Help 5 month old waking every hour - should I let him cry?

[Myneaux]

My five month old son has never been a good sleeper and has always woken up at least twice a night and has fought going to sleep during the day so that we have to use a dummy and comfort him to sleep before putting him in his cot.

Until recently we have been able to get him back to sleep at night by giving him his dummy and comforting him for a few mins without picking him up. I still feed him once in the night.

For the last 4 weeks this has steadily been getting worse and he has been waking every 1-2 hours starting only 2 hours after putting him to bed. For the last week he has been increasingly difficult to settle when he wakes he seems very unsettled and doesnt go back into a deep sleep. Me and my husband have been sat for hours next to his cot with our hands on his chest and putting the dummy back in but we cant go on much longer.

He isnt hungry or cold (have tried warming the room and have started weaning). we have tried the comforter thing and putting rolled up blankets next to him. He doesnt sleep well during the day either and is definately not getting too much sleep. Basically he seems to need us there to go back to sleep and even then is very restless if we remove our hands.

Should we try and let him cry so he learns to settle himself?...am reluctant to do this unless I have to as he is awake so often it will be awful and he would have to learn to give up the dummy at the same time (he cant keep it in by himself)...or does anyone have experience of babies growing out of this phase.

sorry for the long rambling message but Ive had less the 4 hours sleep for the last week and the brain isnt working too clearly !

Poor you! 5 months is a classic mega growth spurt time, many babies' sleep is shot at this point, even those who were good sleepers beforehand. I'd do anything to get a much sleep as possible, whether that's feeding, co-sleeping or whatever. It doesn;t last for ever though it can feel like it!

Personally I think 5 mo is far too young to be left to cry, esp as he's prob feeling unsettled and cross.

Oh and if you've just started solids that may be a factor, both mine were more unsettled after starting with food as their digestion had to adjust.

I wouldn't personally leave him to cry.
It might be that he is over-tired (yes, that can stop them sleeping!)
Can you note down his basic sleep/eat routine & times - might let people give you some ideas.
Keep strong, it is a phase, and will get better - in the meantime, try to go to bed early, nap when you can in the day, and perhaps have 'shifts' at night with your DP - e.g. 9-2am, you get the earplugs, he does the settling, then swap over.
HTH.

The only way you can know he's not hungry is if you offer a feed and he doesn't take it. Weaning at 5 months is not going to keep a baby full overnight, especially not during the enormous 6 month growth spurt, which can last a month. At 5 months, food does not get fully digested, if it gets digested at all. None, or almost none, of the calories in the food that you are giving are being used by his body. The food is just filling space that would've been filled by usable calories from milk. Weaning at this age (or indeed at 6 months when you're supposed to start) is not to prevent hunger/replace milk, it is so that the body can start getting used to food and learn how to digest it. Milk is still the primary source of nutrition for several months.

thanks for the advice i guess we will have to think a bit more before trying sleep training....just not sure how much longer i can carry on waiting for things to get better.

I appreciate what you are saying about early weaning but at this point he is having solids on top of the 5 milk feeds a day and i am still feeding at about 3.30...perhaps we can try a bottle earlier to make sure but he doesnt really seem hungry just unsettled.

over tiredness could definately be a factor as he has typically 3 naps a day, two of which are only half an hour long

I can only offer a bit of hope. My dd was exactly like this, fought sleep, frequent waking and grew out of it over the following couple of months. By 7 months I couldn't remember what the problem was really. We just went with it (but we co-sleep). I fed her whenever she woke and it passed.

I know its just awful but it will pass. DD is now 9.5 months and crawls over to me when she wants to go to bed! Its a complete turn around.

Good luck!

Whenever you post in the sleep section about baby waking up multiple times in the night, you can bet that somebody (well-meaning, of course) will say "growth spurt", regardless of your baby's age.

• If problem lasts more than a week, it's not a because of a growth spurt
• measure his height (length) every day. if there is no dramatic change, it's not a growth spurt

... and in any case:

• there is no five-month growth spurt

Just from OP, it sounds like your baby might be waking up frequently because the dummy is falling and he wants it reinserted. This is exactly why we took it away last month, at 5 months - DS was waking up sometimes every half hour and would fall back to sleep as soon as we reinserted the dummy. Within two days he started to sleep much better and for far longer stretches of time.

I hope that helps.

Wow- i was just about to start a thread asking for help when I read this. My DD is 5 months old and has always been a poor sleeper: 3 naps a day, all of them approx 45 minutes long, and used to wake once in the night about 5am for a quick feed but this has gradually been getting earlier and earlier so that last week it was a 3 am feed. This week she's been waking 4-5 times in the night for no good reason- have added an extra layer of clothing so not too cold and she's taking 6 1/2 ounces of formula at 10.30pm as well as being breast fed 4 times through the day. She doesn't have any signs of illness and no signs of growth spurt either. In fact she's completely cheerful in the daytime, while her exhausted mum tries to function like a human being.
She settles herself to sleep in the mornings but needs a dummy for her other naps and if she wakes at night (I'm still only feeding her once during the night as she wasn't interested in her morning feed when I fed her twice).
Hmmm- from what you are all saying, it's a case of getting through it, which is what I was afraid of. The only question is do I start formula feeding as I'm so tired that I'm sure my milk supply is affected, which may be making the problem worse? I really wanted to BF until 7 months but if it's a case of saving my sanity then stopping when 2 weeks short of 6 months isn't too bad.

You don't have to stop BF even if you are concerned about the effect of your weaker supply on your baby's sleep. Why not just offer a bottle after the night feed as a top-up?

I found my DS' sleep (which is still not amazing) was made very light by his love of a dummy. From 10 weeks (when I started to use it) til 5.5 months (when I got rid of it) he would wake all evening and all night - hourly sometimes. For some reason the dummy just made him sleep very lightly and he wanted it back all the time when it came out.

Getting rid of it was very difficult for me but the best thing I have done. (Really wish I had never given it to him and would not touch one with a barge pole if we have another DC).

This may well not be your problem (- I haven't met anyone who has had such a bad time with dummies as us) but I though it might be worth sharing just in case it is?

Good luck and huge amounts of sympathy. Waking twice a night as I do now is a million times better than where we were months ago...

When in doubt, feed. This is the one thing I wish I had known from day one. It can't do any harm and very often works.

thank you all for your comments and advice. We have had a few slightly better nights with giving a more feeds.

Just out of interest how did you both get rid of the dummy habit?...did you withdraw it completely even during the day?..and how long did it take for your DC to get used to not having it?

part of our problem is that our DS fights going to sleep at all during the day and the only way to calm him seems to be the dummy. I also wish I hadnt started with it but looking back it was the only thing we could do in the early months when he had colic

The 6 month growth spurt can last a month. It can start early or late. If bf and you think your supply is dropping, it is most likely that your supply (which should be v. well established by now) is as it was and there are increased demands due to a ... growth spurt!

Could he be teething? I know most people will say it's too early but every baby is different!

I think with colic you have no choice but use a dummy and you shouldn't regret it! We took it away cold turkey and it was horrible for one nap (he did scream for 30 minutes poor love and there was no comforting him). After that I could rock him to sleep in a dark room and he would be comforted by me. And he stopped waking up quite so much at night. I know some people use the no cry sleep solution for removing the dummy slowly but I couldn't picture managing that. I don't know if I did it right but it only took one nap for him to realise it was gone. Poor thing. He also fights sleep in the day and I find it hard to get him to nap - I use the pushchair or feed to sleep or rock in a dark room with a lullaby. I found the same lullaby each time a great help (even in the pushchair). But I do recommend getting rid of dummies before they get older and attached. My sis is having touble with her 1 year old and his dummy which he doesn't find himself at night. But I shouldn't give advice only experience. HTH

Myneaux - We just took the dummy away. That first night it was a bit hard for him to fall asleep but once he did, he didn't wake up often at all.