a lot - no difference.
We get her to sleep by pretty vigorous bobbing up and down and rocking side to side in our arms (the kind that has absolutely ruined our backs), nothing else has ever worked. She almost always cries during the start of this and really seems to know we're trying to get her to sleep - which she seems to hate!
Sleepy but drowsy never works, she just immediately starts crying when put down. She can't seem to settle herself between sleeps either, she fusses for a very short time which I leave her do, then begins to cry.
Bedtime depends on her naps so it differs, but usually falls at about 7:30/8pm. I get her upstairs for a bedtime routine a little over 30 minutes before. I plan for it to be quite short because she cries through it. The moment I start changing her she fusses and everything calming I try to do from there seems to only get her more worked up. I put her in her pajamas, take her to a dimly lit room, feed her, read to her, play lullabies, then bounce her to sleep in my arms. This can get cut short quite often and goes straight to bouncing though due to getting hysterical, but these seem to be the best things I've found for her to do so far (she immediately cries if I massage her and gets too playful in the bath).
She began weaning at 6 months but nothing seemed to change with that either. The last week I've only given milk due to just being completely worn out.
I've tried settling her in her cot but she doesn't get comfort from anything I can do. Shushing, patting, singing, reassuring, or generally just touching or talking doesn't calm her at all. Only taking her out her bed does, unless she realises she's going to be put back in, then she gets hysterical. We know this from trying pick up, put down when she was crying in her bed and I'd take her out, calm her, put her back, and around the third time of trying this she would not stop crying no matter what I did - hold, talk to, even play. She just had to be bounced to sleep through the tears and it was heart breaking.
More info:
Every time she wakes she needs bouncing or feeding back to sleep and she usually falls back asleep immediately but will take a while before she can be transferred without waking.
She's had many doctors visits and no medical reason for not sleeping has been found.
Health visitors and the like are completely at a loss of what to do for her.
It never seems to matter how much or little sleep she gets in a day, or if we get her to bed as soon as she's tired or let her get more tired - the night sleep is always the same.
She is teething but giving Calpol doesn't change the sleep.
The only way I've managed to get any sleep is co-sleeping and leaving my breast out in front of her - she wakes and latches and goes right back to sleep.
She is very happy in the day unless she's having trouble with her teething. She's playful and smiley and her development is all on track.
I will happily let her fuss but won't leave her to cry.
That is everything I can think of. I really just don't know what to do and would so much appreciate any advice. Thank you in advance.