4-5 month olds sleep club, - come and join..........

[SnowlightMcKenzie]

Hiya,

There have been so many threads lately about babies who were beginning to sleep better, but suddenly hitting this regression to newborn hell.

So I thought I would start a support thread for us all to compete whinge about how little sleep we are all getting, and tips on how to cope.

Baby Starlight was up just twice last night, but the previous night it was 6 times, and because of that I kept putting off going to bed at all last night, so even though it wasn't too bad, I still had hardly any sleep

Don't know anything about dummies I'm afraid, as DD would never take one.

cyteen Glad to hear you're feeling better. It was the "it's never going to get better" that was making me cry the other day too - when they're newborn you expect it to be bad but everyone tells you it will miraculously improve at 12 weeks. Then this happens and it just seems endless ... argh.

I am just blanking any possibility of a six month growth spurt out of my mind.

And we've had two decent nights here. Both times she was a nightmare to get down (thought we'd cracked that, but apparently not!). Last night she was up three times I think but had a reasonable amount of sleep between 1 am and erm 9.45 am ; night before last she was up only twice hoorah (or as I described it to DH "Only once ... unless you count the second time, in which case, twice" - clearly sleep deprivation has destroyed parts of my brain). Don't know whether it's coincidence but both times I eventually put her down with the t-shirt I'd been wearing that day, so maybe that helped?

Ug. I was feeling so lucky with A - he's been a straightforward rather than easy baby - he wakes, I feed, I put him down, he goes back to sleep. So I could deal with lots of waking.

This last week, he's decided that he doesn't like going back to sleep - last night he kept dozing off on the breast/in my arms/over my shoulder, I'd lay him down, and he'd scream. Dozens of times. Took 90 min of screaming to get him back to sleep at 3am and 6am - even tried some Calpol in the end.

Is this separation anxiety kicking in? Or what?

Hi there - things are (all fingers crossed) still pretty good this end. Little one has been waking up at 2.30ish then 5.30ish - a bit too early, but if we can call it morning then that's just ONCE! But do any of you find that - fantastic as it is - mumsnet can also freak you out? Girlwiththemouseyhair, I've just read your thread about dummies (hope it's going OK by the way). Ds has one and it has really helped getting him down for naps / sleeping in his cot. But now I'm freaked he'll start waking for it ten million times a night by 10 months (he's nearly 6 months now) as someone suggested on your thread... Bah. Not about to change anything yet, but wouldn't it be nice if each topic had a 'Actually, it was fine' section where you could read all the stories about rods for our own backs turning out not to be rods at all...

Not so good last night. Ds was up from 4:40-5:50, it took me a bit longer to settle back off, and then dd came in for a feed at 6:15! Ds stayed asleep until dd bounded back in at 7:45, and I had a little nap during that interval too. I'm not sure how many times we were up before that - maybe 3.

Am not too impressed with dh atm though. He is sleeping with dd (just 3) because she is jealous of ds being in our room, and to stop her from coming and disturbing me as my nights are bad enough with ds. They end up shouting and screaming at each other every bed time, and he was completely oblivious that she came downstairs and played in the nursery at 1:30am, as well as letting her come down at 6:15. It's not even as though he needs the sleep because of work, as he has no work at the moment!

Anyway, ds v tired today, but still not managing to sleep for long at a time (c40mins his longest today). He's currently napping in my arm/lap, with the aid of some medised in case it's his stinky cold causing the problem. Can't believe he's only had a couple of cold free days since he was about 2 weeks old .

hello again - have to say I feel a bit better coming on here now, though I know our nights probably sound better than most. DS has been having these difficult nights and half hour naps for over a month now and the sleep deprivation really got to me this morning, we just went into meltdown togeter and my mum had to take him away for a few hours so I could have a break - felt like such a failure.

Normally he sleeps from when we put him down til dream feed, but has started waking more frequently - normally settles straight away with the dummy but tonight he woke and it's taken us an hour so far to settle him...he's so so tired poor love and not even the dummy's working

Feed him gwtmh - he might be starting the big growth spurt and need it! How did the rest of the night go?

We had a bad one. Ds to bed at 7, then awake at 10:10, 12:15, 1:15, 2:15, 3:15, 4:15, 5:15 and then up for the day at 6:05. Very tired now! So much for a good daytime nap (he had 2 hours yest pm in the end) meaning that they sleep better at night!

I agree with csws, gwtmh - when my ds wont settle with the dummy it means he's hungry

We had a good night last night - after bedtime at 7ish ds has been waking for more food at 9.30pm but last night held off til 10.45pm. Then - slept through til 3.45am WOW!!! Then slept again til 5.50 when I had to put his dummy back in and we were up at 7am. I have only recently started using a dummy - dp wants us just to give him it all night - but he's quite good at going back to sleep and I'm worried about dependence and us getting up a million times to give him his dummy back. Plus have just got back from visiting relatives who have a 20 month old who's wandering about with his dummy in all day and trying to speak around it

the night before last was sooo horrendous with about 1 million wake ups, now I feel normal again

I've noticed the last 2 days ds has been feeding for much longer than normal - worried about the next growth spurt...is this it??

csws - your night sounds like my Tuesday night - hope you manage a power nap later!

Not a chance sambo. Have both dc with me today, toddler group this morning, and a party to go to this afternoon.

Sorry for your rubbish night CSWS Sounds like you might benefit from some instant energy in the form of chocolate.

Dare I report another decent night here? Down at 7.30pm, slept till 11.30pm when he fed a little (don't think he was really hungry tbh, it was a half-hearted suck ), was a bit wakey through farting at 1ish but shushed back to sleep easily, then fed at 3.30ish and slept again till 6am when my DP got up with him again so I feel vaguely human again.

Hello, here I am after lurking for a week or so, admitting that I need to join this thread! DS, 4.5 mth old, has never been the best of sleepers, waking 2 hrly until he was 3 months but then it got better and he was only waking once or twice. Last two weeks, things have detiorated until last night when he woke 6/7 times. I fed each time as just didn't know what else to do and he went back down again each time. Pretty sure this is growth spurt central but with DD, 2.3, to contend with too, I am dying a slow death here...

Hey everyone. I've just come here to tell you (not rub your noses in it I promise) that Baby Starlight is improving loads.

I didn't wean early, but at 5.5 and a bit months old she has, for the last 4 nights slept between 6-10 hours straight.

If I had have weaned I would have probably been claiming that for the sucess, but I am assuming and very much hoping, that we are through the worst.

I'm posting to give you hope and to lead you all out of this darkness.

Good luck everyone.

Hi Sydney! Not sure there's a lot of advice for this phase, but hopefully a bit of support so you know you're not alone.

Snowlight - it really does help to know that there is hopefully an end in sight. Haven't read all of this thread but did you just feed every time baby snowlight woke up? Or did you try other things? I've always fed because it works.

I just fed everytime she woke. I seem to remember going crazily round in circles with DS, trying to interpret, control and encourage behaviour, but gave into him too.

So far, just doing what they want seems to be the least stressful path and as far as I can tell, your methods don't make a blind bit of difference so you may as well doin whatever is easiest and just ride it out and try to survive.

And feeding seems to get me the most sleep even if he wakes 35 mins after last feed and cannot POSSIBLY be hungry again! Can he, can he?? Yes, it would appear he can be...

Wow - this is no longer on my threads I'm on list..

I'm really pleased that Baby Snow (could that be Snowdrop?) is doing much better. Especially without weaning. My Mum thinks I'm starving DD although she's on the 91st centile for weight and actually gets her chubby thighs stuck in some trousers.

I'm the same about feeding in the night. With DS I tried to control it, space out feed etc and amde all of us stressed. WIth DD i'm just going with it. All I do do is make her last feed before bedtime downstairs before bath etc. so she doesn't go to sleep in a feed IYSWIM.

Well, she's just turned 5 months and has mastered sitting up so maybe that will help. She's really cute now...I also think newborn = v cute, 2-4 months = a bit rubbish and now really cute!! She's developing so quickly now and it's great to see. She does seem to have had a development spurt so maybe she'll settle down now.

Wishing you all lovely nights with your little bundles of cuteness.

snowlight that is wonderful news.

sydney can I just second snowlight, I got more stressed and upset by trying to get ds to do what I thought he was meant to ie using dummy or shush pat instead of feeding. tbh you will get more rest if you just feed - plus as you are not fighting it, you will not feel a failure when everything you try does not work!! I speak from bitter experience!

Things seem to be going ok here but i don't want to jinx it either. DS2 has been sleeping til about 3ish (sometimes 5ish if i'm very lucky) and going back off again but i have had to be tough and ignore the cooing/laughing once i have fed him and put him down. I used to pick him up again as he was cooing so loudly i thought he would wake ds1 9 he would promptly fall asleep on me) but dh lost his rag and told me just to leave him. After 20 mins of cooing and the odd shout to see where i was, he nodded off by himself . since then, he has settled off to sleep a lot better and i have now started putting him in his cot for daytime sleeps. Again he protests a little for about 10 mins but today he slept for 1 1/2 hours. I used to spend most of that time rocking him in his pram to keep him asleep (what a fool)!! I don't think its anything i've done particularly, just that he's got a bit older (24 weeks), seems ready iyswim and seems more settled this week. I'm off dairy again so i don't know if that's helped him...

sydney - i would echo Snowlight and say that this time around during the really abd nights, i have fed ds2 whenever he has woken in the night no matter how many times or how recently i have fed him. i just do/did the easiest thing in the middle of the night. i also keep reminding myself of 'it's just a phase, it will pass' hopefully its passing but i'm now terrified of what 6 months will bring....

hope you are all sound asleep as are the little ones

btw I haven't weaned yet either so there's another one who goes against the constant pressure about non-sleepers being hungry for solid food.....

loulou I also have not weaned (unless you count an inch piece of parsnip - dp insisted he try it and it went in) and I also see an improvement in the length of time ds sleeps (ds is 25 weeks today)

it's good to read some positive stories when I'm lying here knackered after another dreadful night and 5.30 start. I thought we'd already come through the worst of it, but now it seems not.