8 Month Old - Separation Anxiety - Sleep

[BCFirstTimeMum]

My DD (2nd child) is 8 1/2 months old and I’m struggling with her sleep - mainly nighttime.
I think it could be separation anxiety but wondering if anyone else has experienced the same and what you did to help it.

From about 6 1/2 months, she would usually go to sleep in her cot at bedtime and self settle, wake for a feed and then go back down (with a little shushing and patting) until morning. Not always but mostly.

She has dropped night feeds now (about two weeks ago) and we had a recent period of split nights but thankfully that seems to have stopped!

The main thing I’m struggling with at the moment is that she will not go to sleep without assistance now and when waking in the night (anytime between 12 and 3), she will not go back in her cot so I’ve resorted to co-sleeping for the rest of the night. Once she gets in bed with me she settles quickly and sleeps until morning.
She won’t self settle at bedtime now either and I have to be holding her hand, stroking her face, shushing until she is asleep. If I leave the room she screams and screams. Sometimes she’ll wake after 30 mins - 1 hour and scream until I go back in to settle her again. Whereas before she would roll over and go back to sleep if she did that.

It’s like she’s lost the ability to self settle!

Any tips appreciated!

8 months is a very typical time for separation anxiety. She’s also likely going through an awful lot of physiological and mental developments that are keeping her brain very, very busy and more difficult to settle.

I don’t think it’s a bad idea to be there at bedtimes to soothe them to sleep. I have always done this with my twins, but I work full time so welcomed the extra time with them. They also sleep all night through, so it’s not such a big deal. However, when they were very small and woke in the night, DH and I did still go in and hold their hands til they fell asleep again. I never gave in to co-sleeping – firstly because it’s not very feasible with twins but also because I wanted them to learn that their bed is their bed and that is where they sleep.

I do understand that having to soothe them off to sleep really cuts into your evening time, and so sometimes I would pop out of the room for 1-2 minutes at the time but always come back in, then pop out again. That method can give children the reassurance that you are right there and will come back. It often makes them more relaxed to just drop off to sleep without the fuss to keep you in the room.

I think 8 months is too young for this method (in terms of her understanding), but I would definitely start making it clear to her that she stays in her bed no matter what.