He’s the only one who doesn’t sleep!

[Tiredpaww]

DS is 12 months old and has never ever slept for longer than 5 hours without waking, even then that’s only happened once when he was 5 months old. He went through a spell of sleeping for 4 hr stretches but for the past few months he wakes every 2-3 hours.

I’ve accepted my fate and accept that he will sleep through when he’s ready but I can’t help but wonder why he’s the only one out of my friendship group who doesn’t sleep?!

There are 9 babies in our friendship group who all have varying sleep. Some of the babies sleep through every night, some regularly sleep through and others don’t often sleep through but regularly only wake once in the night and do a good 5 hours stretch either side of the wake.

It feels like I’m the only one who has a consistently rubbish sleeper!!! Is there something I’m doing wrong or do some babies just not sleep?!

Both of mine were shite sleepers at that age but amongst the most reliable when a bit older for going to sleep at a decent time and staying asleep. So think it's swings and roundabouts. We bedshared, fed to sleep, no sleep training etc but they slept through when they were ready (around 15 months for one and 20 months for the other). Before that we had periods of them waking every twenty mins...

Music to my ears, thank you! We bedshare after his first wake (expecting him to join me any minute!) and feed to sleep every wake. Hopefully won’t be long until he sleeps for longer stretches

This was my eldest until he was over 2 yo. DC2 and DC3 are not the same. It’s just some children temperament

Mine are way worse sleepers than that 😂

My friendship group lied about how great their kids slept. It was a very weird thing to boast about and then get caught out a few weeks later with "I was up at 3am" and clearly looking more exhausted than someone whose kids "sleep from 6pm to 8am EVERY NIGHT!".

No, they were not ill or teething.

And OP if it helps, my DS 4YO was up every 2 to 3 hours until about 2YO and now he's a great sleeper. Now if I could just get DD 1YO to get in line...

Honestly, this may well be why. Why wouldn’t he have a snuggle and a feed if that’s on offer? And, if you’re ok with it, there’s nothing wrong with it. If it starts to get you down, it can be changed with some time and effort. It can be hard to remember that you have control over this because it definitely doesn’t always feel that way. But it can help to reflect that if it gets overwhelming, you can change things. It just takes a lot of patience .
And one day, you will miss this. Truly

I love snuggling up with him and know that I will miss it in the future. I’m definitely making the most of the good parts of bed sharing while I can!

I would definitely love longer chunks of sleep but I’m not wanting to sleep train (no matter how gently…) or night wean any time soon. Hopefully he will naturally sleep for longer on his own!

It’s also helpful to read @Tallyrand’s comment. I do wonder if some of the mums aren’t always truthful about how well their babies sleep!

DC1 was quite a good sleeper so we thought we’d nailed it. DC2 is 11 months and has never slept through. It made me realise that their sleep is mostly down to them, they’re all different even when they’re siblings and have done the same thing with both! You’ve done nothing wrong, it’s just how your baby is.

Mine still doesn't sleep. He's 16 years old!
I hear him in the middle of the night. He goes to bed after me. He is still having breakfast with me before I go to work - despite school having finished for him.

Someone said to me the bight ones have better things to do than sleep. I'll confirm after GCSE results day, but it's not a million miles out.

Even if he doesn't sleep through, he will get to the point where he can be told not to wake up others. It WILL happen.

Yours may be lower sleep needs. Once I figured that out and stopped comparing (mine has never gone to bed at 7pm) he slept much better and longer

DS rarely slept through until he went to school. Slept well after that and at 23 is a real bear if he doesn't get 9 hours.

4yo still wakes up once a night around 50% of the time, 19month old wakes 2,3,4,5 times or sometimes every hour, depending on what's going on with her. Very tired! Eldest was also awful between age 1-2, even though she still wakes at night often she is quickly back to sleep so much more manageable, just waiting for youngest to get to that point which I think is still a while away sadly for me!

The sleep consultant I used said some babies know how to sleep whilst others need to be taught. Mine was one that needed to learn and luckily once I got some help my little one was sleeping through in a matter of days. Have you thought about getting someone to help you?