Why won't my baby sleep?????

[krisfred6]

I have a 15 week old DD who is a nightmare at night time.  During the day she is a pleasure (but not at nap time) and I am suffering from severe sleep deprivation.

My DD keeps waking at night every couple of hours, or in the case of last night, every hour.  I have spoken to the Child Health nurse and she has said that she doesn't need a feed until about 4am so if she wakes before then to resettle.  I have tried doing this and at times she is awake for up to two and a half hours.  A friend suggested giving her water when she wakes.  I tried this and she takes the water but still stays awake.  I thought that maybe she was getting ready to move onto a 4 hour EASY so am currently on a 3.5 hour routine.  I also thought that maybe she was hungry so have been giving her a top feed of formula after BFing at night.

I don't think she is specifically waking for a feed as she isn't really crying, and I have tried leaving her, but she sleeps in our room and can be awake for hours.  She also has trouble resettling during the day.  She goes down for her sleeps without any trouble and then nearly exactly on the 45min mark she wakes up.  I have tried leaving her to resettle but she gets herself so upset she wakes herself up.  If I go back in and resettle she will usually sleep for another 45 minutes. 

Here is her EASY for yesterday.

Wake 6.45
E  6.45
S  8.45  (didn't wake until 10.30)
E  10.30
S  12.15 (resettled and slept until 1.00)
E   1.30
S   3.45  (Woke at 4.30 and wouldn't resettle)
E   5.00
E   6.45-7.30
S   7.30

This is where it gets tricky
10.45 (woke before DF but didn't take much of bottle.
12.15 (woke - resettled self)
1.15   (woke - DH gave rest of DF thinking he was helping)
2.15   (woke - resettled self)
3.45   (woke - breast feed)
5.00   (woke - resettled by me)
6.45   (woke and up for the day)

I am at the point where I have no idea.  DD is my second child, but she seems to have much more difficulty with her sleep.  When she wakes (and I was feeding her) she didn't really seem very hungry.  She will nearly always do a poo or fluff when she wakes so don't know if it is tummy issues and don't know how to deal with it if it is.

Please help as I really need so sleep.

[emmiebruce]

Hi, I'm no expert but have you tried extending the A time by a short amount?  I found this worked for my DS1 who only ever took short naps and didn't resettle.  I only had to add 15 mins to make him sleep better.  Also increasing the A times might push you towards the 4 hour EASY and reduce the length of the last A time before bed which could seems quite long compared to the others and may be resulting in OT problems during the night...

Emmie x

[LeeLeeMelis]

I am thinking that she me bay overtired. My little guy is 4 months and a couple of weeks and can only go an hour and 20 minutes or so before needing sleep. She could be having trouble at naps and bedtime because of OT.

HTH:-)

[krisfred6]

Thanks LeeLeeMelis and Emmiebruce, will give that a try, last night was a little better. DD still woke at 1 and 2 but resettled herself quite quickly, so I was only up (although awake other times) only once.  She also slept through her DF last night.  I know that her last A time is quite long, but I couldn't get her to go back to sleep from her nap, and then it got too close to bed time for a nap.  Not sure what to do here!

[*Jo*]

to be honest hun, I would feed her! she could be in a growth spurt or she could be honestly hungry, what happens if you do feed her even a small amount, does she go back to sleep??

when shes awake is she contently awake or crying like shes in pain etc?

the fluffs and poos sound to me like tummy issues, Levi would often be awake for hours with tummy issues, once we got these sortred out he no longer stayed awake at night

[LeeLeeMelis]

I do agree with Jo as well. my guy is 18 weeks and I'm still at the point where if he wakes I feed him.  If he doesnt manage a short nap in the end of the day he just goes to bed early that night. You'll get it sorted out!