6mo Baby Waking 10x A Night

[UrsulaBeresfordTodd]

Please someone help me. My EBF 6mo has been waking 5-10 times a night for the past 4-5 weeks. HV came over the other day to discuss weaning and I asked for advice on the sleep but she just said it’s normal for baby to want mum. She has gone through a growth spurt recently she said which could have caused the frequent waking. I don’t think it’s normal for a baby of this age to not be able to string 2 hours of sleep together. Last night I was awake 8 times, the longest spell of sleep being 1.5 hours and the shortest 20 mins. Please can you share your practical tips for what on Earth I do to stop this madness, as it is affecting everything and I feel absolutely unhinged with exhaustion.

Just in advance of some possible questions:

1. not FTM, I have a teenage daughter who was formula fed. Memories are faded but I don’t remember ever having sleep issues close to this! (The concept of a sleep regression was never mentioned 15 years ago)
2. when baby wakes up, I rock her for a minute in my arms and she falls asleep really easily, or, if she is more peristent, pop her on the boob and she will feed to sleep within about 5 minutes
3. From about 12 weeks up until this regression (?) at 20 weeks, baby would reliably sleep from about 10pm to 2 or 3am then be awake around 5.30am for another feed, before going back down until about 7.30am
4. day sleep is very unreliable. Baby will only have a long nap if it’s a contact nap, and any small disturbance will wake her. Being out and about leads to tiny little naps as she wakes up as soon as we stop car, or try and stop for a coffee if she’s in the pram or whatever. Once her eyes are open, that’s it - she’s awake for the next 3-4 hours even if she has only slept 10 minutes.
5. she is generally a happy baby if she has 100% of your attention. Whinges the moment you stop giving her full engagement. It has taken me about an hour to write this post by snatching a phew seconds here and there. She is very smiley and giggly and meeting all her milestones.

Really hoping someone can come along and give some practical advice that can help this situation become a bit more manageable as I’m at the end of my tether and don’t know where to turn. Thank you

Is she / her room too hot?

Thanks for your reply! Room is about 20-21° with a short sleeved vest, babygro and a 1tog sleeping bag, so I don’t think so. When temperature is higher than that, I put her in her sleeping bag with a long sleeved vest only. I don’t think she’s too hot or too cold.

That sounds much too hot to me! I think at 21C I'd put my baby in a sleepsuit only, with no vest or sleeping bag. Maybe a light muslin blanket he can kick off.

The main issues causing such frequent waking, ime, are too hot, too cold or too hungry.

Think I agree about maybe one too many layers at bedtime, although hopefully with the weather cooling down it won't be so bad now. However I just wanted to say my 6.5 month old was doing exactly what you've described, although it was more like waking 10-15 times a night with crap daytime naps, then 10 days ago his first tooth popped out and he has slept from 7pm-6.30am every single night since without a single wake up, so I think with mine it was a combination of a sleep regression and teething, do you have bonjela you can pop on at night in case it is that? Sorry you're going through the nightmare phase now, it's so difficult. Hopefully you will come out the other side really soon

Thanks! I’ve been following the infographic that you see on a few of the sleeping bag manufacturer’s websites, that sort of matrix which compares atmospheric temperatures, clothing and togs. I will certainly try her in less tonight. Living in NE Scotland and the weather is pretty changeable so 21° is a warm night for us and she wakes up just as much when it’s cooler! Last couple of nights have been warm for sure.

Hi OP.

This was my daughter at the same age. Waking every 45mins. I'm not necessarily suggesting this for you as it's always a personal choice but in the end I co slept with her. We all got a bit more sleep, and she genuinely seemed happier being with me at night.

It's so hard OP, you have all my sympathy. You will get to sleep again, I promise.

Oh wow, that sounds like absolute hell! Sorry you went through that, but I am of course pleased someone else has ensured this torture! I will buy some bonjela, it certainly can’t do any harm. I so hope that there is a simple explanation for this and that she will suddenly start sleeping again soon! When your baby was waking up so frequently, did you feed him each time or just cuddle? I’m worried I’ve trained her to do this by always feeding her whenever she wakes up, but the HV says babies can’t have habits at this age. Thanks for your reply!

Hello! Thanks for your response and for your words of support! I’m very paranoid about co-sleeping and don’t think I would like to do it until she is maybe another few months older. I know about the Safe Sleep 7 and that co-sleeping is the norm for lots and lots of families, and actually co-slept with my older child at times when she was a baby. I just find the thought too anxiety-inducing now though never say never.

@UrsulaBeresfordTodd haha that's ok I understand the feeling of being inwardly glad that others have experienced it too! He started doing it from around 5 months, thought it would be a few days and ended up being a month! He is formula fed and dropped the night feed a while ago, to be honest I didn't take him out his cot when he woke, I would hold his hands and stroke his head back to sleep. If he'd have been full on crying/screaming I of course would've taken him out to cuddle him but I found he could be consoled with a bit of hand holding etc. does your little one have a dummy? Again, mine would wake up crying because he'd spat it out and that's what a lot of our night trips to his nursery were for, to pop his dummy back in, so we bought one of those clips and attached it to his sleepsuit and now when he wakes up he does it himself! So I think the two things that worked wonders for me were the bonjela, and the dummy clip. Seemed to fix the wakings virtually overnight!

Unfortunately, despite buying about 7 different brands/teat shapes, we can’t get her to take a dummy. She took one for the first week then spat it out, never to take one again. Same with bottles, I have tried and tried, but she’s a bottle refuser. I tried breast milk and formula too with loads of different brands/teats. I’m so jealous of people whose babies take a big bottle before bed then sleep soundly.

I tried a few times last night to settle her without picking her up but the crying escalated pretty quickly. Happy for you that the situation resolved and keeping my fingers crossed it does for me too!

DS did this, and yep cosleeping fixed it. Or at least stopped him waking me up when he woke up, he just latched on and went back to sleep.

@UrsulaBeresfordTodd oh god it's just never easy is it!! I really hope yours turns a corner soon, keeping my fingers crossed for you that you get some much needed sleep imminently!!

We’ve had spurts of this and it was often a tooth coming through - so we now try a dose of ibuprofen or paracetamol and if that solves it then you know they’re in a bit of discomfort and can give the odd dose. We tend to do one before we go to bed to try and get the longest stretch of sleep then

No teeth yet but I’ve read the pain can
last for weeks before any appear. Was up 6 times last night, even with a dose of Calpol. My HV insists babies at this age can’t have “habits” but I can’t see why else she wakes up so often. Certainly can’t self-settle and I don’t know where the begin with that.

How did you manage to get him into his own room after co-sleeping? She is so dependent on me for feeding to sleep and settling etc, I do worry co-sleeping with make that worse long term.

All of mine were like this at times - co-sleeping was the only way to make it work. I had a much easier time with DC2 and DC3 because I wasn't trying to 'fix' their sleep the way I had with DC1. She used to wake like clockwork every 45 mins (the length of one sleep cycle) for months. Co-sleeping, she would be able to transition from one cycle to another without properly waking up, so we all got more sleep.

Hopeful bump as another night of waking properly gets underway… 😔

How did you manage to transition to independent sleeping after co-sleeping, and at what age did that happen? Ironically, I haven’t tried to fix anything at all, but gone with the flow and been 100% responsive. I really thought after DD1 was quite easy, things would just fall into place in time with DD2. You don’t get the same one twice, that’s for sure!

I think she needs to co-sleep with you to feel safe. It's not normal to sleep away from mum.

Hi OP
You may not think this is normal at this stage but it can be unfortunately. 6 months is still very little. Rocking/feeding to sleep probably doesn’t help but it’s very hard not to do when you’re exhausted. Mine were similar and I coslept to survive.

Also it’s not reasonable to compare your first formula fed to a breastfed, the sleep is different.

I would say try not to worry about a perceived future problem and cosleep now to deal with the current issue. Just as you are trying to find ways to tackle this issue now - you can problem solve later if you want to end cosleeping.

Unfortunately my first was like this (6 or 7 wake ups was a good night) and my 2nd is no different.
Both EBF.
If I didn't co sleep I'd get zero sleep.

No answers but solidarity!

Thanks @Lighttodark and @5475878237NC but I’m just too afraid to co-sleep. I don’t get how she did sleep reasonably well for several weeks - she used to only wake 2-3 times a night. I looked up local sleep consultants but worry they’ll just suggest leaving her alone which I absolutely can’t do. I feel there is no end in sight.

This is a nice way of looking at things, and definitely something I should apply to all sorts of situations!