Support thread for those who were under the misguided illusion that their DC would sleep through by six mo - come and join!

[arthymum]

Did you assume that your DC would be sleeping through by the time they were 6 mo - and now you've hit the milestone you realise you were wrong, wrong, wrong as you stagger out of bed 1, 2, 3 times a night?

Do you sometimes can't help but wonder if you'd done things differently (BF/FF/stuck with the dreamfeed/co-slept/put them in their own cot/followed a GF routine/listened to your MIL ) you'd be getting more sleep?

Do you sometimes dread meeting up with other mums with perfect sleepers (especially when said babies are way younger and tinier than yours)?

Are you in a permanent state of confusion and doubt about whether to 'try' something or not (CC, ssh-patt, PUPD, NCSS etc.) but feel it's never the right time (teething, cold, too young) and not sure anyway whether you have the bottle/energy to see it through?

Do you hold out faint hopes that they'll sleep better when they're on solids/when the teeth come through/when they're another pound heavier/when they're in the new gro-bag/when they're on more solids - and each time - wrong again?

Do you mostly cope okay but every now and then feel tired and miserable and sorry for yourself and burst into tears at the postman or get into a petulant fight in Sainsbury's?

Do you secretly fear that you'll be on here in 3 years time, posting about the fact that you haven't slept for nearly 4 years?

Then come and join me! I've seen you lurking on other threads but feel that we need a place to congregate. Share your tears, tantrums, triumphs and tips - and hopefully one by one, we can all eventually disappear off the thread and into the land of nod....

anything between 3 and 6 times

tostaky my ds also refused a bottle but I kept persevering with it - I tried around the late morning feed (making sure he was really hungry) when I thought he'd be more receptive and he did take it eventually. Having said that I then did not go the formula last feed route out of sheer bloodymindedness

I'm not sure of the reason for the decrease in wake ups here - we have moved ds to his own room and he has started solids - blw so not huge quantities going in. I have a feeling we were waking him when we were in the same room, also I cannot hear him at all now (heavy sleeper + exhausted) and dp has to poke me to wake me and tell me ds is crying so I'm sure we're missing lots of little cries/grunts. anyhoo, I feel normal-er and I am carrying on with the decorating that got interrupted 6M ago!

Yes Artifarti, DD up at 05:30 every day this week. We always sleep with the curtains open so maybe i'll close them tonight and see if it helps.

tostaky - don't despair, a lot can happen in a few weeks. 4-5 months is a notorious time for it to all go T*ts Up with regards to sleep. Growth spurts, teeth, development all throw a spanner in the works. Of course, I'm not saying that 6 months is a magic marker where everything falls into place (or we wouldn't all be on this thread moaning!) But some of us have seen gradual improvement over the last couple of months. I really do now think that the babes that sleep through pre-six months are the exception, not the other way round. Small comfort in the wee hours, I know...

lollipopmother - we already have thick blackout curtains but there is some seepage around the edge, so we might try blocking that out. But TBH I don't think it'll make any difference! DS seems to be in a transition from waking up 1-3 times to sleeping for longer blocks. Think we might just have to tough this one out for a while. I comfort myself with the fact that every single parent I know has gone through this phase, either with a baby or toddler.

I totally agree. Now that I've had a newborn and seen how tiny and helpless they really are, I can't imagine why they wouldn't wake up several times a night to make sure they're still safe and cared for in this strange new world.

This week has seen a more usual pattern from DS, i.e. night wakings and short daytime naps, but still nothing like they were before. I'm hoping that when he finally goes into his own room (sometime over the next couple of weeks) this will help too, as I am certain that we're all disturbing each other at night.

Another decent night here DS went midnight-6am no problem.

He has woken up at around 10.30pm every night this week though, crying and looking quite frightened - could this be bad dreams? There's nothing wrong with him and he either feeds or soothes back to sleep fairly easily, so I'm not sure why he is waking. Although my cats aren't helping by having late night chase-round-the-house games that end in them fighting under his cot

we are back to the horrors of waking every 1 or 2 hours - ds is teething badly and has contracted a really horrendous cold too - he was sneezing and coughing and wailing so much we brought him into our bed at midnight and none of us got much sleep between then and 6am - I know I fed ds 3 times in that period but not sure when.

cyteen is your ds going to sleep in the cot? If he's being fed to sleep and then put into the cot I think the theory is that they wake wondering where they are cos they're not where they were when they fell asleep iyswim.

Hi girls,

Sambo, really sorry to hear you're back to little sleep... Hope it is indeed teething & passes soon.

Cyteen- I agree with Sambo, it might be that he doesn't instantly recognize where he is (expects to be in mummy's arms). Which is why it's preferably to put them down sleepy but awake, if at all possible. Or yes, it could be bad dreams too...

Fellow sleepless-night-sufferers, I'm off for a holiday to the country where I originally come from with DP & DS. I'll be gone for 18 days or so, and I hope hope hope that my mum will take care of DS for a few nights (preferably at least 3!! ) so that DP & I can have some sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeep. We might even go to a hotel for 3 nights- put DS to sleep at 7, leave, and return in the morning. It's very tempting (as long as my mother agrees of course, not sure she will once she realizes what a hideous sleeper DS is!)

Anyway, hope when I return everyone's getting far more sleep than they are atm. On second thought, I'll definitely be MN-ing from there, as my mum has internet, so I won't disappear completely.

Cyteen - I am definitely in the avoid feeding to sleep camp as it has made a big difference to DS's sleep. But then all the little critters are different...

Sambo - oh bugger. You have my sympathies with the teething. How many farking teeth do they have?! It just goes on and on. Every night I pledge not to use Calpol but nothing else does the trick when he's screaming in the wee hours. He's got the bottom two but now rather randomly seems to be pushing the upper fangs through. A vampire baby, hmmm that'll be an interesting look.

Maria - have a fab holiday. I've heard a few times when people have left their DC with Granny et al and - as if by magic! - it does the trick and breaks the pattern. Course, you don't have to tell her what a bad sleeper DS is and then if he is a nightmare you can feign ignorance and blame it on the time difference/different climate/local wildlife (delete as applicable). And, of course, if it does work, your Mum can set herself up as a sleep guru and we will all go get ourselves a holiday and come back with a 7-7 child.

Things are okay here. He generally wakes up once in need of Calpol and a comfort feed and then goes back down until 5/5.30ish when he does a massive poo and decides the day should start. Obviously not my favourite getting up time but I'll take it for the moment. And sometimes I can persuade him to cuddle up and go back to sleep.

Have a good night, all.

maria have a wonderful break, I am sure you will get some much needed rest if not experience a sleeping through miracle, perhaps as the result of the time change (well nothing else works, so why not?). I have also had fantasies about leaving ds at someone's house for the night, and getting a lovely 10 hour sleep in my own bed..what about a baby hotel for sleep deprived mums, you drop them off at 6pm and pick up at 7am and in that time some lovely mummy substitute cuddled them etc when they woke. I think I'd pay about £200 a night atm for that!

you have probably guessed we had another night of horrors - we had ds in with us all night and I fed him everytime he woke (every 2 hours or so). Poor wee thing. Then he kicked me from about 5.30 til I roused from stupor about 6.30

arti we have also been liberal with the calpol after only using it once in the previous 6 months!!! lol at vampire baby

May I join? Am feeling desperate today, I am only halfway through this thread but I just want to get this all off my chest before I explode (in a quiet tired way, obviously).

DD is 9 months and was waking once to feed every night (which I could deal with) until about a month ago. Then she started waking twice and now three times. Whereas before we could shush her off to sleep if she woke up say 2 hours after a feed if we try this now she just screams and screams until I can take no more and feed her, I am scared that each time I give in she will just wake more and more. Last night she woke every 2 hours from 11.00. At 3.00 we thought 'she can't still be hungry' so DP shushed her for about 40 minutes until he gave up and I ended up feeding her. On top of this DP gets up very early (before 6.00) so I am always woken at this time.

She is on 3 meals a day, but doesn't eat masses and HV has told me 5 breastfeeds a day is too many, but with all this night waking she is on about 7 or 8.

The worst part about it is I get so tired at times I hardly feel any compassion for her when she is clearly tired and upset and not sleeping. Like today it has taken me 2 hous to get her to go down for a nap, 1 hour of shushing and patting followed by giving up in despair and pounding the streets until she finally fell alseep (I went and bought sweet potato and oatibix!). And I'm so angry, because I'd love to sleep but instead I spend my time trying to convince my unwilling daughter that she should be doing so.

I'm sorry to go on and I know some of you have it a lot worse. It's just a bad end to a bad week.

Perhaps I should add (in case anyone can offer pearls of wisdom) that she sleeps in her own room. We do not have a routine as such as she starts the day anytime from 5.00 to 8.00 but then things happen at set times after this ie breastfed when woken up, breakfast 1 hour afterwards. Should I change it so every day things happen at the same time?

We did have a fairly decent bedtime routine going which unfortunately went astray and she was falling asleep at the breast, but am now making sure this doesn't happen and am shushing her to sleep.

Right am now off to finish thread and garner all the wisdom!

Hi Beatrix - that sounds miserable. Do you think she is teething or anything like that? In terms of your routine, we do the same - ie it depends what time we get up, although I make sure that we catch up with ourselves at the end of the day so that teatime and bedtime are always roughly the same time. Isn't nine months the kind of time that separation anxiety can kick in? Maybe it is a comfort thing that will pass with lots of reassurance?

Sorry I can't offer more 'wisdom' (haha!) at the mo - DS ended the evening with a poo so powerful that it flew out of his nappy, then out of the bottom of his trousers and pooled on the floor. An hour later I have just finished dealing with the aftermath and now I have to cook tea (not very hungry now...) What with that and teething, we could be in for a helluva night...

Blimey, that's some poo!

Fingers crossed for a better night.

Morning all - as suspected a grim tooth-and-poo filled night here. We are all under par with no appetite and nausea and DS has also reached the peak of teething misery (last time it was still another 3 weeks before teeth arrived...urgh) I'm not leaving the house today. In fact, leaving the sofa will be a struggle.

How's your LO Sambo? Any better?

Beatrix - how's it going newbie?

Maria - saw the other thread. You're in my favourite country in the world. I dreeaamm of being there soon, when I can summon the energy to fill in a passport form. Enjoy.

arti things have improved thanks for asking...and a tooth appeared this morning! ds went from midnight to 8am without feeding although I did get up at 4am and spent 45 mins trying to get him to sleep - I used the dummy and held his arms down cos he wakes himself up waving his arms about, he fell asleep after about 25mins then woke himself up again, so I tried again then decided to give up cos I was cold and he rolled over and went to sleep by himself!!! Ds's daytime naps have gone to pot but dp says we should force him to sleep by using the dummy and holding his arms down twice a day. Dp did this succesfully yesterday afternoon and I did it successfully this morning - I am sure good daytime naps lead to rested night time sleep so we will continue with this.

beatrix goodness that sounds horrendous, do you use a dummy with your LO?

Good morning everyone, writing this from my mum's house (I'm still on holiday).

Things have continued being very diffucult... but the good news is that my mum looked after DS for 3 nights in a row & DP & I went & had 3 nights of uninterrupted sleep- MUCH NEEDED sleep as you can imagine. Bad news is that DS continued his usual fragmented sleep pattern, which is really bad these days- basically he wakes at least 8-9 times in a 12 hour period (meaning, from bedtime at 7.00 or 7.30- till waking up in the morning around 7.00 am). I think it's definitely a sleep association issue because we give him a huge bottle of milk around 10 or 11 pm, which he finishes completely, and it's not possible that it's hunger that keeps waking him up after that. We'll have to do some sleep training once we return to London, which I really dread & didn't want to do But I can't see any other solution...

oh dear maria poor you. What is an uninterrupted night of sleep like? I've forgotten

Our nights are better with wakings at midnight and 3.30 or 4am. But, now the daytime naps have gone to pot - ds used to nap reliably 3 or 4 hours per day, that's down to 20 mins in the morning and 20 mins in the afternoon - usually I have to force him to sleep by using his dummy and holding his arms down, sometimes he falls asleep from exhaustion - it's not right. Not sure how to proceed...

Maria, your mum is a star - 3 nights of proper sleep! Although, sorry to hear DS's sleep just as bad as ever. Hope you're enjoying your holiday though.

I have been reading Teach Yourself Baby Sleep by Andrea Grace, and it definitely makes sense. Not so gentle (not sure if that's the right word, so hope you know what I mean) as NCSS, but not controlled crying either, although she does include it. It's given me the confidence to go ahead with night weaning. Last night I only let DS feed for a very brief period during the night (twice), so I am now pretty sure he doesn't need to be fed, it's just a habit. It's got a case study in each chapter, which I've found really interesting and I've got a few ideas from it.

The plan is cut night feeds, then work on getting DS to sleep in his cot all night, not in with me, and then hopefully through the night...

He always goes down like a dream, then wakes up about 1 hour to 90 mins later - tonight when he woke, I stood in the door, shushed and told him to go back to sleep. He did! Farking miracle. He's still asleep.....

Have been away! Not sleeping much though.

Was feeling very sorry for myself last friday, feeling a little more upbeat. I think I have adapted to the lack of sleep, for now anyway.

Arti hope the next tooth doesn't take 3 weeks. Am currently feeding twice a night but shushhing a lot more! Have realised DD is teething also plus she had a cold over the weekend so am hoping it is all a phase and things will settle down. I think I read on this thread not to hope for much. oh dear.

Sambo we don't have a dummy, we only tried a couple of times in the beginning and she didn't take to it and we did not perservere.

Maria glad you've got some much-needed rest. Enjoy the rest of your hols.

Whinegums I have also been reading the AG book and I do like her approach. DS had almost weaned himself off night feeds but then the teething really kicked in...then he got a tummy bug, so we're back there again! Poor little mite was screaming this morning at 6am. Took a long time of cuddling and Calpol before he finally dropped off again. The offending fangs are looking very inflamed this morning so hopefully on their way. Until then he needs the comfort.

Sometimes I find that Mumsnet confuses me more than ever. In RL, lots of BF baby seem willing and able to sleep well at night but on MN it seems really common to still be BFing through the night at 1yr+. I start thinking I should just let him decide when to wean...but then we have another night that leaves us all tired and miserable and I think not.

Beatrix, it's amazing how you can adapt to it. If anyone had told me I'd be up in the wee small hours like this, and not find it totally unbearable, I wouldn't have believed them. I have good days and bad of course, last night I went to bed at 10pm so that helped!

Arti, yes, the view(s) bf through the night is confusing. A lot of people on here and some of the 'attachment parenting' gurus say that some babies need a night feed until a year old, and sometimes longer. However, I think your DS has demonstrated that he's probably not one of those - usually. If they're under the weather it's different - like us - if I'm not well, I might want water during the night, but usually I don't.

Last night I only fed DS once, at about 4am, and I only let him feed for a few minutes again. He wasn't best pleased when I detached him, but with cuddling and letting him sleep in with me, he was ok. So I do think the night feeds were habit, when a few weeks ago I was convinced he needed them, as he took big feeds. Not that you can tell when bf of course, but it felt like big feeds.

Is burbling a by product of sleep deprivation... I'll stop now!

As for the night feeding (especially with bf babies). I think at 1 year old- and actaully much earlier than that- they certainly don't actually need the night feeds. Personally I'm happy to feed back to sleep- we give one bottle during the night, the rest of the feeds DS has dropped on his own. And actually (and lots of people don't know this) Gina Ford actually advocates feeding at night for babies who have problems with sleep, because first, the milk helps them go back to sleep quicker, and second cutting out night feeds is much easier than changing bad sleep habits (e.g. babies waking at 5.00 am and not going back to sleep for an hour or so).

I also think there's a huuuuuuge variation in night feeding. It's very different, IMO, to feed a baby once a night (it's almost a strategic move, helps the baby go back to sleep quickly). And it's a totally different thing to feed every 1-2 hours (usually bf) with a 1 year old. If it's the latter, I'm sorry but I really don't understand how that can be a good thing for parent or child. I also personally disagree with the idea that the baby can be completely left to 'lead' when it comes to night feeds. The parent has to play an active role too, I think.

Anyway. Am glad to let you know that things are slightly better here sleep-wise. Not good (we're still at 4-5 wakings per night) but better. Which is a step in the right direction. I think the fact that my mum had DS for 3 nights meant he got used again to sleeping alone in his cot, in another room from us. He still has his dummy problem, of course, but there's been a step in the right direction, as I said. It's amazing how quickly babies adapt to changes! It really only takes 3-4 days (and my mum didn't let him cry at all, btw, she just made sure to keep returning him to his cot during the night).

well, i'm an infrequent visitor to this thread, but just wanted to check in and say there is light at the end of the tunnel - we have gone from waking at least every 2 hours to going to sleep at about 9:30 (suits us), up at 8ish, with only a couple of quick feeds.

we have done nothing different - we are co-sleeping still, and plan to carry on. The only thing that has changed is that she seems to wriggle over onto her front more. But really i think it is just like everything else baby-related ie everything is a phase.

Hope this doesn't jinx it.

Glad to hear that there's been some improvement all round. We are doing fine, up once for a feed then back to bed until after 6. I personally prefer this than when he was sleeping right through to 5 and then deciding to get up!

In fact, I think I am beginning to realise that this is good, DS is average or better and I should stop whining now! DP and I have realised that because we're always tired we've put life on hold as a result - so we've now decided we're going to make some plans to go out, have lunch, accept friends' offers to babysit, book a holiday ie generally try and get a bit of a life. It feels good.