Baby awake for 2hrs at a time through night

[Hodgeheg8]

Hi there, I’m new to mums-net, but am at my whits end with my baby waking up in the night and it taking typically up to 2 hours to get her back down, sometimes longer!
she has done this since she was about 4MO, now 10MO. Thankfully she’s now started occasionally sleeping through the night, which almost makes it worse now when she does wake as I’ve started to occasionally enjoy a half-decent nights sleep!
she goes to bed really easily at the start of the night, I leave the room while she’s still awake and she self-settles. I have blackout blinds, and white noise and a humidifier, so the sleep environment is good. But when she wakes in the night it takes FOREVER to get her settled down again. And I often have to rock her for ages or have my hand on her back or she holds my hand. It’s backbreaking and exhausting! I’ve weaned he off milk at night, but sometimes out of desperation I give in and give her a bottle. Sometimes it’s teething, trapped wind, or a cold, but most of the time she simply won’t settle for inexplicable reasons!

any advice would be greatly appreciated!

thanks

Does she sleep if you give her milk if so just give her the milk she might be hungry. I’m sure mine were still getting night feeds at that age.

My first thought was hunger too, even offer water and a rice cake if you want to wean off bottles or milk in a cup, just to see

10 months is quite young not to have any milk at night in my opinion. Mine still fed at night sometimes until about 2yo. They have tiny digestive systems, they don't have big reserves of energy like adults do.

what is she doing for daytime naps? Maybe time to drop the morning one?

If she takes the bottle and settles after, I’d say it’s hunger and she’s only falling back to sleep after 2 hours because she’s tired herself out

i think she may be hungry too, just give s small feed just to help fill her up and see how she goes. There’s always a reason for being unsettled x

Split nights!!! I just wanted to say that my now 7year old used to do this and it drove me crazy! I never really got to the bottom of why he did and he it eventually stopped. But you have my sympathy that it is absolutely awful!! We tried lots of things including co-sleeping but nothing truly worked.

He did suffer a lot with ear infections and also had several allergies - I don’t know if these things were linked. He now sleeps really well (and has done since he was about 4) and is healthy etc. My second son is 3 and never did the same waking at all!

I think once he dropped to one nap, things improved a little then we never had them again once he completely dropped his nap. Not sure if it was linked or just a developmental thing.

I agree, sounds like you maybe over napping her during the day time- either too long naps and/ or too many naps. Have you considered even awake windows during the day. Look at your awake windows and timing of last nap before bedtime. Maybe you already do this but im just highlighting just in case. Good luck.

with both mine I made up bottles, warmed up in microwave in middle of night, handed them to them and went back to bed at 1-2 years. they drank and went back to sleep.

I wouldn't reintroduce milk at night after 10 months.
You probably need to look at the day time schedule though.
At that age I'd roughly be going for a short morning nap 9.30-10.
Longer nap after lunch and up no later than 3pm.
Self settling at bedtime.

Thanks all for your thoughts.
split nights is definitely the word!

I don’t think it’s hunger, at least most of the time it’s not hunger. Giving her a bottle doesn’t necessarily help her back to sleep quicker.

she’s generally restless at night and sometimes she’s wide awake and ready to party, other times she’s sleepy but can’t seem to take that extra step to fully relax no matter what I do to comfort (or leave her).

it might be the daytime naps, but she gets so exhausted in the evening, I don’t think I can cut them back too much otherwise she won’t make it to a half decent bedtime (currently 7/7:30) and she starts waking up
at 5am!
will try reducing the length of her two daytime naps gradually.

What times and how long is he sleeping in the day?