10 month old, teething? Bad parent? Other mums making me feel guilty

[mdavza]

Hi, I had a baby that slept, uh, well, like a baby, and then he got 8 teeth in rapid succession, and then a cold, and another cold, and aaarrrrrghhhh.
I read up on so much stuff and sometimes I just want to throw all the well-meant advice out the door and
a) feed my baby at night if he can't get back to sleep
b) cuddle him and stay with him until he's asleep
c) get a full night sleep again, for more than one night in a row.

All in all I suppose I'm not too bad off, he does have the odd night where he sleeps through and only wakes once a night (touch wood). But the worse is, at the baby group I went to, all the other mums, with babies my age and older, said their babies were sleeping through fine, no problem. One said she decided at this age to stop the night feeds and gave him water and he cried for, like 5 minutes for about 4 nights, but that was it.
I felt like such a failure, believe me. How is it possible, if so many people on here are lacking sleeping babies?

Well, a lot of people aren't entirely truthful. As you've said yourself, you feel like a failure - which is how other people feel, and why they may be less honest about it.

What you do now is up to you. When they're poorly and teething everything gets messed up, so I personally just give in at those times- cuddle DS to sleep if that's what he wants, take him into bed in the early hours etc. He's already demonstrated he can sleep through, so he'll probably settle back into it eventually, and you can get yourself more rest that way.

Or you can try and carry on being firm! Either way, you're not a bad parent. How well your baby sleeps very rarely has much to do with what you do! The parents of the good sleepers quite often find that out with baby 2, or at a later stage with the first one.

Don't worry I would lay money that we have ALL felt like this at some point. It always seems as if everyone is doing it better and knows more but trust me they aren't and they don't. If it helps my dd is 2 and still ends up in bed with me most nights, often needs me to stay with her while she falls asleep and shouted down the stairs for 'more milk please mummy' at 5am the other morning as she heard me getting up to feed the blinking cats!

I always felt as if me and my dd were behind all the others from my baby group but as we have got to know each other better I have learnt that they have all had various issues with their dcs and thought they were the only ones.

It is easy to get upset about it when you are sleep deprived and exhausted but it does get easier and you find your own way through eventually, besides 8 teeth in quick succession is really hard on your ds and you!

My DS is 10 1/2 mths old. I decided that I was happy to feed him at around 11 and then again after 4 if he woke. The amount of comments I had about the fact that he should be sleeping through at his age was stupid. I know I'm not a bad parent, DS is happy, and so am I. I decided that, as he is a big baby (already in clothes for 18mth old) that he probably couldn't make it through 12hrs without a feed - also, he's a baby, why wouldn't he want a cuddle from his mum.

For one thing, I would say that when people say their baby is sleeping through, what they mean is 'I put baby to bed at 7, I feed baby at midnight, then baby sleeps til 7'. My version of sleeping through is 'I put baby to bed at 7, baby wakes up 12 hrs later, no feeding all night'. Also, I honestly believe that some people lie. THey are so worried that people will judge them and find them wanting, that they would rather not say.

As it happens, DS now sleeps from 6 til 4am, when he comes into bed with us then sleeps on til around 7ish (after a bf). But he did that himself, I did do some CC with him when he thought it was a good idea to wake up every 1 1/2 to 2hrs, but I still didn't expect him to go 12hrs.

You're not a bad parent if your dc is happy and so are you.

Sorry, rambled pn a bit there!

Thank you soooo much!
tinierclanger I find it hard to understand that people cant be truthful about something like this, but you're probably right. And I have some mean fantasies where I really hope these same people get sme very unsleepy babies sometimes in future!
I guess this makes me a more compassionate person, yaaaaaawn.
The root of it is that I'm used to being able to come up with solutions and with a baby you have to go with the flow, or I feel this is the better option. Thank you again and again.

mdavza - they are lying.

Mdavza, I really sympathise with that comment about being used to coming up with solutions - I was/am just the same, owing to the nature of my job - took me a long time to really get used to the fact that a baby is not a logical system!

I got a lot more relaxed about our sleep 'problems' when I met other people with similar issues and started feeling more normal. And as a very wise friend said to me, if it's not a problem for you, it's not a problem.

The first rule of baby sleep club is...............lies, lies, more lies and selective memory.

People hardly ever tell the honest truth as it is seen as some kind of badge of good parenting, but is rarely anything to do with you and what you have done (as tinierclanger says)

Like Mycat says (big waves) peoples versions of what constitutes sleeping through vary wildly. My own experience with DS that has just turned one is that he does go from 6.30pm till about 7am about 60% of the time but it has been quite a long hard road to get to this place with lots of upsets (colds, teething etc) but unlike with DD whenever he was grouchy I just took him into bed and fed him and never felt guilty or anxious about it. Sometimes we have had random weeks where he wakes twice a night and then weeks where he sleeps through till 8.30am. I have kept feeding him morning and evening for this reason, that I don't know how else to get him back to sleep and comfort him, but at the moment bfing is quite a comfortable and zero effort way to do this. I have a little snooze and he has a quick cuddle, everyones happy!

P.s Mycat, have you had your big birthday yet or is that soon???? Exciting!! Hope DS had a good first xmas x

people i think don't lie as such but just really only register the last couple of nights and if they were OK (as in can't remember any significant wakings) then say they have no problems.... which i reckon is pretty normal. we have DS 19mnths and due to the 1 bed flat is in a cot strapped to our bed. which means we wake him quite often so my good night is the above. but i don't think he has slept through from about 3 months. you just get used to it and when people ask me i just say we are fine, not to lie but because i don't want to be that mother who is always moaning about lack of sleep!! but if you question me further i will certainly talk about it. I think this happens a bit.

Well tbh mdavza, if you want to compare, it sounds like your dc was sleeping very well before his teething and that he was doing this before the other mum's dcs, if they are just now cutting out the night feeds.

I think most mums would do what they can to comfort their dc if they were in any discomfort - night or day - so don't beat yourself up about that.

It's hard whilst it's happening and I think the lack of sleep makes you feel more irrational about things than you would otherwise.

Just do what works best for you and your baby and don't worry about what anyone else is doing. You are being a good, caring mum and full nights sleep will come again when ds is thru' his teething/colds etc.

DS is 18mo and sleeps through occasionally. Mostly he wakes once during the night. We feed him/ give him milk and try to settle him back in his bed. If he's ill or teething or particularly upset he comes in with us.

I have felt like a failure so many times about DS's sleep because all the other babies I know were sleeping better much sooner. I have to say the theme with most of them was a bit of tough love and we weren't up for that (DS voms within minutes of getting upset, not worth it) so... we're pretty tired, and sometimes feel a bit inferior, but mainly we're happy with our decisions around his crappy sleep.

As tinier says, the problem is in the eye of the beholder. The whole 'rod for your own back' thing may be true but I'm glad that when DS wakes up thirsty or wanting a cuddle,he expects one of us to appear.

Hi Pat - not had birthday yet (February). I'm not sure if I'm excited or scared by it! DS loved all the boxes and wrapping paper at Xmas. Hope your DD and DS (and you and DH) all had good ones too. Must meet up again soon.

mdavza - if your happy and ds is happy, then really don't worry about it (easier said than done I realise, I was a nightmare with my DD about all this, am much more chilled out now with DS)

and i also keep it short and sweet with folk i don't know to avoid well meant advice as well because i LIKE having him near me and my mid night kisses when and has woken and wants a little love. and if after 19months i have learnt anything about raising a baby is that in the end you need to answer to know one but yourself, your little one and your partner so if it works for you and makes you all feel good then it does not matter what anyone else thinks.

My DS was a good sleeper like yours from early on and has gone through bad patches like you are having. I have found sleeping with him (not feeding so much as he isn't interested) and comforting him rather than controlled crying (though I do leave him to cry a bit initially to see if he will settle) or similar the easiest way to get through it. And he goes back to sleeping through again of his own accord (fingers crossed as he's going through a bad patch at the mo!).
In my opinion if he's been ill/cold/teething etc, tough love/ccing is not the way to go. Hope it gets better, and all those with perfect sleeping DCs will have bad patches too. (Plus they don't mean to make you feel bad, I have been guilty of saying things to other mums that I have later realised were untactful about sleeping, e.g. Do you think she really is hungry in the night, or is it just habit? OOOPS!) If they have found CCing worked for them easily then maybe they are trying to help? But I have found this technique has worked well with people who have never had good sleepers if you see what I mean - to teach them to settle or stop them waking out of habit/for comfort.

My DS still wakes up most nights, and he is 1 3/4! Even when he doesn't wake up properly (to the point that he won't stop until someone goes to him), we can hear through the monitor that he grumbles and wakes up frequently.

I think we are to blame to a certain extent for his bad sleeping habits, BUT we have managed to teach him to be much more independent (shush-pat, pick up/put down, then put down methods).

However, parents who have never been tested by their angel sleepers can't know what it is to be tempted by the tricks like feeding back to sleep, so you shouldn't take their smugness at face value. They don't know your DC.

Also, there can be serious justifications for feeding at night, for example teething, and growth spurts. My DS recently went through a phase of waking at night, and one occasion drank a whole 14oz of milk! He is now taller than any other kid of his age that we know.

Remember that you and your child have to be able to live with whatever method you choose, so make sure it's something which suits both of you, neither too soft on the child nor too hard on you, and vice versa.

Agree with pastagirl, lying is not really the right term,
it's more to do with people being loathe to come across as moaners.

It's true, though, whenever you have a problem with your child
you look around you and everyone else seems alright.

And that's were Mumsnet comes in!

mdavza, I hope it gives you some comfort to know that we are going through
the exact same thing as you and have been for a few weeks now, though the last 5 days have been the worst.
And just like yourself we have decided on go easy on dd2 and re-introduce cuddles and night time bf (plus calpol) instead of sticking to tough love.
She is in pain, she needs us. This too shall pass.

I agree. With you all. I've had to sat myself down, over and over again, and say: what does MY instict say, and sometimes I can be tough, when I think it will be beneficial to lo, but mostly I feel that he is just a baby. When I feel sick, or even when I can't sleep at night, it is wonderful to be comforted by someone, even just by their presence. I want him to know that he is not alone.
Now I must just go and find those mums with babies with similar sleeping patterns (see: no problem!) to mine!