My baby has forgotten how to fall asleep

[GLC789]

FTM to an 8 months old girl

First 12 weeks were a write off with sleep for the household, so let's pretend they never happened.

Then magically, she slowly got into a lovely routine of outters on her bottle by 8pm, then one night feed and back to sleep until 8am. Even a cheeky all nighter thrown in from time to time. Life was stunning.

I'm the last 2/3 weeks bed time bottle has been hell on earth. There is no night the same. We rarely get her into her crib before 11pm.

She will either...

Refuse bottle, but cry and reach for bottle, but fml, don't put the bottle in her mouth because she just wants to be fed without actually sucking. Okay hun. This can go on for hours.

Or,

Take some of her bottle, crash out for all of 5 minutes then wake up quite literally tantrum/play/cry/play/cry for bottle but push it away. Again, this can go on for hours.

How it ends... She exhausts herself so much she eventually falls asleep upset in my arms. I too, am usually crying silent tears, even DH is a broken man on the floor from doing his best to help look after us both.

She has been teething in and off since 13 weeks old and actually has 8 teeth, so I know it can't be just teething related.

Naps - usually half hour in the morning some time and a bigger (90 mins or so) between 3/5 ish. Always awake again by half 5 as that's dinner time for us all.

I just want my baby girl to fall asleep for the night nice and happy and feeling safe and loved, not upset and in distress.

How on earth do I go about resolving this? Any advice would be so much appreciated.

Sorry for long post, I didn't want to miss anything out and end up drip feeding.

We had to move dinner to much earlier cos my eight month old was similarly not wanting nighttime feed and it has helped. There is just a huge sleep regression at eight months cos they are developing so much. We're in it at the moment

The second nap is too late in the day imo. Naps must be over by 4pm otherwise bedtime is a nightmare

This. I’d say make nap time consistent if you can. First nap maybe 10-11 and second nap 1-330? My daughter did an hour earlier than the is but she went down at 7. Also how many bottles in the day? She might need less now she’s on solids.

Thanks all for your replies, I'll try to bring her naps forward if I can.

Bottles in the day, it really varies. As do her solids. She never wants her bottle first thing, that's always a fun hour if and and off the bottle.

Then she will want something to eat be it bottle or solids every 3 hours. She will drink anything between 90 and 210 ml per bottle. We have never had feeding consistency since she was born (she was BF first 6m). Her growth it spot in though.

She has started to say da da and her verbal babbling is getting more advanced. Perhaps thays it, she's just going through regression due to this.

As a family we've never been that strict with routines - especially when transitioning to dropping a nap, for example my dc2 has some days with two naps and some days with one nap at the moment. Mealtimes are also a little fluid, especially lunchtime.

But the only absolute "rule" we have is no napping after 4pm! Guaranteed awful bedtime if naps go on after 4pm, this rule applied to both my kids.

Agreed - longest wake window before bed. Should be at least 3 hours - with my 12 mo is now at least 4 hours. My babies sleep isn't great but if naps after 4pm we're screwed 😅

Time to ban any shut eye after 4 it seems!

It'd be nice to be able to take my evening showers without tears running down my face while sat on the shower floor again 😂😂😂

Get her checked for an ear infection, my DS2 was a nightmare for ear infections with no symptoms except it hurt him to swallow and he gutted through the start of the day as he was more rested but he fell apart in the evening when he was tired.

If thats clear, then consider teething and give a dose of calpol 30 mins before the evening feed

If that doesnt work then try some controlled crying to reset back to her previous able to settle herself situation

Update.

Today, I decided to go out for a pram walk to sooth her into her nap earlier than usual. So far she's been napping since 1:30. It's nearly half 2 now!

This is looking promising!!

She woke at half 3!!

Letd hope this helps bedtime tonight! X

That sounds good op, you've just got to keep her awake until bedtime now!

She's currently laughing at her daddy pretending to to fall over so all is well so far!!

She's asleep 👀.

Pray for me!!

Update:

She had two wakes in the night for feeds. But I'm putting the first one down to missing an evening feed due to the schedule change!

Other than that she stayed down until 8am!!

I feel like a new woman already!

I will look into baby sleep tea if we can't iron this out in a week. But, I'm hopeful!