is/was your LO a really bad sleeper? support and advise thread!

[chrislo4]

chrislo4 I can understand how you'd think this late bedtime means not sleeping well but I would go down onto my knees in gratitude if my older twin Dom would do a stretch of 6 hours (and I suspect most ladies on here would feel the same). But you know, I think your LO is still very young and she hasn't really settled down to her proper sleeping patterns as yet so any tips would be a bit premature. But maybe some one else can give you a tip or two. Good luck

Sorry, i perhaps should have said i don't think my daughter doesn't sleep badly. She sleeps very well. It's the settling down & not wanting to go to sleep that I found difficult. I hope Dom starts sleeping for longer stretches soon! x

 

[kosh]

I'm so pleased to have found this thread. My LO hasn't ever 'gone to bed' before 10.30pm. These days it's closer to mid night before she goes to sleep. She's alert most of the day but night time is when she's really bright. She has recently been sleeping from 11.30/12 til 5.30/6, waking for a feed then back to sleep for a few hours. We dont have set feed times as she feeds on demand from about 7pm. Any tips on getting her settled earlier? xx

how old is your LO? 7 weeks? again she's waaaay to little to have a pattern yet. mine would stay awake till 10-11pm most nights and wouldn't 'go to bed' at the same time every night until pass 10 weeks I think, and he did this totally on his own. just give her time!!

Same here. I think at 7 weeks I wouldn't have even realised that there could be a pattern! Hang in there, I think our crappy sleepers are the exception rather than the rule. Chances are by 10/12 weeks she'll be a completely different baby anyway

same here!

 

[Jellysecret]

Hope everyone is having a better night than we are, been awake an hour and a half now and doesn't look like she'll be falling asleep anytime soon. oh well I've had an hour *yawns*

 

[AngelUK]

Am awake. Dom was fed at 11:30 then slept till 1:30 and wanted resettling. I couldnt fall back asleep and now an hour later he wanted resettling again. And both times I had to pick him up and rock him. I think I pulled a muscle in my back, it hurts. I wonder if I should go to bed again since in 45 minutes he will want feeding. I wonder why he won't sleep as well for me as for OH? OH said last night he didn't wake at all between feeds.

Edit: fed both boys now instead of waiting for their 4 hour's interval. Hope I can get a bit of sleep now.

 

[ellebelle]

Am awake. Dom was fed at 11:30 then slept till 1:30 and wanted resettling. I couldnt fall back asleep and now an hour later he wanted resettling again. And both times I had to pick him up and rock him. I think I pulled a muscle in my back, it hurts. I wonder if I should go to bed again since in 45 minutes he will want feeding. I wonder why he won't sleep as well for me as for OH? OH said last night he didn't wake at all between feeds.

Edit: fed both boys now instead of waiting for their 4 hour's interval. Hope I can get a bit of sleep now.

Good luck!!! Hope the rest of the night goes well!

 

[nicb26]

Ugh well I'm doing the cc for a second night. 1st time was 1.20- only had to go in once and she fell asleep (5 mins ish). But now she's been awake since 3. As soon as I go in she's blowing raspberries at me so I know shes fine. Shes had some water. Its gone quiet now but I'm going to have to go and move her as shes turned round in her cot and wiggled down the bottom so that I can't properly see her on the monitor, little monkey.

Xx

 

[AngelUK]

Thanks ellebelle but yeah I knew he'd do the one hour stunt; here I am again. And I had barely dropped off too.

 

[nicb26]

Thanks ellebelle but yeah I knew he'd do the one hour stunt; here I am again. And I had barely dropped off too.

You poor thing getting woken up just after falling asleep is the worst. Hope you get some sleep tonight x

 

[flibbrtygibbt]

Are you sure he hasnt got reflux?
I have been blessed with two reflux babies.
(i know with out sleep its hard to believe it but i have been blessed with all my kids )
in each case they had slept well and then all of a sudden they stopped and up ALLL the time
my ped had me elevate one end of the crib and put a tsp of cereal in a 2 oz bottle in the evening and its helped alot.
I exculsivly Bfd my first reflux baby but would pump in the morning for the evening bottle.
With this little guy I have had to BF and FF combine because I am older and having supply issues. in both cases doing those things helped loads to get them sleeping again.
As a matter of fact my lo will sleep for 9 hours at night now just by elevating one end of his crib and making his bottle a wee bit thicker (I dont beleive its a wives tale about filling him better thier doctor actually told me that by making it thicker it stays down better untill they are older and thier esophagus finishes maturing to keep things down on its own)
I wish you luck and sweet dreams!

 

[AngelUK]

Had to resettle him again twice in the last hour. I had dropped off finally and was in the first deep sleep when he cried again. That woke poor OH who had to nudge me awake. Sigh. Dominic does have reflux, both my twins have but they take ranitidine for it, which cleared up that problem. Also, we were advised to give one meal of porridge along side his bed time bottle. No change.
Seems he is quiet now, I shall venture back into bed. It is 5am here and I am thinking he will want to get up in an hour or two anyway. Maybe I can get 40 mins of sleep.

 

[flibbrtygibbt]

good luck!

 

[kosh]

did you manage to get some sleep in the end angel?
how was everyone else's?

ours was not brilliant he was up 100s times but, in a weird way i think it helped.
i think i asked already if your LOs are particularly gassy? because the other night, half awake, in the middle of trying to re-settle him i had this revelation 'if he didn't have so much gas he'd sleep much better'. well, last night, he spent all night farting but every time before he could pass gas he would wriggle and moan as if very uncomfortable. and a few times he woke up screaming really badly
so i though maybe is something I'm / he's eating? He had toast with a bit of cheese on it, maybe he's got a food intolerance? I'd forgot about it, but when he was 2-3months I thought he'd get an upset tummy if I ate too much cheese.
so I decided I'll start a strict elimination diet and see if it has an effect. i know he won't become a brilliant sleeper, but it might reduce the number of unexplained wake ups?

 

[Lulu1982]

We had a good night once she cruelly went to sleep. It took just over 2 and a half hours for her to go to sleep in the end and during that time the OH decided to have anther wobble and got angry wit me for being mean and tried telling me that she was having night terrors and that I should be in there cuddling her.

It really pisses me off that I have spent the last 7 months foruming and researching and asking professionals to make sure I'm dong things right/researching how to help her sleep better and in he comes with his crap theories when I'm already 2 hours into the fight!

He later apologised and I sent him off to research night terrors so he could see that that's not it.

Anyway ... She slept through from 9.30 until 6.30. It seems that on the nights we have a massive tantrum, she sleeps through and the other times she is only ever up once now ... I almost cant believe I'm writing it!

She's gone down for her first nap with no fuss at all.

I wish I had sme magic to offer those who had bad nights last night.

Kosh ... Sounds like a good idea. Wen I was BF, cutting out dairy and spicy food seemed to help Ava's colic.xx

 

[firefly15]

Bleurgh. Another bad night for us It started well with a sleep from 7.30 to 11pm when he woke for a feed but then he woke up at 12, 12.15, 12.25, 12.45, 1am...you get the picture. He finally settled to sleep around 1.30/1.45 ish and slept through til 6.20 but then was up for the day despite looking and acting knackered. I didn't get any sleep at all til after 2am - gave up looking at the clock as it was too depressing. Isn't it supposed to be babies that have trouble sleeping when over tired rather than me?!

Kosh - anything is worth a try! It certainly won't hurt and iit may just be part of the answer! LO definitely had gas at 6.20 as he let rip with some massive parps when I picked him up, just soooo annoying that he then decided it was getting up time.

for all the other crappy nights. Today I will be found eating chocolate. My backside won't thank me, but I don't care! I may even indulge in a coffee if I venture out of the house later on. DH is out tonight and I'm already dreading bedtime on my own I'm 32 and putting my own child to bed makes me nervous

 

[lisa1980]

Kosh - definitely worth a go if he's very gassy. I have coeliac disease which is a gluten allergy (in wheat, barley, rye etc) and if I eat it....let's just say it's not pleasant I'd say dairy is a more likely candidate in babies really but eliminating one thing at a time would definitely be the way to go. Fingers crossed it alleviates any discomfort and you uncover an amazing sleeper!

Firefly - for your bad night. I sympathise with dreading the nights. I'm also 32 and whenever OH is out late or working nights I spend all day stressing about the evening Who knew that it could be so stressful

Lulu - yay for a good night even if it came after a stressful evening. Hopefully it'll improve as time goes on. My OH also has a bad habit of randomly coming up with theories based on nothing which go against what I'm doing. I've found a death stare followed by pointedly ignoring him and continuing as planned works pretty well

Angel - I hope you managed some sleep

Nic - how did it go? Was she asleep when you went in?

Well ladies, I broke. After taking 1.5 hours of screaming to get him to bed, then him waking up after 40mins I decided to try CC as NOTHING I was doing was working and he was clearly exhausted.

It sucked, I won't lie, but it wasn't actually as bad as I had imagined it would be, and he cried less overall than he's cried for AGES. He fed once overnight then went straight back down with 30secs of crying, then woke again at 5.45am but OH settled him with some water in less than 5 mins. I actually had to wake him at 8am!

I don't want to turn this thread into a CC-fest as that's not what it's for and I know many are uncomfortable with it (understandably. I was/am too), so I won't go into lots of detail unless people want me to, but I'm planning to try to continue with it as it surprised me with how quickly it worked last night. I'm not kidding myself that it'll always be this easy but I'm going to play it by ear.

I never thought I'd do it, and it's tough (maybe more for me than LO though it seems ) but I feel so much happier today. We've been playing with his toys, singing songs etc, all the things I want to do everyday but have been too tired to do with enthusiasm if I'm honest. I'm really not trying to justify it or recommend it to anyone as I can totally see that it's not for everyone, but it's given me a little hope that things may improve more quickly than I imagined.

I hope everyone else's nights were sleep-filled

 

[chocolala]

Our night was ok ish, took her ages to go off, about an hour 45 mins. As I was knackered I went to bed with her at 9:30, she woke sometime between then and midnight for a feed. Then at midnight the husband came in to say that there is a big chance he's going to be offered a job! Can't remember much of what he said as I was only semi conscious!

Cant remember how the rest of the night went, I just know she woke several times, then woke for the day at 7:30. I'm still knackered but feel slightly more human than yesterday.

Re my question about monthly cycles and Lily's sleep, I not sure if there is anything in it regards lily, or whether I'm just looking for answers where there aren't any, but I'm going to keep an eye out to see if there is some sort of pattern.

Someone said the other day, can't remember who, sorry, that they find nap times so much easier than bedtimes, it's the same here, lily still fights sleep at naps, but she really ups the ante at bedtime. I wonder, for me anyway, if she's picking up on something in me, whether im unconsciously giving something off at bedtime as I want to go to bed at some point too, I dunno!

Hugs to those that had a rough night xx

 

[chatter]

Well ladies, I broke. After taking 1.5 hours of screaming to get him to bed, then him waking up after 40mins I decided to try CC as NOTHING I was doing was working and he was clearly exhausted.

It sucked, I won't lie, but it wasn't actually as bad as I had imagined it would be, and he cried less overall than he's cried for AGES. He fed once overnight then went straight back down with 30secs of crying, then woke again at 5.45am but OH settled him with some water in less than 5 mins. I actually had to wake him at 8am!

I don't want to turn this thread into a CC-fest as that's not what it's for and I know many are uncomfortable with it (understandably. I was/am too), so I won't go into lots of detail unless people want me to, but I'm planning to try to continue with it as it surprised me with how quickly it worked last night. I'm not kidding myself that it'll always be this easy but I'm going to play it by ear.

I never thought I'd do it, and it's tough (maybe more for me than LO though it seems ) but I feel so much happier today. We've been playing with his toys, singing songs etc, all the things I want to do everyday but have been too tired to do with enthusiasm if I'm honest. I'm really not trying to justify it or recommend it to anyone as I can totally see that it's not for everyone, but it's given me a little hope that things may improve more quickly than I imagined.

I hope everyone else's nights were sleep-filled

Hi, I have been stalking this thread but if I am honest have been a bit shy in posting. So I hope you don't mind that I tell you a bit about my situation and ask for some help.

My LO is 7 months and has never slept well. At the moment he goes to sleep really easily with no fuss at 7.30 as long as I lie with him but he is up every 30mins/1hour until 10ish when he will sleep for 2 hours at a time, exactly. The last 2 weeks he has started to need to be BF to sleep almost every time he wakes.

I have been against CC however am beginning to think this is our only option as it does not seem to be getting better on its own, my DH is sleeping in the spare room, I am often in bed at 7.30pm trying to catch up on sleep and am starting to get bad migraines.
Anywho, I would be super interested to know how you approached it last night, how long it took, did you have a limit in mind before starting etc, if you do not mind sharing I would really appreciate it.

 

[AngelUK]

Hi ladies, thanks for asking. Well by 5 I was in tears after having gone in there and tried to get Dominic off to sleep again and again. Thing is, he wants to sleep and he tosses and tries all sorts of positions but just when he seems he has dropped off and I go back to bed, he wakes again and cries. Anyway, my adorable OH was still/again awake by that time and when I came back to our room he had switched the monitor to his side of the bed and made me go to sleep and he took over the rest of the night. How lucky am I?! He is so wonderful! Even though he had the night before and will take again tonight, he said he wouldn't take no for an answer and for me to just sleep as I clearly needed it more that night (AF!). I slept till 10

 

[kosh]

sorry you had a bad night angel, but at least your OH is wonderful!

can i ask you (and all teh ladies here) - where do your babies sleep?

 

[kosh]

lisa