3 1/2 Month Old wakes constantly & up for day at 4am. Exhausted!!!

[A-team]

Hoping you can help.....

My DS has never been a fantastic sleeper (has woken up to feed twice nightly since he was born and usually needed settling once or twice at other times in the night-usually a shoulder pat was enough), but now he has taken it to a whole new level. He used to sleep 7-7 with the dreamfeed and 2 other feedings. Now, he goes to bed at around 7pm and I used to do a dreamfeed at 11pm but I'm lucky if he makes it past 10:00. Then he is usually up at 1:00 for a feed, and this is basically where my night ends. From this point on he is up about every 45 min and is usually completely up and awake at 4am. I always try to keep him in the crib when he needs to be settled and I won't feed him unless it has been at least 3 hours. Usually by the time 6am rolls around he has a 30 min "catnap" and then is up again. His naps have gotten much worse as well.

I have a 1 1/2 year old as well so me trying to nap during the day usually proves to be impossible. I'm completely exhausted and DH is out of town for two weeks, so I have no relief. I don't know whether trying to put him to bed sooner would help, I'm just worried that he will still wake very early in the morning. I also don't want him to be OT if I try putting him to bed later. Below is basically what his routine was before this nonsense started happening:

7:00              Wake up & Eat
7:30- 8:15     Activity
8:20- 9:40     Nap
10:00            Eat
10:30-11:15 Activity
11:20- 1:00  Nap
1:00             Eat
1:30-2:30     Activity
2:30-4:00     Nap
4:00             Eat
5:30             Try for short nap but 50/50 chance it will happen
6:30             Eat
7:00             Bedtime
11:00           Dream feed

Both kids are actually sleeping at the same time right now but I'm foregoing a possible nap in search of some help!!! Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[Erin M]

How long has this been going on?  Any possibility that it might be a growth spurt?

He might also need some more A time -- how are his naps right now?  Also, is he waking up looking for anything (like a paci or something?) and only falling asleep when he gets it? 

[A-team]

It's been a few days. I thought it may be a growth spurt but he's not any hungrier than usual. He doesn't use a paci or really any other prop. If he's screaming I pick him up, otherwise I try to settle him in his crib by patting his shoulder or jiggling his legs. Should I be moving his A time closer to the 2 hour mark?

Tonight he went to bed at 7 and was already up crying at 8:45. I settled him and now gave him his dream feed. Fingers crossed for the rest of the night but not off to a great start haha

[Erin M]

Oh goodness, I'm sorry I missed this one for a few days -- I would definitely try upping his A time and see how it goes.  That crying not too long after BT is most likely overtiredness from the short naps so more A time should give you some better naps.