9 month old wakes every 2-3 hours

[OrionNebula]

Hi baby is 9 months next week. She still wakes every 2-3 hours at night, sometimes a slightly longer stretch at the start of the night. Currently breastfeeding is the only way I can get her back to sleep. I don't think it is a settling issue as she goes into the cot awake at the start of the night and for naps and settles herself (with soother) so I know she can do it. But in the night bf seems to be the only thing that works.

She usually takes 2 decent naps a day but the lengths and timings are very variable. I'd struggle to do a strict routine as I have an older child who has activities and can't be tied to the house at certain times.

Is this something sleep training might help with? Or is it likely to just be developmental and I need to ride it out? I've been rolling with it for the time being and catching up on sleep in the morning when she naps but worried about how I am going to manage when I go back to work at the end of September.

Any advice welcome.

My DS could only stay asleep for long periods once we took away his dummy and he could self settle. (I.e. no dummy or feeding to sleep). The principle being that when they stir in the night they can’t fall back to sleep by themselves again if they’re used to a dummy or feed.

We did pick up / put down. So put down awake (no dummy). If he got upset we would pick him up, cuddle etc and then put him down again. It only took 2 nights of a bit of crying (a few minutes at a time between picking him up) and since then he’s gone to sleep by himself within minutes and slept really well. It was literally magical.

He’s 3 now and I’m still so glad we did it and don’t spend our evenings trying to put a toddler to sleep. Sleep training gets harder as they get older so my advice would be do it now.

Ok thank you. I will try settling her without the soother.

When you did pick-up put-down did you wait specified periods to go to him or just kind of trial and error?

Ds was 9 months and night waking for feeds. About 6 times a night. Sent dh in to settle him instead of me and took 3 nights until he slept through... Dh offered water the first night and ds had a bit. A sip the second night and just a bit of shhh the third... Transformed from frankly a twisty little buggar to a cherub!!

We did 2 minute intervals if he was upset. If he was awake but happy we just left him to it.

Ok thank you. Will give that a go tonight!

Did you take it away for naps as well or just night time?

We had this issue and it turned out that they had had a growth spurt and were hungry; you say you don't have a strict routine but is your baby eating three meals a day and eating enough during those meals?

She has 3 meals a day, doing mainly blw but with some pouches as well. She seems to eat pretty well although obviously with blw not everything goes in.

Naps as well but they are harder so it’s best to start at bed time.

@Babychewtoy thanks!