How do you get your baby to sleep through the night?

[Megss]

My baby is 5 months old and 8 days, he has never slept through the night. He always goes to bed on a full stomach, fresh nappy, consistent bedtime routine, white noise, etc. What else can I do? Beyond exhausted at this point. Thank you 🙏🏻

Mine were 16mo and 2yrs old when they slept through, 5 months is very, very normal to not sleep through yet. I know you’re knackered and it’s hard but it will happen eventually, I promise.

Sorry this isn’t what you want to hear but not many 5 month olds sleep through the night and when people tell you their baby does/did take it with a pinch of salt! “Sleeping through” in baby books also means a 6h stretch which they don’t make very clear.
How often is he waking? Is he feeding then going back down or is it taking a while to get him settled?
Is your partner helping you during the night?

It’s normally & healthy for a 5 month old to wake during the night. Pretty common till they’re 12 months old I’m afraid.

My 4 year old still wakes in the night so I’m afraid I can’t help other than to say, you will survive this bit, where you are so tired you barely know what day it is.. neither of mine slept through till way later than their peers. It was exhausting but we got through. Dig deep!!

You teach them through sleep training. Or you can wait for it to organically happen.

Not what you want to hear but there isn't a magic formula. A lot of parenting (whatever people tell you) is luck.
Hopefully your baby will sleep through soon, maybe when they are weaned, and eating more solid food, or maybe wake up at a more bearable time? My 2nd DC slept though at 6 months. I thought id died and gone to heaven. At that point DC1 was nearly 4 and still not sleeping through....

Break the feed to sleep association if you can. But as others have said, some of it is just time. It will happen and probably sooner than you think!

14 months for DD2 and I'm still waiting... (DD1 slept through, i.e., 8 hour stretch) from 8 months, so hopefully you get lucky!

Sorry OP but you can’t change a newborn’s behavior. It is the biological norm that they have short sleep cycles as this is protective against SIDS and they want and need to be near their mums. Independent sleep is learnt and development.

Follow a loose feeding and nap routine in the day to make sure they’ve eaten enough and that they’re tired but not overtired. Dreamfeed until property established on solids. Put down awake at the start of night so they fall asleep in the cot by themselves. Make sure they’re warm enough which for mine was always an extra layer on top of what the grobag chart suggested. Then cross your fingers and hope for good luck because it is mostly luck!!

Change your expectations, it's completely normal for babies, toddlers and even children to wake at night. Adults wake at night! just do whatever works to resettle as quickly as possible. We co-sleep for the second part of the night, that helps a lot.

Honestly, it completely depends on the child and their temperament. My DD would always wake in the night, until one day around 11/12 months when she started sleeping through. We didn't change anything - she just became "ready"!

You wait...

5 month is very young.

Second the advice on changing your expectations. My DD at 5 months was feeding at least twice a night, meaning she didn't sleep for longer than 3-4 hour stints. She first slept through (7:30pm til 6am) at 10 months, did that for a few weeks and since then wakes intermittently every night, but usually self settles back to sleep.

Most babies don't sleep through until they're much older. Sleep training may not fix that either. Its aim is to help babies get themselves to sleep, not sleep all the way until morning without waking. At that age, they may still need a feed during the night and you shouldn't ignore that.

From my experience it is a lot down to luck with kids and sleeping. My DS was a brillant sleeper and my DD was about average, I think I did about the same with both of them yet they slept quite differently. One thing I saw another PP mention was not to feed to sleep, I would feed on waking from a nap, then play and then chill a little before the next nap. I used to do the housework while DCs sat in their chairs / on playmats, I would carry the chair round the house with me as I did stuff and talk to them and interaction with them and they were generally quite interested in everything going on.

Pray.

And then maximise your own sleep however possible in whatever way that looks like. Whether that's co-sleeping, giving yourself a split night sleep (so going to bed earlier), sleeping in shifts. Whatever works.

DD1 slept 8 hours from 12 weeks. Then when she hit 18 months there were nights when I could count my sleep in minutes, and that lasted until she was 2.5/3.
DD2 didn't sleep through until 15 months ish and barring illness has been fairly bombproof since then.