Multiple night wakings - Please help extremely tired parents!!!

[macosta068]

Hi there!
First of all, thanks to all for contributing to this wonderful website. It's awesome!!

My 15 month old son had always been a good sleeper, sleeping through the night pretty much since he was 4 months old. We used pu/pd a few occasions, usually after a major milestone (teething, illness, etc).
The last month, after he had a really bad cold/fever,  he has started to wake up several times at night (randomly), crying out really bad, almost screaming. We wait a little bit before we intervene, maybe a 2 or 3 minutes, and then we go in and try to comfort him (usually by ssssshhhhh him or patting his back and telling him "go back to sleep, everything is ok, etc). Sometimes  he doesn't even want us to touch him and moves his arms up and down trying to avoid our contact. We don't feed him and he goes back to sleep in 10 - 15 mins. He was waking up once or two times, but since last week he has started waking up multiple times (4 or 5)
Here is how his daily routine looks like:

6:45 - 7ish - Wake up and feed (bottle - 8 oz)
8:30am breakfast
10:30am mid morning snack
Noon - Nap (hi only nap fpr the day, 2 hours)
2pm - Lunch
4;00pm mid afternoon snack
6PMdinner
7:30 bath
8 - bedtime (and feed bottle - 8 ozs)

PS: yes, he goes to bed with his bottle, drinks it and falls asleep. But he has been doing this forever and never affected him. I know I have to change this at sme point...

Now my question is, what should we do when he wakes up?? I have been checking tracy's book but it's not really clear to me how to approach this issue so I can teach my son how to get back to sleep on his own. I am not sure that I am doing things correctly.
No need to mention how affected we are by this sleep situation, we cannot rest properly and it's really driving us insane. It has also started to affect us as a couple, since we are extremely tired and have arguments over almost everything..

PLEASE HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


thanks in advance,
Maria

[mum101]

Hi Maria, Welcome to the forums!
I'm sure you will get some great advice from the parents here. 

We have a great sleeper but stuggled with night wakings from 1 1/2 to 2.  DD would call out, see us then lie down and go to sleep, so obviously had an association with seeing us to re-settle.  It's hard too, because all she'd need was to see us again and she'd be fine.  I wasn't keen on her crying until she gave up.  But we wouldn't go in her room anymore, just stand at the door.  And we'd take a little longer to go to her, unless she was distressed.  We end up also having to explain to her that mum and dad are sleeping too and we are tired too, so we weren't coming in.  Your little one might not grasp (or accept) that statement yet!  It was a little bit of a battle, especially when she'd make demands, such as 'put my blanky on' or 'water' so we had to stick to our guns and explain very calmly that she could do it, and that we weren't coming in as we needed to sleep too. All was done very calmly which is a HUGE ask IMO! hehe.  We now have her in a blanket sleeper for winter, and in hot weather we leave a non-drip bottle of water next to her cot, so she can get a drink herself.

I'm not sure, but perhaps he needs more sleep at night, could you try putting him down earlier to see if it changes his sleeps?

cheers
charmaine

[Layla]

Hi Maria - do you think he might be teething? Molars or eye teeth can certainly disturb their nights. Have you thought about some pain relief to see if it will help???

At night - you could do either pd or wi/wo. He's a link to the sleep training methods for toddlers https://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=63896.0

When I did the wi/wo, I used to stay with her until she was settling down (rub her back & tell her everything is ok, night time, etc...) & then leave. I never stayed long enough for her to be asleep cause you can become a prop in that case.

See how you go tonight but if all of a sudden the NW's have increased I would think there is another factor (like teething or maybe infection of some sort).

You might also want to try an earlier bedtime - try for bedtime at 7.15-7.30pm to give him some "playing" time & to be asleep BY 8pm. He would probably need about 11hrs at night & 2hrs at night. So an earlier bedtime might help here too with all the nightwakings that are happening at the moment

Let us know how you go
Layla