My baby is 11 months and never has slept through the night....

[Amani]

DD2 is nearly 11 months and still does not sleep through the night. She is a very fussy eater (may be that's the reason). Anyhow I put her to sleep around 8pm, then she wakes every 2-2.5 hrs - just for me to pat her back to sleep - then she goes back to sleep and then around 3-4am ish for a feed.

Is there anyone else out there in whose baby has never slept through the night? I've tried controlled crying, but I just dont have the heart to hear her crying for ages (plus I am working and all I think about in the middle of the night is the easiest option to get her to sleep again i.e milk/patting)

Hi Amani!

Been offline for a while during house renovation type thingies, and was just reading through Dec thread to catch up when I saw the link to here.

DD's 1st birthday is less than a month away and she has NEVER slept through. There was a stage at 12wks-ish when she started to do a 4-5hr stretch and I thought we were on our way, but now she is back to waking every 2.5-3hrs. (and that's good).

I went back to work FT in August so haven't honestly had the time or energy to come up with a "plan" - just going for the path of least resistance and co-sleeping/feeding back to sleep as it is the closes I can get to sleep.

"what i would like to know is has anyone had a DC who didn't sleep through for a long time, say 10/11mo (or longer) then suddenly 'got it'?
If i keep going with the flow with ds2, feed him when he wakes and wants it, cuddle/shush him when he doesn't & get up with him at ungodly hours in the morning because he's ready for the day, etc.etc. will he one day think 'oh, i'll sleep 12 hours from now on!'???

Or do i have to DO SOMETHING (irrelevant of method)?" - That is EXACTLY what I would like to know too!

Caz - I don't know anyone whose DC doesn't sleep at 11 months, but if it helps, I can relay something DD's paediatrician said. (Babies are followed by a paediatrician here in France, who sees them once a month until 1 yr)

When DD was 4 months and not sleeping through, her paediatrician said "Either you sort this out now, or she will wake up expecting to be fed every night until about the age of 2". She suggested that 2 is an age where babies who don't sleep through finally start to.

Needless to say, we were so scared by the prospect of sleeplessness for another 20 months that we cut night feeds that night and DD started sleeping through 3 days later.

It was the single best advice I ever had.

Caz dd did just get it, but she was 2. She slept through one night off her own bat, then when she woke after that I said no milk when she asked and she went straight back to sleep. Only had a few nights of her waking and asking for milk after that. But when I had tried previously she kept waking and asking for milk for months afterwards so I think that she was just ready that time.

However when I look back now, those 2 years just flew by, I'm already almost half way there with ds so if he does the same then so be it. I think it depends how close to breaking point you are as to whether you decide to do anyhting about it or just ride with it!

Caz dd did just get it, but she was 2. She slept through one night off her own bat, then when she woke after that I said no milk when she asked and she went straight back to sleep. Only had a few nights of her waking and asking for milk after that. But when I had tried previously she kept waking and asking for milk for months afterwards so I think that she was just ready that time.

However when I look back now, those 2 years just flew by, I'm already almost half way there with ds so if he does the same then so be it. I think it depends how close to breaking point you are as to whether you decide to do anyhting about it or just ride with it!

Amani - Hows things?

hello amani. how's it going now?
have read through posts so far. am biting my tongue re. for/against debate but would love to know what Ben GOldacre (Bad Science column in Groaniad) would make of the presentation of causality on both sides of debate - and Sunderland's study is a literature review, not presenting 'evidence' that she has found, which is how that particular link came across.
Anyhoo, our dd was a crap sleeper and it pushed my to and over brink of sanity.
We eventually cracked our dd's waking every 90 minutes by stopping all but the 5am night feed, and leaving her for between 2 and 4 minutes whenever she awoke, then going in to soothe, pat and restore dummy (was quite colicky as newborn and didn't like comfort sucking on me so dummy was introduced - not a problem sleep-wise at all, despite darkest warnings of health visitors etc). We started on a Friday night so that DH could go in to her to break the night-waking = booby association. Keeping a log of waking/settling time was very helpful, cos when you're sleep deprived (which we all were) it's really hard to keep things in perspective. By the Monday night, waking was about 50% of what it was and we were getting blocks of 3 or 4 hours. She also started eating better during the day. Now, at 11 months she usually goes through until early morning feed then sometimes has another hour or two (if we're lucky).
I was unhappy about gradually increasing the amount of time she was 'left' to cry for, so we never did that part of the CC thing and I did most of the things in the no-cry sleep solution (use sleeping bag, had her play in her cot with some toys during the day, bath/story/milk routine and nice quiet atmosphere, no talking during night-feeds, enough daytime sleep) but I found that the thing that helped most of all, apart from getting her out of the habit of feeding all night was upping her exercise level - the first time she slept through was on holiday when we'd been swimming twice in one day!
Our local health visitors, gawd bless'em run a sleep clinic. Do yours?
Hope this helps. It will pass, whatever you decide to do. It really will.

Hi Amani
I haven't had time to read the whole thread but just wanted to add that my ds is nearly 10 months old and has NEVER slept through unless you count the night he was born, which I don't as I didn't get any sleep myself!

He has slept for 3 and a half hours on two memorable occasions but mostly he wakes every two hours, and that's a recent development - it used to be every hour.

Out of my group of seven friends with babies the same age, only two of them sleep through and they very diplomatically keep quiet about it while the rest of us discuss the trauma of babies who wake two, three, four, five... times a night.

I still feed my ds roughly every three hours (10ish, 1ish, 4ish and 6ish) and cuddle or rock to sleep the rest of the time. The only way I can get through it is to have him in the bed with me and dh in the spare room. Not ideal but I feel relatively well rested...

Hello everyone - am back - went on holiday so missed all the posting after I last put my own posting up.

DD didn't sleep very well on holiday - was really unsettled so even though we had a lovely time, still feeling tired. Didn't want to try offering water in the bottle until I was back in the comfort of my own home - at least if she cries all night she wont disturb DD1 in the next room (we all shared one lovely room when on holiday so it wouldn't have been ideal to try it then). Anyhow, have decied that when DD2 wakes up tonight am going to reduce the amount of formula in her milk (i.e she usually have 5 scoops for 5 ounces, so am going to put 4 instead and gradually decrease) - however it's not just the night feeding, its the tapping on her back when she still needs for comfort - am going to try the 5 tap arrpo

whoops - pc threw a wobbly but meant to say am going to try my own version of shush pat - tap her 5 times then say sush and so on