Still in the 4 month regression 5 weeks later 😢 GP or wait it out?

[NovemberFlush]

I've posted about this before, but our LO who has just turned 4 months has been going through what we believe is the 4 month regression for 5 weeks. We are so exhausted, every night time and every nap can be so hard. At night he does his first stretch of sleep which can be anywhere from 1-3 hours usually. Then after this, he's awake every 1 hour or every 40 minutes. It takes multiple attempts to get him down in his next to me, as he wakes up loads. My poor dh insists on being the one to soothe him as I breastfeed, and he still feeds quite a bit. And my dh is up with him every hour of the night after the first stretch of sleep, over and over again. 😢 We've tried bedsharing, which doesn't really make a difference anymore. We can't swaddle anymore. He enjoys rolling onto his tummy and tends to sleep best like this, but doesn't always do it. He turns onto his side and usually within a couple of minutes rolls onto his back and cries. This happens multiple times through the night. Daytime naps are hard, he only sleeps 30 - 50 minutes usually. I worry he's not getting enough rest. When I've googled, it says to ask a gp if it goes beyond 6 weeks, should we?? Or do we just wait it out? We have a bedtime routine every night which we try and stick to. Just feel so helpless and tired all the time 😢

Agree with the others saying feed the baby every time.
This is normal sleep at your baby's age. Focus on ways to get more sleep for you that don't rely on the baby being asleep (e.g. you go to sleep at 7pm, baby is in sling with other parent).

@bluebunnyjacket I normally fed him every wakeup overnight, but when it became every 40 minutes I didnt realise I'd have to feed him that often tbh. He always falls asleep really quickly when picked up, so we just assumed he wasn't hungry, just uncomfortable from sleeping positions.When I have tried to feed on every wakeup, he would sometimes just fall asleep next to my boob without actually feeding. So that's why we thought he just needed help getting back to sleep as opposed to feeding. Hope that makes sense, but like I said, I will feed every time now and see if it helps him sleep more.

@MooseAndSquirrelLoveFlannel thank you 💕 I've heard about the towel under the sheet, but haven't done anything like this as I didnt want to go against the guidelines. My friend did it with her baby though a while back and said it helped.

@DameDiazepamTheDramaQueen Thank you. Obviously we're first time parents and completely in the dark with it all.

Everyone has advice and feel free to ignore mine.
You are all exhausted.
Take turns at nights, but let the other parent sleep all night. Do 2 night shifts in a row each, so each parent gets 2 uninterrupted nights sleep, before swapping. When you both are more rested, look at what's waking baby

Never posted a reply on mumsnet before but your question jsut resonated with me. I had such a bad 4 month regression with my now 2 year old. If you can afford it, I cannot recommend this lady enough

https://hushbabysleep.co.uk

it is really hard but so worth it in my opinion

It's a bit of a shock, isn't it? No one knows what they're doing , just try everything! x

If you feel you need professional advice, start with your health visitor not the GP.

Health visitors deal with under 5s development.

Are you using a dummy? That helped me tremendously

Agree

No, he doesn't take a dummy.

I will give the health visitor team a call after seeing how tonight goes and see if they have advice.
As I mentioned up thread, he woke up early this morning cooing away. I think I'd fed him an hour or 2 before this. We both heard him cooing and thought we'd give it a few minutes to see if he was unsettled. He ended up turning onto his tummy and sleeping for over an hour and a half after. So this is why I've been confused, because sometimes he feeds and wakes up soon after. Other times he doesn't feed and sleeps quite a while. I can usually tell when he's hungry, so it's thrown me a bit.
I didn't always feed before a nap, we'd do eat, play, sleep. And he'd sleep fine for 1 hour and a half. But I have been feeding before naps too to try and help him sleep longer now, but he still can wake up after 40 minutes or so, which is why we thought it was linked to the regression/sleep cycles.

Thank you, my baby doesn't take a bottle so that wouldn't work I'm afraid. Appreciate the reply though!

I disagree with the suggestion to feed each time unless that’s what you want to do. It can create a situation of “reverse cycling” where baby starts to get used to consuming more and more calories over night.

I agree with the earlier comment that this “regression” is really baby’s sleep habits changing. It can be a time to try to teach baby how to sleep more independently since the old ways generally won’t work anymore.

@BendingSpoons @comfyshoes2022 This is what we initially thought was happening. When he wakes it's usually when I've read a sleep cycle ends.
Also, he wakes more around the 3-5 am part of the night. I always feed around then becuase it's when he wakes the most. He still wakes every few minutes though when he rolls onto his back. Regardless of just being fed or not! 😓

Yeah that sleep regression doesn’t go away. I’m waiting for it to finish at 16 months.

The GP will laugh at you what do you think they will do?

I'm going to go against the grain OP and say don't do this, you know your baby and if he doesn't need feeding don't offer, you could create a bad habit that you'll have to break.
I read so much here how often babies have to breastfeed but honestly mine fed as if they were bottle fed, every 3/4 hours at that stage.
For one of mine I fed during that regression thinking it was a growth spurt till I realised it wasn't and I stopped.
Another was sleeping through and didnt go through the regression at all so it's definitely not always true that the baby needs feeding.
If they can be comforted in other ways I absolutely would because that will be mote helpful in the longterm.
It sounds like this is related to him learning to roll. One of mine was only happy sleeping on their front once they learned to roll over, they slept much better on their front so I let them be. They couldn't roll back again, is that the issue? Can he roll onto his front again?
Sometimes learning new movements can cause big issues with sleep xx

I didn't think they'd do anything other than check him over. Only asking as this is what I came across when looking it up online: 'If the regression lasts longer than six weeks, or if you have concerns about your baby's sleep, it's recommended to seek advice from a healthcare professional or certified sleep consultant.'

My baby also don’t always need or want feeding when he wakes at night and his daytime sleep is always fed to sleep or in the car. But since he’s been a few weeks old he doesn’t wake crying. He wakes up making noises, or kicking the mattress, or most recently showing off his skill of blowing raspberries. About half of his night wakings he’ll fall asleep on my chest instead of accepting the boob he’s offered. Especially at the four month regression they aren’t really waking because they’re hungry it’s because they need to learn to adapt to and connect their sleep cycles which are totally new to them.

It’s also normal for daytime naps to be shorter. All our daytime naps which aren’t in the car are contact naps because when I’m holding him I can respond to stirs instantly with rocking him and keeping him asleep longer. We use Huckleberry to track his feedings, sleep and nappies and because my baby has just turned four months they sent an email with this suggested schedule which I might try loosely fir the next week (but modified for a 7am wake up time) and see how we get on with it. We’ve been doing bedtime starting at 9 but he’s taking longer to settle so isn’t getting to sleep until about 10:15-10:30 so wondering if an earlier bedtime might help now he’s older. The later one isn’t working, and having something to try makes me feel like I’m doing something. I think it’s just a case of waiting for him rather than anything I try though! But I might be able to sleep when he does earlier. ^^ I also have found videos from this sleep consultant useful when they come across my FYP on TikTok. Not advocating her services, I’ve never tried her but I find the aspects of the science behind the changing sleep helpful.

He does struggle rolling back again. He can get onto his front on his own, but we're trying to teach him how to go the other way. He has done it before a couple of times, but doesn't find it as easy. (If you have any tips for rolling tummy to back please let me know!)
It all did seem to coincide with rolling and this did cross our minds. I didn't think it would last this long tbh!

@toastofthetown thank you, we also use Huckleberry. I try to keep an eye on wake windows along with the sweet spots and schedule recommendations. It takes a while to get him to sleep though, he really fights his naps. We try and aim for 8-8:30 pm bedtime. But because he takes a while to get down for naps, the schedule is always pretty off.

I wonder if it’s not all the four month sleep cycle changes, but also milestone related. They like to practice skills at night if they wake up and are bored and this might just be one things after the next, and when he stops finding rolling interesting or can easily get himself out of the situation he got himself into then it might get much better. Until they learn to crawl at least 🙃

@toastofthetown yes he used to do this, we'd wake up to him trying to roll onto his front around a month ago 🥹 but now when he's going from his side onto his back, it's during his sleep. I've seen him do it during daytime naps too and it really seems like hes asleep, or at least half asleep. Definitely not fully awake. Then he wakes up and seems upset because he's not comfortable anymore. That's what we'd been thinking anyway, but I could be wrong!

They say this but if I’m honest. All of the info is tailored towards bottle fed babies. When I was telling my health visitor they she was feeding 20-30 times a day she didn’t believe it. The advice for breastfed babies don’t work you just have to ride it out.

It's constantly changing though.

He'll figure out how to roll both ways and settle for a bit, then he'll learn to crawl. So then he'll refuse to lay down and crawl around his cot queue lack of sleep for parents again.

Then that new skill will settle and he'll sleep again, until he learns to pull himself up. He'll then fight sleep again and keep pulling himself to standing. More lack of sleep for parents, especially after he throws himself out of the cot the first time!!

Then he'll settle again, then he'll learn get out of bed.......and so it continues on and on it goes.

Finally, when they start sleeping perfectly through the night they suddenly decide 4am is waking up time. Then it takes another 3 or 4 years for that habit to break.

Finally, they become teenagers and you never see them unless they're foraging for food.

You'll always worry OP, there will always be something going on interrupting your sleep, but that's parenting. Welcome to the madness.