BabyWhispererForums.com
SLEEP => Night Wakings => Topic started by: Susa76 on August 27, 2011, 10:00:23 am
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We have a lovely 7 months old baby girl who slept ok until 4 mo old. Then she started to have shorter naps or skipped naps and started to wake up more often in the night, sometimes 10 times and usually demanded breastfeeding to settle. She was sleeping in our bed and I was usually breastfeeding her right away when she woke up, because I was already so tired and needed to find an easy solution to get her back to sleep. So the usual case I guess...
After reading Tracys book we realised we created the problems ourselves by our actions. Now we have established 4 hour EASY routine which works almost perfectly I think, and started to use PU/PD if she seems to wake up without being hungry. PU/PD usually works quite well, altough sometimes it can take 60 minutes because she wakes up quite soon again. We have been able to lenghen day naps by using PU/PD and to cut down night feeds quite a lot.
The challenge is that our baby is still waking up quite a lot during the night, some nights even more than previously. I'm not sure if this is due to the new things: 1) moving to her own bed, 2) introducing solid food - stomach pain?, 3) reducing night time feeds, or all these. In any case I think she's not getting enough sleep because waking up all the time and her parents are slowly turning into zombies as well :). I would really appreciate if you lovely people would have some advice for us on how to continue from here.
Here is some additional info about our situation:
Our baby is breastfed, usually both sides at each feed, altough the amounts have been decreasing since we started to eat solid food (in 6 months age) 3 times a day. She doesn't use pacifier or drink milk from a bottle.
Her daily routine:
8.30 E wakes up, breastfeeding
9.00 A (activity times include all sorts of playing, music, bathing and diaper change)
11/11.30 S (nap 45-90min)
1 pm E solids and breastfeeding
2.00 A
3.00 S (nap 60-120min)
4.30 E solids and breastfeeding
5.30 A
7.00 S (catnap 30-60min most of the days because seems tired)
7.30 E solids and breastfeeding
8.00 A
8.30 E cluster feeding
9.00 A bath etc
9.30 E cluster feeding
10.00/10.30 S
1 am/1.30 am wakes up, PU/PD's and if it takes over 30 minutes and seems hungry -> breastfeeding
2.30 wakes up, PU/PD until sleeps
3.30/4.00 wakes up, PU/PD but usually I end up breastfeeding, diaper change and breastfeeding again
5.00/5.30 wakes up sometimes as well.. if PU/PD doesn't work -> breastfeeding (if so, then the next waking usually is around 8.30)
6.30 wakes up, seems usually hungry, breastfeeding, diaper change and breastfeeding
Our bed time routine: walking to the bed room, swaddling her, walking a little bit in the room singing and closing the curtains, then standing still and patting her back until relaxed and then laying her down to bed. Resting my hand on either side of her tummy (she sleeps on her back) and trying to take my hand away before she sleeps. I stay in the room for about 10 minutes to make sure she stays asleep.
If she doesn't fall asleep right away, she usually starts whining and then a bit later crying -> we do PU/PD until sleeps (or on rare occations, start 4S from the beginning. We usually pick her up quite fast if she whines, which might be part of the problem (?). It's just that we don't want to wait until she cries.. because she usually doesn't calm down by herself and if she gets really angry she doesn't settle down so easily anymore. My voice can settle her down for a little while, but usually it doesn't really help and she starts crying after a little while. My hand on her tummy doesn't usually help, so we usually do PU/PD right away, because it seems effective. We have to do it 2-10 times usually to get her back to sleep day or night.
At night she doesn't usually do mantra cry, only when going to sleep. Sometimes she wakes up already crying and then I know it's not hunger, it's something else (stomach etc.) and I do PU/PD successfully. However most of the NW's she starts with a little whining noice and then later on crying if not noticed right away.
Thank you very much for yor help!
Susanna
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Welcome. :) Since your nap lengths vary, your easy is difficult to understand. What is your A after a 90 minute nap? Is it only 2 hours? How about your overall day - are you looking for an 8-8 day? You start your EASY at 8:30, but then at the bottom, it appears as if the wake up is really 6:30 with a 10 pm bedtime? That is a very late bt for a LO. What are you aiming for?
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I'll try to clarify :) We haven't been practicing EASY for a long time, only for 3 weeks or so. That's why there might be some differences to the original still. Before starting EASY our daughter could stay up very late, f.ex. 1am and wake up also late, around 11am. So now we feel successful that we've been able to bring her routine earlier all the time.
If an 8-8 day can be achieved for us, that would be so great. However so far, she rarely sleeps so much.
A times can be sometimes 2 hours, sometimes more. I've been following her signs and acted upon those. At the moment she doesn't seem to care if she sleeps 30min or 90min, she's very active and happy nevertheless. However I have noticed that if she goes to sleep at 11am, then the next sleep is almost for sure around 3pm, so there's 4 hours between bedtimes.
We do start our EASY at 8.30, that's when she naturally wakes up currently. (this might be earlier though if I skip the morning feeds). At the bottom there are times when she wakes up in the night or in the morning (f.ex 6.30), but then she wants to go back to sleep after eating. Bedtime 10pm is late, yes, and one of the things I've been thinking that could I change the routine so that instead of the evening nap, we would prepare her for the night sleep? Or is that too big change right away?
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At this age, many LOs are transitioning to just 2 naps. The exception would be if your LO only takes a 30 minute nap and then you would want a cat nap.
Also, most LOs are doing about 3 hours A. http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=64158.msg476652#msg476652 I think you should push your LO to get to that slowly by extending A times by 15 minutes every few days.
Also, I would try to aim for a bt of around 8/8:30. If you find you need a nap later in the evening, I would just go for an earlier bedtime instead.
What do you think?
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I can't really give any advice right now but if I get any success I will certainly share with you. My DD sounds just like yours, she is always very happy in the day but like you we usually have 3 nw each night. I also ebf and she won't take a bottle or paci. She also slept great until 4 months and about one month ago we had 6 nights of sttn!! Didn't last. For me I am sure teething is causing problems but we are desperate to try and crack this as we too are exhausted. Our daytime Easy seems to work well with decent naps and 7-7 bed. We are going to try pupd this week as we go in holiday with friends in a few weeks and worried about DD waking everyone. I will let you know if we have any success.
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On the feeding end of things....try to ensure milk feeds aren't decreasing too much because of solids. Milk has way many more calories than solids and should make up the main portion of food until 1YO. I had to cut way back on solids when DD2 was 8 months as she really cut her milk feeds and was wakening more at night. Are you BFing first and then offering solids a while (usually 45 minutes or so) after? This helps ensure they talk proper milk feeds.
Also when you are working on all these issues don't be surprised if your LO still needs a NF. BF babies tend to need NFs for longer. A DF and NF at 7 months wouldn't be at all unusual.
HTH x
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My daughter was very persistent refusing solids so ppl adviced me to feed solids first, milk second. However now she eats solids quite well so I will for sure try out to bf first. Good idea. She'd love that! :)
I have never waken my baby to dreamfeed, could that help? I always wait for her to wake up herself.
I would be very happy to have only 3 nw's. Last night she woke about 7 times, can't really calculate anymore what happens night time :)
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How about teething? Have you tried medicating before bedtime?
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Thanks for the good advice! I'll start lenghtening A time, transitioning to 2 naps and bringing BT earlier. I'll also try to medicate her for teething.
Last night was as follows:
9.15 S
10.30 NW, after 1 pupd and burp, she fell asleep quickly
00.10 NW, she didn't settle when doing pu/pd -> feed
2.00 NW, as earlier, I ended up feeding
4.00 NW, wet diaper, had to change, didn't settle anymore without feeding
6.00 wet diaper again and feed
8.30 woke up
So she seems to be hungry and/or habitually waking every 2 hours. When we started to follow EASY and introduced pu/pd, we tried so that I would feed her earliest around 4 am. If she woke before that we would always do pu/pd quite persistently. What do you think about this? Is this too stressful for her? I didn't like the procedure because I'm not sure if she's really hungry or not or whether she just falls asleep at the end due to exhaustion. I think this worked to some extent, she got back to sleep, sometimes even quite easily when we did this couple of nights in a row. However then she started to wake up more frequently, and I had the feeling that she started to wake to see if it's time for milk now, or mayby now, or maybe now... So I didn't try this anymore so systematicly.
Should I first implement the daytime changes, and wait their impact.. and for now forget all the night time changes, and feed her whenever she's hungry in the night?
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(((HUGS))) I am sure you are exhausted. I don't think she needs to eat every 2 hours at night, so I think something else is going on. As Shiv said, 1 NF would be normal, but you are feeding so often.
Yes, I would work out the routine issues during the day to see if that helps.
Is there any sign of discomfort during the day? When she short naps, how does she wake?
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She's happy during daytime, altough some teething signs now and then. From the naps she usually wakes up quite peacefully, she will silently start playing with her blanket or s-g and smiles when I go to see her. If I don't her her waking up, she's start crying. If she wakes up in the middle of the naps or if the nap is too short, she's crying. However during daytime she never wakes up crying so as during the night time.
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Didn't you say she was short napping? How often are her naps short?
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Usually her first naps are 45-60 minutes, and second 60-90minutes, and if she takes third, it's only 30-45minutes. If she wakes up after sleeping about 45minutes, I usually do pu/pd and it works almost everysecond time during the second naps.
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At this age, that 3rd nap can cause NWs and EWs. I would try and skip it if you can. Was last night a better night?
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Thank you so much for the advice so far! Your comments help a lot to think things from another perspective, also writing down our day and reflecting my own actions is very useful when trying to learn to do things better.
I've skipped the third nap for 3 days now (good effect --> BT moves earlier all the time). Last night I gave her medicin for possible teeth/stomach pain (--> no effect). And I've been feeding her more frequently during the day. So far no progress in terms of NW's :(. However I think that she didn't need so many feeds in the night so maybe we're going to the right direction.
E 8:15, 10:00, 11:30
A 8:15-11:50
S 11:50-12:45
E 12:45, 1:30 solids, 2:45 breastfeed
A 12:45-3:15
S 3:15-5:00 (one wake in between, pu/pd)
E 5:00, 7:00 solids, 7.30-8:30 breastfeeding
A 5:00-8:45
S 8:45
Night wakings: 9:30, 11:45, 00:30, 2:00, 3:30, 4:00, then I lose count, maybe 5:30, 6:00 and 7:00
Night feeds: 00:30, 2:00, 4:00, 6:00
She is very used to get breatfed before sleeping, which might be part of the problem. In the evening she is maybe overstimulated or s-g and doesn't slow down to eat properly so usually I turn off the lights and breastfeed, which works very well. Almost right away she starts eating very well. This gives her maybe the wrong signal that eating is related to sleeping, and so she demands food whenever she wokes up ??
Would it help if I add some activity time after last evening feed, so that BT would be more strictly separated from the eating? Or then if I should feed her only in the living room, and not in the bed room / bed anymore?
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(((HUGS))) I think dimming the lights is fine. You don't want her OS at bedtime.
The NWs close to bed signal OT to me. I would aim to have her sleeping by 8 when she wakes at 5 from her last nap.
Is there a reason you are BFing so much during the day? It looks like you are doing it before and after solids? I wouldn't think you need that feed after solids, as she has already BF. Are you doing it to relax her for sleep?
I don't think she needs all of those NFs either. What happens when you try to resettle?
What did you give last night for teething?
You mentioned tummy pain - do you think she has that?
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Yes, I totally agree that her BT should be at 8. I'm still working on that.. It's quite difficult to move it so fast :)
We went too see a doctor today because our babys development has fallen behind, doesn't turn over etc. The doctor said among another things that we should feed her solids much more (weight index) and said that she's probably waking up in the night because of hunger and separation anxiety. The conclusion was to get her eating better and more often and to start physiotherapy. She also said that we might want to wait a little while before sleep training, and fix these other things first. I hope these will work...
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Does he still want you to BF so much? It looks as if you are BFing a lot and it can cause feed to sleep issues.
((HUGS)) on the developmental stuff. Honestly, they all develop at their own rate and I am sure your LO is fine.
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The doctor suggested that we increase the amount of solids, not BFing. Yesterday our daughter ate very well but that had no effect on NW's. She still woke up over 10 times... She doesn't want BF every time, but wants to get close, to be picked up and usually falls asleep in our arms or in her crib after a moment of shuss/pat. However she wakes up after every or every second sleep cycle, which is very stressful.
I could try not to BF so often during the day, and see if that would help.
I think during first months we have rushed in too soon whenever she made a noice, and now she demands our presence right away when she wakes. What do you think? If so, how to move on? We don't want to change things too drastically or so that she would be scared, feel abandoned etc.
I tried Panadol painmedicin for teeth/stomach pain.
She has been improving slightly with naps though. Yesterday took twice over 90min nap and today looks good as well. Once we had to do pupd though to get her back to sleep after first 45min.
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((HUGS))
I would work on your EASY so that BF is in the beginning, solids 1-1.5 hours later and then sleep.
It just doesn't sound like that many wakings is hunger. :-\ The only thing that helps us with teething pain is Ibuprofin. You keep saying stomach pain. What do you mean? Do you think your LOs tummy is upset?
You are doing to have to do some sleep training at some point. Of course, I would work on the feeding issues first and rule out pain. But if your LO is needing your body to fall asleep every time, then at some point you will need to do PU/PD.
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Hi there,
I thought to give u an update since there has been some developments. Here is how our days usually proceed (if the naps are successful, i.e. 90min)
A 7:00 -10:15 am (wakeup time varies between 7:00 and 8:30 and our daily routine accordingly)
E 7.30 BF, 9.00 solids, 9.30 BF
S 10.15-11.30
A 11.30-2:30
E 12.00 solids, 1:00 BF
S 2:30-4:00
A 4:00-8:30
E 4:30 solids and BF, 7:00 solids and 8:00 BF
S 8:30 pm
Night wakings and night feeds have been decreasing all the time enen though still not perfect.. Last night:
S 8:30
Nw 10:30, shs/pat
Nw 00:30, shs/pat
Nw 02:00, hungry -NF
Nw 04.00, shs/pat
Nw 05:30, wet diaper and hunger, NF
7:00 wake-up
So she still seems to wake-up crying after two sleep cycles, and can't settle on her own. We have had one sttn and one night with only one NF but usually we wakeup every two hours.
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((HUGS)) Is there a reason you are doing so many solids in the evening? How about BF? You are doing solids and BF together. Why not separate them?
Here are some sample routines for you. http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=164030.0
I am glad you are seeing fewer NWs. That is great.