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....

Argh for you too staines - I'm very glad at the moment that I have no plans to go back to work just yet.
I went out for a ladies' night last night and got back around 11pm to hear DD screaming and DH with fingers poised to call the hospital. Apparently DD had been screaming for an hour and he'd changed her, offered her milk and cuddled her and she just wasn't settling. I went up, gave her boob and within 2 mins she was cooing away at me . I didn't bother with CC last night cos DH said he'd been doing it but she wasn't giving up. She didn't even feed properly, she just wanted boob and she got it. She was up 3 times between 11pm and 8am and I was doing a charity run this morning so I was not best impressed. I'm at a loss as to what to do now...I'm not convinced CC will work for her.
welcome elizabethbob, I'm sure you'll fit right in DD has never regressed cos she's never slept properly...[goes to look up regression in the dictionary]

Chulita your DD sounds like a very determined little girl! Ah well, she may be giving you a tough time now but I'm sure her determination and tenacity will be a tremendously positive personality trait when she's older. DS is stereotypically boyish and gives up at the first hurdle which will probably have me tearing my hair out when he grows up!

Staines, perhaps your DH and mine should just bugger off on a boy's holiday together. I feel like the pecking order in our house goes DS, XBox, DH then me at the moment. And don't feel pressured into CC, it's not working for Chulita after all and it doesn't work for us at nap times if DS wakes himself rolling over, it's only worked for us in the wee small hours when I don't think DS is fully awake anyway. I originally swore I wouldn't do it until I was (a) desperate and (b) DS was 8-9 months minimum. It just felt like the time was right this week because he'd pulled a few 5-6 hour shifts.

Hi princess and elizabethbob, welcome to the world of the weary.

I'm leaving this to the end so that I can say it dead quick, then leg it and hide:

DS slept from 7.30 until 5am last night.

Feralgirl Did I notice on another thread that you have had success at naptimes by co-sleeping/ taking DO to bed with you? If so and I didn't misread/ get wrong person can you tell me more about that?? I'm having a nap nightmare at the moment...

DD is gradually getting tireder earlier in an evening. Will be taking her as soon as posted ths as she is starting to whinge. We are getting one night waking for a quick feed but on the whole not too bad. Still doing NCSS and is so much less stressful then CC.

Must go she is starting to howl

She is asleep in bed but I will probably be back in 30-60 mins for another feed. She thinks this 8.30 sleep is just a nap

Yeah, it was me. DS stopped doing decent naps at about 2 months old and would only do one sleep cycle of 40 mins and then not go back to sleep. I let him do his short naps morning and afternoon and just concentrated on his midday ones. This is what I did:

12 o'clockish, I'd settle DS with boob and spend two hours with him actually asleep on my chest. I'd ususally go to sleep too coz I was so knackered, or read or watch TV. He'd sometimes wake up and I'd feed him again or just cuddle until he dropped off. Did this for about a month.

By 3 months old it was uncomfy to have him asleep on me so I'd still feed him to sleep but cuddle up really close in bed with him. It was about this time when he started refusing to sleep on his back. If he woke I'd feed him or shush-pat him back down again. Did this for a few weeks then experimented with being next to him until he was asleep then getting up but staying in the same room (on MN) so I could deal straight away if he woke.

Then I started putting him in his cot but sleeping in my bed next to him for the whole time, still feeding to sleep and shush-patting if he woke. By the time he was 5 months, I'd feed him to sleep, put him in his cot and then leave and he'd sleep for a couple of hours.

At about 5.5 months I decided to stop feeding him to sleep so I'd feed him downstairs, bring him upstairs and sing the same song every time while I put him in his grobag, put him in his cot and then shush-pat him until he was in deep sleep.

After a few weeks, I stopped shush-patting and now I just do the song, the grobag and leave him in his cot wide awake. He mutters for 5 mins and then does this weird wail which sounds like he's going to cry and then just goes to sleep for ages.

These days, quite often he'll do 2 x 1.5 hour naps and 1 x 2 hours nap!

It was a looong and drawn out process but it forced me to sleep during the day which probably saved my sanity and I think he sleeps better at night because of it. I don't know how much of it was down to me and how much of it was just about his development though; maybe he'd have learnt to do it by himself anyway?

Oh, and full on black out blinds and white noise have helped too. We like the sensory deprivation in our house!

wow, fg, am impressed by your determination to get ds to nap! i short sightedly took the path of least resistance and thought if ds has 3 hours of daytime naps, it will all be okay, and if some of them are in the car, some in the pushchair, well, it won't really matter.......hmmmmm, and here i am, still moaning about sleep deprivation! he is getting better, but i am running out of time!!

bless dh, i moan about him a lot. he just has a different conception of parenting to me. i think he thinks that it's very important to be a good provider (ie he's from the 1950's) and his job has been badly hit by the recession. so he's picking up extra work at the weekends and taking annual leave to do extra work. however, this means that his priorities are work, recover from work (on his best friend the puter), ds, and i wonder why my wife doesn't want to have sex very often any more. whereas inside my mind i am on a loop of 'i haven't had a whole night's sleep in six months' and am very resentful. i have tried explaining this but am running into the old 'men are from mars' scenario, we are just not speaking the same language....hang on, this is all prob tmi for all of you! sorry, been thinking too much today!!

ps, however, it is true that dh thought paternity leave was a good opportunity to improve his football manager rating. he got manager's manager of the year!

Little bugger princess woke up at 9.30 so went up fed her and she is now down again, this one should last until 4ish but you never know. I will be joining her soon as hayfever is killing me and I want to sleep.

Staines you are a football manager widow as well. Isn't it sad that they will sit for hours pretending to manage a pretend football team.

and he's copied my mn name! staines passive!

Lol Staines, although I think I've been unfair to your DH by comparing him with mine! My DH doesn't have his job as an excuse (PT, messing about in a shop) and I am the main provider! Our parenting approaches are also v different; his could be described as lazy laid back, mine is a tad more bossy and controlling proactive.

Hulla, if you're still lurking, please don't shout if it doesn't work. It was mainly so that I'd get a guaranteed 2 hour kip in the middle of the day!

And Debs, I'm here in snivelling sympathy for the dreaded hayfever. Evil pollen count today. I dread DS showing symptoms as it was hell for me as a kid.

FG, I have already implemented phase one of your nap plan! DD had her morning nap in bed and not on my lap - the first time ever! I'll let you know how we get on!

Hi staines

I was told today that CC only works if you do it for every wake up - including the 2/3am ones. I've been only really trying at the 7pm and sometimes the 10pm wakings so maybe I should decide on 3 days when I'm going to go cold turkey and resign myself to no sleep.
DD is a very good day sleeper, she has 3 naps a day of between 1 to 2.5 hours and we (generally) have no trouble at bedtime. We just need to crack these night-time wakings for my own sanity.
I keep meaning to try black-out blinds, I've got blankets over the window but it means her curtains are never open and it gets really hot in her room sometimes.

Hi,

Can I join in? My son is 6 months this week and is waking up at least twice after I go to bed. I feed him back to sleep but he is hardly feeding in the day now and the health visitor says that he won't eat much in the day if I keep feeding each time at night. He won't settle easily any other way so I am at a loss with what I should do! He goes down awake for his sleep and most of his naps (after 6 months of trying) which is what the health visitor said last time.

Turning into a bit of a zombie now, I had about 4 hours sleep last night and the husband is going to have to sleep in another room tonight because I bring him into our bed once it reaches 4am and I am desperate for sleep, but he then cries in our bed on and off until around 6/7am. I keep saying this will make me strong to keep up a brave face - but I am getting to the end of my tether!

morning all...isn't it brilliant to have lovely flappy arms and lovely kicky legs! and you can hit mummy in the face from 5.45. and kick her in the stomach! god, life's brilliant.
bless him. we are watching tellytubbies and he is in his entertainer. happy as larry.
yesterday i was delighted as ds napped for two hours in his own bed in the morning. i got so much done. i felt like supermum. today we are going to the childminder's for a practise run and i am hopefully going to have a nap on her waterbed and read heat magazine while she gets to know ds. then we're going to the park for a picnic with our mummy gang. today is going to be cool.

i just need to disregard the three wakings last night and the fact that i just can't stay awake to put ds back in his cot once he wakes after 2 am. it's like a vicious circle - if i have enough sleep i can put him back in before he falls fast asleep. then we both sleep better and longer. if i'm knackered we both fall asleep with him on the boob and there's your proverbial rod attached to your own back.
welcome row - i haven't listened to the hv since i realised that all they can tell you is government guidelines. i think it's a tragic misuse of women who are supposed to be experts in babies - they can't apply anything to your individual baby, just advise government guidelines for everything. what's the point!!

Hey all. Stainesmassif DD decided to give me a 5.30 am start today. She'd been down to just two night wakings/ feedings until a few days ago but the last two nights have been grim. Night before last was bed 7, wake 9, 12, 2, 4, 6... Last night bed 7.30 after massive screaming fit, 11, 3.30, 5.30... so a bit better than the night before I suppose. She's utterly refusing to nap more than 30 minutes, has absolutely no interest in food (BLW or even the spoon I tried this morning) and keeps bursting into howls for no reason that I can discern.

I'm having one of those days when I can't be as cuddly and comforting as she probably wants because I'm just so tired. Feel like howling myself.

[coffee and doughnuts for kiwipanda]. Sometimes when DD is whingeing and we've had a crap night, I just sit there holding her having a good old whinge myself...trouble is she finds it funny so no sympathy from LO's corner! Fingers crossed your DD gets some naps in today.
Last night DD slept from...wait for it...6pm til 10pm without waking up!! 4 hours!! That's a big thing in our house. Of course she did her usual between 10 and 5:30 but still, we didn't get the 8pm scream toot toot!!

ps - how sexist am i - hv's can be men too!
kiwi for you, it just makes the whole experience so much harder doesn't it, everything seem insurmountable.

was going to write more, but ds not going for the 2 hour power nap today, just woke up

Ooh, Staines, can I come to the childminder's too? It sounds lovely!

I know I shouldn't whinge (but I'm gonna anyway) because DS slept from 8pm ish until 2.30 last night when he squawked and then went straight back to sleep after I'd shushed him for a second and he didn't wake again until 5am. However it seems the pay-off for this ace sleeping is that we have to actually get up at the crack of bleedin' dawn every day as at 5am he was full of beans. How can he only need 9 hours sleep a night FFS? Maybe I should cut down on his day sleeps now?

So what with that and DH waking me when he finally decided to come to bed at about midnight, I realised that I still only got two-hour stretches of sleep last night which explains why, even though my baby is pretty much sleeping through, I still feel like crap!

Bah.

Feralgirl I'm with you on that - DH needs some serious sleep-training... 34 and he NEVER sleeps through the night, can't self-sooth, snores like a pig and now he's got hayfever which apparently only affects him when he goes to bed. I'm thinking of trying controlled-crying on him. I'll check on him after 5 minutes though, I promise.

Bad night last night, she just plain refused to go to sleep until 10pm. a whole hour and a half after i took her up. On the plus side she came off the boob before rolling over to sleep so hoping she is getting used to the NCSS.
she did wake up at 4 but think that was the heat.

What do you put them in? she has a 1 tog slumbersac and was in a rompersuit but is often quite warm when she gets up

Have found it is essential she gets 2 good naps in the day at least 40 mins long.

hmmmm, dh was left underneath the apple tree at the bottom of the garden as a baby. now he just gets into bed and turns out the light, he's away. maybe there's a lesson there! not one that i necessarily want to learn though...

For some reason the last 2 nights have felt better even though they've been pretty much the same with the only difference being that my little pickle hasn't woken up between bedtime (5:30pm) and 10pm. Last night she slept from half 5 til half 11 with only one forlorn wail at about 8 - not quite sure why but there we go. She then slept from midnight til about quarter to 3 but lay there chatting to herself til 4 when she decided she wanted a drink. Of course I was lying awake the whole hour waiting for her to cry , what a waste of an hour's sleep. She then slept til about 6 ish but was happy playing til just gone 7.
I've noticed that a lot of babies go to bed a lot later than DD. Is that out of choice or cos your LOs aren't tired enough early on? I can't keep DD up beyond 6pm even if she has a nap and doesn't wake up til 5 she'll still be ready for bed at 6ish, sometimes she's in bed tucked up at 5! I'd far rather she went to bed later and slept longer, I'm just not ready to go to sleep at 6!!

Chulita, re bedtimes; DS just goes to bed 2 hours after he wakes from his afternoon nap. That can be 6.30 or sometimes it can even be 8.30. His afternoon nap always depends on how long he had for his lunchtime one and that usually depends on what we've been doing in the morning iyswim.