My baby's lack of sleep is ruining my life

[crispyeggs]

She is just a terrible sleeper and has been since day one. Had severe colic until 16 weeks and has always, ALWAYS needed rocking and feeding to sleep. She has never slept without this. She is six months old.

The last week, this is no longer working and she is screaming bloody murder from bedtime every night, all throughout the night and is sleeping only in 20 min intervals on one of us and is waking the moment we put her down. Have tried pain relief in case it's teething pain, nothing works.

Tried sleep training g but she doesn't tire - will just scream for hours unless held.

I honestly want to die. What do I do?

are you sure she doesn’t have reflux?

She has been a refluxy baby and we give baby gaviscon in the morning at night. She has never been this bad, ever. It's come on very suddenly. Been to GP today and he said she seems absolutely fine.

Any excessive crying during the day? Any other symptoms?
Our DD was like this and was eventually, after many months and many GP visits, diagnosed with a cows milk protein allergy and silent reflux.
I was breastfeeding so had to cut all dairy from my diet. If formula feeding you'd need to get a hydrolysed formula prescribed, if that doesn't help an amino acid formula is the next step.
For silent reflux usually omeprazole is prescribed.

I don't think she has CMPA, she had reflux which was managed pretty well by the gaviscon. I think this is something behavioural/linked to our bedtime routine?

She has gone on total nap strike and naps 2/3 times a day for about 20 mins at a time. She is absolutely exhausted but is incapable of sleep, no matter what we try.

Could she be very overtired? Does she sleep in her own cot? What's your bedtime routine?

This sounds very tough OP. Can you tell us a bit about her daily routine?

Have you weaned her yet? My little one is 5-1/2 months and I've had a rough few weeks with her. My HV suggested weaning and that's really helped her.

Have you spoke with your health visitor? I always found them more helpful than GP's. Is she hungry? Is she weaned? Are you giving her milk still in the night? Sounds really tough for you op.

Weaning has been going well but it's not helped with sleep.

Routine is usually wake between 6/7, but this week uts been 4/5.

Feed on demand but roughly 5 x 7 oz bottles per day, plus a little veg based meal around 4/5pm. Yoghurt and avocado around 8/9.

Naps vary depending on when she wakes up but usually one around 9/10, one around 1/2 ad another around 3/4, no longer than 30 mins at a time.

Active every day, going to groups, laying and doing sensory. Long walks and local drives every day.

Bedtime starts at 6 - stories, hushed voice, low lights, warm bath gebtle songs, lavender massage, cuddle, pj's, white noise, red light, final bottle and bed between 6.30-7.30 depending how long she takes to go down.

Now she goes down and wakes within 20 minutes SCREAMIBG. Currently sat with her on me, asleep but disturbed, squirming, heart pacing, jerking a lot. Dr advised staggering xalpol and nurofen in case teething or ear ache but nothing worked- when she screamed tonight I did something I've never done before and put dancing fruits on and she immediately calmed and smiled, screamed like fuck again when it went off. Something is really wrong here isn't it? I'm absolutely on the edge

Hv lovely but not helpful, just said she must need to be held. Another duty hv basically said I've fucked her up and she needs to be sleep trained.

I can't explain how terrifying she is at night I need someone to actually see it in person. When I take her to appointments she makes me look nuts as she is fairly pleasant

I could have written this post, except my baby is almost one. I have no advice. Just solidarity. It’s shit.

Sending huge sympathies, it’s brutal. My DD’s sleep went to pot when we started weaning and I think it was tummy cramps from digestion/wind. I noticed she was significantly worse if she had solids after 1pm for the first month or so of weaning, and when we were following one of the green veg type weaning plans.

Could you try her solids earlier in the day, and something easier to digest?

Also, if possible, get it on film.

Does she have to nap on you in the day or will she go down for them?

Is her poo the same as it normally is - so frequency and what it's like?

Have you introduced any new food since this started? And is there anything else different at all such as bad skin or rashes or just anything?

Aww sweetheart, I remember this well!!. Keep regular contact with your health visitor. You need to look after yourself too. Hope you have extra support from family/friends to let you have a rest
Sorry can't advise on baby being difficult. Sending 🫂 x

My eldest was like this. Slept in 45 min chunks at best for months. It was only reading on here that I realised it was cmpa and as I was bf I cut out dairy. Suddenly slept in 3 hour chunks. God I felt like a new woman.
Soya is also a common allergy.

When did it start?

Honestly if this persists I think I will end up either taking my own life or putting her up for adoption, I am not joking. I can't live like this. I am shaking, not eating, not sleeping and I just want to end it

I would just sleep holding her, and have the other one watch to make sure she doesn’t slip down. Do it in shifts - she sleeps on you from 8pm-2am, and on DH from 2am-7am (or whatever). It may only take a few days of this to break the ‘overtired, constantly waking, screaming’ cycle as she will be rested and sleep begets sleep. It sounds extreme but then your situation sounds extreme. Worth a go?

Has never gone down for naps in the day, has always napped in pram/sling - just bounces awake the minute you put her down.

Nothing new food wise, I even stopped all solids yesterday to see I'd it helped and it didn't.

The first week we started solids she slept through with only one wake up. Now it's just gone to shit

Will she not just get used to sleeping on us that way?

Could you try co-sleeping? At 8 months I couldn't deal with my sleep starvation anymore so I started co-sleeping and it changed my DDs sleep for better.

Possibly, but you’ll both be getting a 6 hour stretch each which has to be better than now surely? And she’ll be rested too, and it’ll break the cycle of overtiredness. Once you’ve broken that cycle you might find she improves naturally as she will have learned to sleep deeply and regularly.

Did it start after you started weaning? Or added any particular food to the routine? It can be hard to figure out, but it sounds to me like discomfort. Mine really struggled with weaning at first, he had reflux already and a lot of foods seemed to make him very gassy. It only lasted a few weeks though.

Does she nap in the car at all? Car naps on the go saved me (and pram naps in the kitchen to a specific song and rocking rhythm). Is there any chance she'd give in eventually if she continued watching the dancing fruit? Maybe more day sleep will help with night times.

So sorry it's so hard, if it's any consolation my DD was the worst sleeper in most conversions for a LONG time, now she sleeps through consistently at nearly 2.

About four months he went through the standard regression but he’s gotten worse. He used to wake loads but never really cry or scream but now he does. I have never really tried sleep training though so I’m going to try that. I do know how you feel, a couple of times over the weekend I did genuinely think at least if I was dead I could finally rest. The weirdest thing with mine is he is so happy in the day so I can’t think it can be anything underlying health reason (although he gets worse when he has a bad ear). I’m the opposite to not eating though, I eat so much crap because I’m tired and drink so much caffeine, I’m genuinely worried about the impact it’s having on my health both the lack of sleep itself and the choices I make when tired

I was going to suggest co-sleeping too. My baby wasn't a good independent sleeper so we spent most of the first 9 months co-sleeping as I would at least get some rest that way.