Misguided Illusion Part II - Baby still not sleeping through by six months? Come and join us!

[MomOrMum]

Thought I would start a fresh thread as, sadly, we have almost filled the first one.

Feral, Kiwi, Chulita, et al...shouldn't we have graduated from this thread by now?!

Now welcoming a new crop of 6 months+ babies determined to help us reach new heights/depths of sleep deprivation.

Here is the original thread:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/sleep/713951-Support-thread-for-those-who-were-under-the-misguided-illusion

We've got pants sleep again Skye hasn't slept through in about a month, and last night was awake from 11:20 till 1:10 then 3:30 till 3:45 and 5:55 till 6:25, and then awake for the day at 7:30. Not sure quite what's going on, it's either teething, MMR reaction, or something unnamed. During her first wake she'd start dozing off then suddenly tense, arch her back and scream for about 20 seconds. Then she'd relax, and the cycle would repeat - for 2 bloody hours!

She's also not been eating well, and I guess the two are related.

Sorry there are so many people having rotten times - I wonder if it's the weather...

Glad there are some improvements though! Fingers crossed hers will improve soon!

Thanks all,

Hooray for good sleep for olivo and blue, nice to hear some success stories. Sorry you are having a rubbish time Galena, my money is on another tooth - DS's always came through in 2s. Maybe it won't last long.

Reluctantly did some CC with DD past few nights when settling for naps and for the night. It has been ok, she is protesting rather than screaming and has never cried more than 15min. Don't know whether it is coincidence but since this she is only waking twice for feeds which is much better. Might try dropping feeds in a week or 2 as I would love to have her sleeping well before she starts crawling.

Hi everyone. Things going fairly well here [cautious optimism]- M is sleeping from 6.45/7ish through to about 5 pretty routinely, so the early rising is the only remaining "problem". When I think that only just under a month ago she was up every 2 hours on a very very good night this seems like a miracle really. Wimps controlled crying has worked wonders for us. I think I might do wake to sleep if the early waking starts to feel like a big problem but actually quite enjoy bringing her into our bed for cosy feed first thing and she suckles away quite happily for 45 mins ish so we don't actually have to get up for the day at 5.

Hope things staying better for others. Glad to hear dd is sleeping more atm, melonian- have so been there on the feeling desperate front! How's Skye, Galina?

We seem to be improving a little - for the past 2 nights she's woken for an hour or so somewhere between 12 and 2, but then has slept till 7 or 7:30 so that is FAR better!

I think it was a reaction to the MMR, although she is chewing a lot, so hopefully tooth 2 will appear sometime soon!

Glad to hear M is improving, auto. I'm glad I'm not the only one who sometimes feels that it's not necessary to solve an issue that others might think of as a problem. If it works for you, it's fine!

Gone downhill again here last night.

What's "wimps controlled crying" autodidact? I definitely couldn't do the "hard" sort for all sorts of reasons!

Wimps controlled crying is just checking and resettling every few minutes, blue, instead of extending the time by increments so that you could potentially leave the baby crying for quite a while without going in to him/her. Tanya Byron suggests it as a slightly less harrowing alternative to the full on idea. It's still horrible but, give or take a few blips, it really was almost instantaneously effective after the first awful night and even then the longest she cried was about 20 mins. I think it ultimately worked because it forced her to learn to settle herself without a boob in her mouth and she just couldn't do that before, even though we tried to put her down sleepy but awake/rocking/patting etc. It felt very, very mean but I think it was worth it for the family as a whole. Partner and I were bickering terribly because we were so knackered and I wasn't getting any time with my older kids in the evenings as M would be awake and needing me from 7pm, sometimes every half hour through the night. 9 months felt like long enough and I was cacking my pants about going back to work on that amount of sleep, tbh.

Sounds like it might be worth investigating! We've got both boys in the same room and I worry about ds1 being woken up by extended crying. DS2 will sometimes go down without a feed, and I do usually put him down awake but he seems to need to suck to get to a sleepy state. DS1 eventually started to suck on his teddy instead, and I'm still kind of hoping DS2 will magically do the same soon!

Been away for a while at home 'B' (no internet yet) so lots to catch up on. Good to hear some success. Thanks Galena for the offer of cake - it is one of my major coping mechanisms. Think I am quite a way from you as over in cider/cream tea country so cake will have to be virtual . Sorry to hear you're having rubbish nights again. I do suspect teeth so hope they're through soon. After DS's first few teeth we got better at recognising when it might be a problem. He's gone to bed with calpol and nurofen tonight as I can see the last 2 incisors ready to pop.
DS is well now but sleep has been up and down. I have reread the section about 'success is like a dance' in the NCSS many times to keep vague sanity. He has done some 4 hour stretches until 11 and a couple of 5 hour stretches until midnight. He's then awake about every 2 hours after a long stretch. I reckon his average is 3 wakings before 5am now (also do the bring to bed, feed and get another hours sleep thing), which is better than it was. It is a very s-l-o-w improvement. Definitely 1 step forward, 2 back at the moment. On one of these better nights though I was wide awake until about 3am, even though I'd been up to BF him twice the oxytocin was doing nothing for me. DH was on nights so he couldn't shush/pat me to sleep . Lots of separation anxiety as well at the moment (he's almost 10 months), and very upset at bedtime. I have been in need of medicinal vino once I finally get him down. DH is struggling to settle him on his many night wakings, especially after his stint on nights when it was just me. It seems it has to be mummy and it has to be boob (or else sucking mummy's hair, which has long since ceased to be endearing). Have also decided to stop thinking of the night BF as anything to do with food, and only to think of them as comfort. Has made it much easier to justify to myself, especially when I was on my own overnight and on survival mode.
Ho hum, on we go then.....

Home B, carve? Did I miss the fact that you're moving/have moved, or are you just one of these rich families with houses scattered over the world? I'm in Gloucestershire, so not as far from you as the London bunch .

Sorry to hear there is such slow improvement for you, but I also decided to stop worrying about the bf overnight as I realised she wasn't going to still be bf to sleep at 18, so I would feed her as long as necessary. The night feeds got shorter and shorter (in fact, they were just long enough for her to fall asleep really, and once asleep I'd unlatch her and put her to bed) and then she would stop waking for them. At a few weeks before she was 1 she stopped waking at night (ok, since then she's started again, but in between I've stopped bfing so now she just gets her dummy and is rocked to sleep).

It will improve.

Wow I feel half human again! Autodidact, we are just the same as you except DD is 8 months.

We also did wimps CC checking every 5 min and I still feed her before sleeps but put her down awake. Last night she woke at 11 but settled after 5min whinging, fed at 3 and slept until 6! That is the best ever, only 1 night feed!! I so hope she can keep this up, but we're going on hoiday next week - eek!

We are in East Devon so maybe not a million miles from you carve, and Galena.

Hoping all the teeth come out quick

Alas, we are not mega-rich Galena. DH is on a temporary contract away from home and he gets some expenses to rent so seeing as I'm on mat leave we all commute together and come back to our proper home when we can. Far from ideal, and I do think it doesn't help the sleep issue, but better than being apart, and I'm sure much better for DH & DS's relationship. Thankfully DS was more accepting of DH settling him a couple of times last night, think he just needed time to get used to it not being always Mummy again. Roll on the next set of DH working nights then .
Our rental place is in South Glos & permanent home West Devon so not a million miles away from you or Melonian. Think some of the posts a while back must have left me thinking more people were London based.
Great to hear you've had some success Melonian (& autodidact). We haven't wanted to do any CC up to now, and are doing more of a NCSS thing, although I don't think it's safe to rule anything out for the future, especially if I struggle when I return to work. This parenting lark seems a balance between ideals and maintaining sanity to me. Can I just ask (in case we crack at some point) - when you go in to check do you settle DD until she's no longer crying? DS is a real screamer at night. He just gets so upset and totally beside himself, its horrible and it takes ages (or boob) to calm him down. I think if we left him he'd make himself sick. In the day he's a little poppet and hardly ever tricky at all though, just seems to undergo some transformation at night. Can't have everything I suppose....

Hi Carve, schlepping back and forth must be hard, and a nightmare that DH does nights, so then you are on your own at night and have to be quiet in the day as well?

We have done just about everything in the NCSS - have introduced nap routine, bedtime routine, comforter, have tried gradual withdrawal but could only get as far as shush/patting to sleep, which took longer than feeding so not much use. At least these meant that DD could settle without boob occasinally. Last night she only woke once for a feed .

I'm not trying to influence you at all, obviously you know your baby, but I never ever thought I could do CC, and I certainly still couldn't if it meant leaving her screaming and distressed until she passed out exhausted. But maybe if you can get to the shush/pat stage you will know if your DS is "ready" for gentle CC. You can always say - I'll stop if he gets really distressed/cries for 30min and leave it for a few weeks. I can't remember if your DS self-settles at bedtime but if not that would def be a time to try it - when you're not exhausted and you know LO is ready to sleep.

Aren't we lucky to live in Devon? I love it so much at this time of year. Off to Cornwall next week so fingers crossed for some sun, that'll probably scupper the sleep progress.

I see, carve! I was hoping I could become the 'poor relative'... Doesn't cound great, but far better for you all to be together, I'd have thought! Assuming your rental place is near Bristol, it's about an hour from me (Cheltenham) - perfectly do-able for a meet up at some point (if wanted!).

We did CC with Skye at one point (when she'd be awake for 2 hour stretches every night, yelling if we cuddled her, yelling if we didn't, etc. We decided something had to give. We did the 5-minute visit version, and she never cried longer than 30 minutes, and within 4 or 5 nights wasn't waking at all. We didn't settle till she'd stopped crying, we'd just go in and had a phrase which was all we'd say - we'd go in, put our hand on her chest, kiss her forehead and say 'Mummy and Daddy love you, but it's time to go to sleep', kiss her again and leave. She would immediately ramp up the screaming, and it was hard not to go back in straight away, but after 2 or 3 visits she'd start crying intermittently and I'd leave her and only go back in if she cried for a 5-minute stretch. Then she'd suddenly go quiet. That said, she's now learned how to cry till she's sick (only a recently acquired 'skill') so we're trying to avoid having to use CC again!

Aagh! The night before last DS2 slept through till 4.30, so I think maybe he's getting better... so last night I was up for an hour between 2.30 and 3.30! Every time he nearly settled, he woke himself up with a coughing fit, so running back and forwards to the bathroom in case he coughed himself sick - not uncommon.

So, this morning we ended up in A&E with DS1 after an accident directly or indirectly due to lack of sleep on my part. More and .

Seems like we can't go on like this, but we don't want to try any sort of sleep training - probably PUPD at first - while he's unwell, and he never seems to shake these colds/coughs for long... Gah!

Blue, I know exactly where you're coming from with the 'never well' thing - Skye was ill permanently from November to May. We just waited for her to be better - rather than completely well! Hope DS1 is ok?

Skye has been a bit better recently - has generally been waking once or twice - lst night it was twice, but each time she settled in 10 minutes, so I don't mind that! I'm sure one day she'll go back to sleeping through.

Here's hoping everyone else is having improving nights.

Hey girls, sorry it has been a while, my DD has now moved into her own room, cut another 4 teeth, started walking and climbing and has turned one but is still not sleeping! ahhhhhh!

Thanks for the advice ladies. We're not at the CC stage yet but I'm learning that playing "I will never..." is unwise when it comes to parenting, and hearing your experiences is very helpful. I always said I'd never make aeroplane noises when spoon feeding DS but guess what....
Melonian, if DS is well, happy and tired but not overtired he can self settle and has always been able to which makes all his sleeping issues particularly foxing. He doesn't do much in the way of in between wingeing - he's either ok or highly distressed. He just doesn't seem to conform to the 'rules' of how babies should respond to all the ideas you get . Have been trying to get him attached to a comfort object for ages for example but he's not remotely fooled... And Devon is fab . Hope you have a great time in Cornwall.
Galena - Only a few weeks left communting but meeting up would be good. Would need suggestions as to where though(??). Totally know what you mean about being ill forever. I think DS has either been ill or teething since January. He's teething again now so nights are worse than usual. Once through he'll have all 8 incisors. I heard legend of a respite in the teething process at this point but I can actually see his canines descending quite clearly under the gum ....
Blue - FWIW, I've never been able to get anywhere with PU/PD. DS just gets so worked up, and my back really suffers (esp. now almost 10 months and cot is lowered) so eventually I crack and he either goes to sleep on my shoulder or I end up BF. Your DS may of course respond much better so do report back if you give it a go.
MrsMcJnr - you have wrecked my fantasy that DS will magically 'get it' when he turns one .

I?m not getting anywhere trying to get my DD close to a toy either. She is not remotely interested in soft toys or snugglers of any sort. She does like to have her muslin to sleep with in her buggy though so I am giving that to her in her cot too, I guess it smells of milk and me! We have also introduced music recently and she seems to like it. She goes back down faster than before we played the music but she is still up every hour or if we are lucky every two after we put her down. I am fed up of the whole possible teeth excuse too. DD has 14 and I too am wondering if we?ll get a reprieve before any more come in but she is biting all and sundry again so it doesn?t look like it. Keep trying the back stroking, I thought it would never work with DD but over the last 6 weeks or so she will fall asleep like that and I am trying really hard to put her down awake but sleepy. That all goes to pot after midnight though when I simply feed her and put her down next to me in the bed and hope that both of us manage to get some sleep I just cannot seem to find the energy to break that cycle

Poor you Blue it is so hard to look after one child when you haven?t had much sleep let alone two. I seriously worry some days that I won?t manage it. Hope DS1 is ok now?

Galena ? DD gets to the hysterical nearly sick stage so quickly!

Skye slept through from 7:30pm to 7:00am last night! Didn't do anything different, she just didn't wake up.

Fingers crossed for tonight!

MrsMc - 14 teeth?! Skye has 1 - although I think we may well see the second in the next few days! We have always played music at bedtime - although it's gone off by the middle of the night (we put it on a timer for an hour) and she still generally settles.

Sending sleepy dust to all the little munchkins!

Galena - wow!

MrsMc - yes, DS1 is fine - he seems to be the only child in the world who doesn't like plasters though... Hmm, I can see that PU/PD
would be back-breaking and DS2 is such a lump. Maybe I'll hold off on that a bit longer.

We had quite a few wakings last night, but only one between us going to bed and 6am, which is pretty good going. He hasn't stirred yet tonight, but I've probably jinxed that now! ;)

DS1 sussed the whole sleep thing out at about a year. Whether it was a development thing, attaching to his teddy, or stopping feeding at night I don't know - they all happened around the same time. So I'm hoping that DS2 will do the same. It is so much harder this time round though, because of having a 3 year-old to look after and far fewer opportunities to go and lie down in the daytime.

Bah - shouldn't have said she'd slept through - she woke at 2 last night and wouldn't go back down for 40 minutes. (Ok, so that's not so bad really, but I was hoping for another sleep through!)

Blue - glad DS1 is ok. Hope you had a peaceful night last night.

Oh, and carve, not sure where's best to meet - only been to Bristol once! If we were to meet in Bristol, I might be tempted to travel by train (so I don't have to park the car anywhere) so something close to the station would be good. Otherwise, if there's somewhere you know out of town I can drive. Wednesdays and Thursdays are good for me (although not 23/24 June or 15 July). Might be best to email me at r.e.swinton AT googlemail DOT com as I always check email and don't always check here.

Hope we can arrange something!

Yes Mrs McJnr, we are having more success with a muslin but DS informs me clearly that this is a very poor substitute for my hair which he loves sucking (appears to have same effect as BF, am kicking self for allowing him to develop an entirely unhelpful replacement )
Blue have you heard of the No Cry Sleep Solution book? Its discussed a lot on here, & if you're not keen to do CC it might be worth a go. We have had some success with DS settling much easier and waking less, but then illness & teeth have scuppered (this would be the same with CC though I guess). Thanks for the reassuring words re: your DS1. God I hope mine does something similar.
Galena - yey on the sleep through but not-so-yey on the next night. Will have a think about where would be good to meeet.

DS woke about every 1-2 hours last night. I did manage a settle without BF (rocking, music, back stroking, and erm, hair sucking ) which I haven't managed successfully in a few weeks, but then he was awake an hour later. DH brought him to bed at 4am as we'd had enough.

Yes Mrs McJnr, we are having more success with a muslin but DS informs me clearly that this is a very poor substitute for my hair which he loves sucking (appears to have same effect as BF, am kicking self for allowing him to develop an entirely unhelpful replacement )
Blue have you heard of the No Cry Sleep Solution book? Its discussed a lot on here, & if you're not keen to do CC it might be worth a go. We have had some success with DS settling much easier and waking less, but then illness & teeth have scuppered (this would be the same with CC though I guess). Thanks for the reassuring words re: your DS1. God I hope mine does something similar.
Galena - yey on the sleep through but not-so-yey on the next night. Will have a think about where would be good to meeet.

DS woke about every 1-2 hours last night. I did manage a settle without BF (rocking, music, back stroking, and erm, hair sucking ) which I haven't managed successfully in a few weeks, but then he was awake an hour later. DH brought him to bed at 4am as we'd had enough.