10 month old Sleep - Normal?

[OneKookyPinkShaker]

Hi all,

Looking for advice on my 10 month old frequent wakes as I keep getting told by family it's not normal.

He is breastfed though has a bottle of formula before bed although has significantly dropped the amount of oz's now he is eating more.

He has always been quite a clingy baby and will mostly contact nap or nap in the pushchair on the go.

I don't really want to sleep train or cry it out personally I don't really think he is suited to this with his nature. I pop him in the cot so I can get ready and have done since he was tiny - though the next to me then and he just screams until he is sweaty and sick. That's with talking, singing and toys. I'm also just talking shoving on leggings and top and having a quick wash in the bathroom not full on hair and makeup routine.

He goes in his own cot at the beginning of the night. Either by feeding to sleep or rocked and cuddled. The first wake up can be anything from 9pm till 2am. There seems to be no pattern to this at all? We have the same routine of giving him his tea, bath time, story, bottle then take him up around 6.30. Have tried to have a slightly later bedtime but he seems to naturally want to sleep then.

At the first wake up my husband will go first try to settle him, rocking, shushing. Sometimes teething gel. Most of the time this doesn't work and he will come to me. He then feeds. If I don't he cries and claws at my top until I let him. Cuddling or rocking doesn't work. I then cosleep with him for the rest of the night.

This point though he wakes up so frequently it's every hour most nights and he wants to feed. He will not go back in the cot. It can take two hours to get him back in so I needed to stop for my sanity to get any sleep.

He then wakes up around 5.45 to 6.15 for the day.

My husband has been sleeping in the spare room since December to allow us space to cosleep as he moves around a lot. He will get him at 6 and I go back to bed till 9 before he starts work.

But I just don't know what I'm doing wrong. Friends and family keep telling me he should sleep through by now.

I'm starting to get worried about surviving back at work.

Sorry for the huge post

There will be posters who can give you specific advice about specific bits of your post but I just want to address what your friends and family are saying about him sleeping through by now - it is 100% developmentally normal that he wakes in the night and you should ignore those who say 10 month olds should be sleeping through!

FWIW I leaned into the cosleeping and my DS and I slept on a floor bed. Moved the bed into his own room at 12 months but slept in there after the first wake. Night weaned at 21 months which reduced wakes to 2 per night, he's now 2y 4m and sleeps in a toddler bed in his room, with a mattress on the floor next to it which one of us sleeps in if he's unsettled. Wakes once per night and goes back down very easily, literally just a kiss on the cheek. I personally think being responsive (as you are doing) makes babies feel safe which leads to independence! It's bloody hard but leaning into it made it far more manageable for me

Waking once or twice is normal, plus some disturbed nights because of teething etc. But what you're describing is really bad and not normal from mine and my friends' experience. You have my sympathy as I'd be broken by that.

Sleep training is your only option really. Look into a sleep consultant to help you. I don't think they do anything that you can, but they help keep you consistent.

Sleep training isn't all bad, my baby settled incredibly quickly when left to cry it out. He cried horribly for 25 minutes on the first night but since then has never cried more than 5-10 minutes. He coos and babbles happily mostly.

That being said, 10 months is late to sleep train so it'll be harder. If you go down this route, you need to be consistent.

My baby is very similar at 9 months so maybe this is just a developmental stage I don’t know but I feel your pain!

I thought baby was just hungry on the wake ups so just offering boob whenever my baby woke but I actually think I’ve caused a bad habit now as the wake ups started every 3 hours then in the end we’re all waking every hour and feeding was reduced in the day. So long story short I’ve been trying to pluck up the energy to drop to 1-2 night feeds only. So any other wake up just rocking and soothing consistently in other ways and we’ve significantly reduced the wakings and feedings the past few nights so I’m convinced a huge part of it is habit! it’s so difficult to distinguish actual hunger when the habit is set in stone though my gosh it’s not easy as I’m constantly doubting myself like ‘is she just hungry :(‘
But I just try to reassure myself that the wakings are reducing and the feeding is increasing in the day so surely what I’m doing is working ?

Sending my thoughts to you as it’s a crap place to be so sleep deprived x

Thanks for the message. Pleased I'm not alone.

How did you find getting your LO back to sleep without feeding the first couple of nights?

Difficult, she wasn’t best pleased but I keep persisting every night soothing her rocking shushing and singing. I sometimes still almost give in out of tiredness as it’s so easy to feed to sleep but it is definitely working. We had one night feed last night and she slept 6 hours and 5 hours! We have still had some rough nights waking every 2-3 hours but the habit is definitely decreasing. Teething in the middle of it all and probably sleep regressions won’t help I imagine.
If you know they have fed well enough in the day just try your best to persist, definitely helped having my partner with me. Even though my baby is always wanting me at the moment just a 2-3 minute reset with him and then back to me helped.
I set myself a goal every few nights, no feed just soothe on wake ups before 2 hours to start then no feed before 3 no feed before 4 and we’re now at no feeding before 6 hours one night she went 8 hours on her own without one only soothed her once at 5 hours in.
i would say try and be consistent with it we are still working on it but it’s definitely working x

Exactly the same here. 7pm bed, 9pm wake then basically hourly or even more frequent from 4am, up for the day at 6pm at which point husband takes (he sleeps on the sofa) and I sleep till 7.30, as have a 3 yr old to get ready too.
so to let you know you are not alone! It’s awful and tiring. Might try the above posters method, my fear of stopping BFing in the night is if the wake ups remain and baby can’t be settled. Then it will be more of a mess than it is now! But not sure if I’m just using that as an excuse as I’m too tired to face baby crying / adjusting to changes over night! Good luck, keep us posted

I'd be curious as to whether those friends and family who are saying this BF or FF their babies. My first BF baby was like this, my second BF baby less so, some babies do just sleep better than others.
Remember it is a cultural expectation that babies sleep independently at such a young age, not an evolutionary or biological one. Check out the BASIS website, they have some really good educational information about this.

You will always get the posters who make out that waking at 10 months in the night is somehow abnormal and that you MUST leave them to cry themselves to sleep which is rubbish.
Like others have said, as soon as I realised its just how some babies are and relaxed about it, the less stressed I was. When I went back to work I realised I wouldn't have the stamina or willpower to try changing anything in the middle of the night so we started with not feeding to sleep at bedtime. We coslept so I would bf feed them and then before they were asleep take them off and sing to them etc. I tried a few times and it didn't work so gave up but then tried again a few weeks later and within a couple of days they were falling asleep without feeding which I couldn't believe was even possible!!! Then gradually throughout the night I would do the same on wake ups. Sometimes it would work and they'd go back to sleep easily and sometimes if they got upset I'd just feed them. The wakeups got far less gradually.

The method is no longer working tonight :( Baby will not be soothed in any other way than feeding it’s been 2 hours only since last feed. Had a good day with feeding and solids, but teething and just unsettled in general so I will just rock and try soothe for 5 mins if it doesn’t work then I will go back to feeding to sleep for a night and try again tomorrow

I am starting to learn that if they cannot settle any other way after a little bit of time something is really going on and to just lean into the magic of breast feeding whilst we can I suppose. Your gut just tells you this method isn’t working they are just getting more awake and more upset rather than a small moan and unhappiness it just gradually gets worse that’s the only difference I notice when I know she may be able to settle without feeding she’s not happy but it’s not to awful trying to soothe, when it gets to loud and awful then boobs the answer for me. Our babies are just reliant on us to sooth with boob and are used to that so I suppose we just continue where possible to do that but a balance of trying to not solely soothe on boob immediately for every wake up as I said in previous posts it was definitely a habit, when we stopped automatically feeding and skipped a few feeds we were getting some big chunks of sleep when not automatically feeding.
I will continue to try and soothe in other ways on wake ups so we don’t lose the progress we made to much but if baby cannot settle after a few minutes then I’ll embrace the ease of feeding to sleep for tonight/until baby feels better.

Sending thoughts to you all it’s only 11pm and I am completely exhausted as I imagine you all are too.
Sorry for babbling!

Things have been worse this week due to sickness bugs for both us and teething so I definitely didn't have the willpower to try it over the last week as I just needed any sleep I could get.

He woke just before 10 last night and my husband tried to settle him including with a bottle and he just screamed continuously whilst my husband rocked him for 30 minutes until I came in and got him

No it's definitely from FF friends and family I haven't had much support apart from my husband and constantly get asked when I'm going to stop

I know people talk about pressure to breastfeed but I definitely felt pressure to move to formula since early days.

Yes this definitely happens unfortunately. I remember one Mum saying it's ironic how much pressure their is for women to establish BF, only for then have the same amount of pressure to stop at 6 months! Like you I didn't start really enjoying it until my 1st was 4-5months (was easy though from the start with my 2nd as I knew what I was doing!) So there was no way I was going to stop. I also got questions about when I was going to stop and you will hear it called 'extended' breastfeeding, which is a nonsense term that suggests you are going beyond the 'normal' time. Personally I chose to breastfeed to full term- which was when my son self-weaned at 2.5 years when he was ready, without tears and fuss. It is perfectly acceptable (and recommended by the World Health organisation) to do so, although you will find a lot of judgement about this! I just stopped telling judgy people what I was doing, none of their business anyway! And like I said, as your child weans onto food and has water he will be able to be without you for longer and longer. I had my first KIT day yesterday and my son happily managed from 08:30- 2:30 without BF with food and water instead, and he just had some extra feeds in the evening on demand .With BF when they are older you can be flexible (my son is about to turn 10 months). I found being around other BF mothers helped me ignore the other comments so if you have a BF support group in your area it might be useful- makes you feel less alone in your decisions to carry on BFing beyond what some in society deem acceptable!