Help me. I'm losing my mind with exhaustion!

[Confusedfirsttimemum]

DD is 7 months old. For the first three months, she was a lovely sleeper. Went to bed drowsy and fell asleep on her own. Slept through until about 3/4, took a feed and then went back to sleep until around 6:30. I felt great!

From 3 1/2 months onwards, it has all fallen apart bit by bit.

First, we had the early morning wakings. Up for the day around 5am.

Then extra wakings to feed. Usually about 2 and 5, often accompanied by not going back to sleep after the second feed.

Then refusing to go to sleep in the first place without lots of ssshing and patting.

Now, waking for up to 2 hours in the middle of the night and refusing to go back to sleep. This has just been the last week or so.

I am still breastfeeding and doing BLW, and people keep telling me it's hunger. The thing is, I wouldn't mind getting up once to do a feed. No problem with that at all. It's the refusal to settle afterwards and the refusal to go to sleep at night which is driving me spare. Last night, despite a feed, we had yelling from 3am to 5am. I feel like I am losing my mind and at 4:30 ended up sobbing in the bedroom for 15 minutes whilst DD screamed in the other room. I just couldn't sit with her any longer. Poor DH had to comfort me and then went in to settle her for another 1/2 hour.

Daytime naps are not great either. They normally require a dummy or a fast moving pram (no stopping to look in shops). These normally only last 1/2 hour, although I can sometimes get her to go longer by pouncing when she stirs and ssh/patting her, or speeding up in the pram even more.

I just don't know what to do next. DH wonders whether the last week has been teething (no teeth yet). I am torn between feeling that we need to do something drastic before it gets even worse (although the thought of CC makes me feel ill) or whether we should just try and ride it out.

In terms of things we've tried, PU/PD is not any help, because DD doesn't stop crying when you pick her up! She won't go to sleep on me either. Co-sleeping was also a disaster as DD thinks that that's playtime and spends the whole time rolling around, pulling my hair, scratching my face, etc. The dummy sometimes works at night, but often only for 20 minutes or so until it falls out, so I try to avoid it.

Help! Help! Help!

Hi, no words of advice i'm afraid. Just posted myself on feeding . My 7 month old is still waking for a feed every 1.5 to 2hrs all night. I'm also bf and blw. I just wanted to sympathise. I've got a 2 yr old too that i'm terrifiedwill also wake if dd cries for longer than a nanosecond!

Oh goodness, I can't even contemplate what life would be like if I had two.DD is now howling because she's been exhausted since she woke up but no amount of coaxing will make her nap.

Not that this helps in any real way, but we had all this and more with DS at that age. He never slept well from birth, and not settling after feeds was a problem for aaaaages. We had early wakings, late bedtime, screaming in the night, the whole caboodle.

And then, at 10 months, he started sleeping a good 9-10 hour stretch. We did absolutely nothing to make it happen, he just seemed to finally get over the one thing after another (hunger, teeth, gut problems) that had stopped him ever sleeping, and so he slept!

Of course, at 14 months he's randomly started early wakings, but my goodness I've appreciated these few months of uninterrupted sleep

Oh god! How long was it before he started to sleep again? Hanging out for four months of sleep in 3 months time is not an appealing thought .

Confused, our DS did exactly the same thing at 7 months - wouldn't settle in the evening, woke up constantly at night and wouldn't settle in his cot, our bed anywhere.

I was also adamant I wouldn't do CC - but then we found out I was pg again and we really felt we had no choice as DS not sleeping combined with 1st trim exhaustion meant I was going loopy.

We CCed DS for 3 nights - 1st night cried for 1 hr (went in every 5 mins), 2nd night cried for 45 mins, 3rd night 10 mins, then slept through 7-7 .

Course, his sleep then went tits up again at 14 months when he started teething big time, but that's another story!

Oh, and DS2 arrived last month and he's a bloody awful sleeper!

HTH!

I'm not totatlly against CC. More than anything, I am scared that it won't work! DD is very strong willed.

Last night I spent 1 1/2 hours trying to comfort her off to sleep (patting, ssshing, feeding, etc) and nothing doing. Does that mean I could expect to be listening to her screaming for even longer than that if I did CC?

CC doesn't work for all children and I'm not sure how long I would have tried it if it hadn't worked for us tbh. We were lucky that DS1 responded to it quickly but I know others that haven't .

Sorry, I know that doesn't answer your question. All I know is that he would sometimes take 3-4hrs to go to sleep before we did CC but once he realised he wasn't coming out of his cot for anything, but we were still there, he did eventually sleep.

It was a hideous thing to do and I needed dh to keep me strong but we were going insane with tiredness .

That's what I'm scared of. DD cried herself to sleep for 30 minutes once when I was in the car on my own and couldn't stop. She was all 'funny' with me for about 24 hours. Screamed when I put her down, only took 5 minute micro naps. I couldn't bear it if CC actually made things worse.

If you suspect teething, try calpol/calprofen (find the latter helps more). Teething pain is no fun for anyone.

Yes, definitely try the calpol route. I think the crazy thing about cc is that you have to be REALLY resilient yourself to get through the first few days, so if you are tired anyway...

If you really want to give it a try (and there are loads of threads talking you through it) then make sure its over a weekend so you've got time to sleep in day or whenever you can get some support. Don't start it if you don't feel able to give it a really good go, or it will be worse than before.

My 3 have all been crap sleepers. Its bloody awful isn't it.

Good luck!

Just wanted to give you all my sympathy!

Read a very smug post previously about mothers with babies who sleep through very early and really had to bite my tongue not to shout.

She obviously needs to learn to self soothe and really, CC and all is whenever YOU are ready. You can't do it half heartedly and you are in it for the long run.
A good 2 weeks I would say + set backs whenever teething, colds etc...

I never had the stomach for it until DD turned 18 mths and me semi comatose begging the Dr to give me anti depressants when all I needed was uninterrupted sleep.
Can't say it worked though but we stick to our guns and its improving. For one thing she knows not to ask for milk in the middle of the night anymore because she won't get it.

Guess at this age its easier because she can understand when I say sternly go back to sleep. I have to say am weak though because I sit there and obey when she says mummy? hold hands?

Oh and BTW, i was quite smug too before, DS slept through at about 4 months.

DD is therefore quite a shock.

which leads me to conclude, some babies are just bad sleepers.
Do whatever works for you.

Thanks guys. We've tried the Calpol earlier in the week and it did seem to help her get off to sleep, but not back to sleep in the middle of the night (surely it doesn't take as long as 90 minutes to kick in?).

However, the big news is that last night was better. Much better. We had 15 minutes settling to sleep, one 15 minute waking for a feed at 4am and not up until 6:30. I feel like a new woman. Perhaps threatening CC was enough to make her think she'd better do a good one.

I think that, so long as there are good nights as well as bad ones, I'm going to hold off on the CC for now. As I said previously, I don't mind feeding once in the night at all, and I'm really scared that CC will make things worse.

Will probably be back tomorrow saying that we've had another awful one. But, for today, I'm a happy woman .

You have my total sympathy! My 17 month old is getting worse and worse sleep wise and I am 6mnths preg and really exhausted. I have tried everything - even going to the length of paying £250 for expert advice from a baby sleep clinic -who did not recommend cc. In fact lots of baby sleep books are against cc - ie Baby Whisperer and Save our Sleep/Tizzie Hall. They both say it distresses and confuses some babies (ie with the constant going in and out of room) I have tried cc with my baby several times and he has often cried non stop for over 3 hrs and if does fall asleep at end of this , it is only for max on 30 mins. The SOS book recommends leaving the baby to cry and either not going back into the room at all or staying in room whilst baby cries but not picking them up - just sit there until they go to sleep (which in my experience can also take hours!)
This is my first time on here so I am not sure how this works but I would happily email you the sleep plan the clinic gave to me if you would like it? There were def some v helpful tips in there that I continue to use -my baby did improve drastically for a while but has now regressed.

Fab news confused! Lol at your LO picking up on the threat of CC!

Im in tha same boat. I have a 6 month old who BF to sleep, and soemtimes goes in the cot drowsy, but wakes every 2 hours sometimes to feed, sometimes to be hugged. it can take between 10 mins and 2 hours to re settle each time, I also have a 2 1/2 year old who is having nigth terrors so Im up with him in the night too - and I cant let no 2 cry too much in case he wakes his big bro up. I never knew it was possible to be this exausted. we ve tried medised (which was great with first baby!) but now not allowed for babies, but even then he wakes up loads but does have a good 5 hours at first. I bought the no cry sleep solution book by elizabeth pantley when we had probs with no1 sleeping naps and nigth time and ittakes soem time but does work. Im just waiting for no 2 to get rif of this cold hes had for 8 weeks so we can get started sleep training no 2! its a good book and offers alternatives to CC which Im so against. good luck xx

Confused -just going to throw in my two pence worth!

If I were you I'd be focussing on the day time naps - in my experience when the naps are right, the night is right.

Admittedly I have slaved myself to naps but for a decent uninterrupted sleep I amm happy to walk for hours, miles and miles, in wind and rain for DD2 who for a long time wouldn't nap anywhere but the pram in motion.

Just a thought that it might be worth seeing if there is a correlation between a good set of naps and a good night.

Hope tonight is good for you.

Weirdly, the naps got better just as the daytime sleeping went really downhill... We were finally getting a good long lunchtime nap and two 30 minute morning and afternoon ones.

Last two days v variable. Will update when I'm feeling stronger. I may have to join that support thread...