do they ever end...?

[teezee]

ok dd has not been sleeping well at night for any length of time for almost 2 months now.  not sure what to do, if i can do anything.  from my understanding when they go thru growth spurts they don't sleep well at night cuz they are hungry...when they develop and do new things they don't sleep well at night so when do they  start to sleep well at night??  lo has been on a roll literally from four months - rolled over from her back at 4 months and now from her belly from 5 months - she is now 5 and a half months and with the exception with the odd night (thankfully i get that much) she hasn't slept through the night on a regular basis and i just don't know what to do.  i imagine the 6 month growth spurt is coming up but again - without trying to be repetitive i just don't know what to do!!  she  naps well during the day - 2hrs in the am, 2hrs in the afternoon, sometimes a catnap in early evening(4-5 oclock) - so i don't know if i am doing anything wrong!
tawnya

[amheusser]

What do you do when she wakes at night?  If you're in there trying to "fix" the wakings, it may be creating a habit that she has come to expect.   You're right that there is a lot going on right now, but wakings from any one issue shouldn't last more than about a week (then the next issue starts 2 days later  :roll: ).  This is a tough age - hang in there and remind yourself it won't last forever!

[teezee]

i usually just let her "talk it out" and when she becomes irate i will step in and try sh/pat altho that doesn't seem to work anymore or give paci but she doesn't like that either now (i think b/c of teething).  so i feel i am not left with alot of options, altho i have tried pu/pd and occasionally that works.  i also think that she wakes up b/c of having a lot of gas, she has reflux and that hasn't been doing all that well lately (just had to up her zantac) so i try to burp her or exercise her legs to get the bubbles out which is a lengthy process in the middle of the night.  it's not like it is out of habit (i don't think) b/c she wakes up anywhere from an hour after i put her down until about 5am (she goes to bed at around 8pm), it is different everyday.  the only logical thing i came up with is that b/c her reflux is bad maybe she's not able to take as much bm as she needs if she's eating smaller meals (which she always has but has slowly increased them when she started feeling better), and if she is going thru a growth spurt than maybe she needs those feedings in the middle of the night??  last night she was okay until 1am and then slept for about 15min and was up til three screaming, tried everything under the sun but the only thing that worked was feeding her - and she took a huge feeding by that time!  so again i'm just not sure what to do anymore - i don't wanna starve dd when she actually is hungry!  oh and when i do feed her in the night she always lets a large amount of gas out as she's feeding and after she does that she seems to do much better...i have tried gas drops before she goes to bed, exercises, etc but nothing seems to be working now!

[amheusser]

You may be right about the reflux/teething limiting her daytime intake.  I don't have any experience with reflux, but check out the board dedicated to that.  Hopefully the new meds will help her get back on track, otherwise I think she just has to grow out of it.

It's so hard to tell what they need at this age.  If she's taking a huge feeding, it could be a growth spurt, but that should only last about 2 days at a time.  It could be that she woke for some other reason but used up so much energy during the waking that by the time you fed her she was hungry from that.

The only thing I can think of with the feedings is to set a time (like 12 or 1) and not feed her before that.  Then feed her at the first waking after that time, and not again until morning.  We did that around 5-6 months with both of mine, and I think it helped to end night feedings gradually instead of trying to do it all at once.  Plus that way you can send in dh for any wakings between 8:00 & feeding time.  :wink: