Sprited 4 month old with NW's

[helenfinnandben]

Well we ditched the dummy last night! He had a DF at 11 which he woke up a bit at the end from but went down fine. He then woke at 2.20am and I tried to settle him with a bit of PU/PD and S/P but he was sucking the life out of my arm as I held him so reckoned he was hungry! Fed him and then did shush pat till he settled again without dummy and he slept......till 6!!!!!!!!!!!! I think he probably woke from hunger at 6 as doesn't normally feed till 3/4 so i did use the dummy then in bed with us to hold him off till 7 so i can keep the 4 hr EASY up. Have just put him down for his morning nap minus dummy so will see how it goes. Fingers crossed you lovely ladies and your great suggestions may have soled the problem for us....for today at least lol!

[k_mac]

Hi!

My goodness! You could be me writing these messages! I have an 18 week old son who does 30 min naps through the day (which we are trying to work on using S/P and PU/PD and not having much success at the moment - just a lot of tears  ) and he is up just as frequently as your LO through the night too. Like your LO my DS has a dummy but doesn't seemed overly attached to it - but maybe I need to be brave like you to give it the boot too! 

I am up to the end of day 5 at the moment in concentraing hard on helping Sam to sleep (my husband is home for the school hols and can look after our toddler) and I'm so tired and doubting how successful we are being. He seemed to make great progress the first couple of days and the last two he has gone backwards and is getting SO upset at me every time I put him back down - poor little fella. He has been generally rocked to sleep up till now and like you I have been putting Sam in bed with me just to get some sleep. It's taking all my self control not to do that (or keep feeding him) through the night at the moment being so tired!

Anyways I guess I'll just keep trying to be consistant and see how we go. I just wanted to write and say you're not alone in dealing with this right now! I'll be thinking of you - hope things improve quickly for you!

Take Care,
Kate 

[helenfinnandben]

Hope things improve for you soon too. Ben certainly didn't seem dummy dependant but clearly was! I am using it to hold off feeds and for his quick cat nap which he generally has at 5ish but not in the cot. Good luck!

[k_mac]

Was just wondering how things were going for you today.........hopefully fantastically!

Sam had a fairly good night - only woke 4 times. I fed him at 11 & 3 and then 6:30. He was pretty settled in himself and I only needed to give him a quick cuddle and pat and he went straight back to sleep! I thought that maybe today would be better, but unfortuantly we've just had 20 mins of crying (while I PU/PD & S/P) before he finally went to sleep just now.  Oh well.

Hope things are improving for you! Good on you for holding off on the dummy! I didn't really use it last night - but I tend to use it like you do! 

[helenfinnandben]

Last night wasn't great. DF at 11 then woke at 1.30 (nappy leaked and was soaked so had to change and feed to settle) then woke at 3.30 and 5.30 (fed again) so has totally ballsed up today's routine - he's only done 45 min cat naps apart from at 4 when he fell asleep for over an hour - not very helpful......... and he's just woken before his DF tonight - he hasn't done that in over  a week...so expecting a bad bad night tonight!
Hope we're both posting with "he slept through" type posts tomorrow (though somehow I doubt it) lol!!!

[helenfinnandben]

and last night even worse......
woke at 10 ("dream feed" bottle 6oz) then 12.30, 1.30, 3.30, 5.30 (fed) and 7.00 still none the wiser as to what's waking him. Ditching the dummy made no difference so have to say we gave in last night and used it to settle him at 3.30. Just wondering if this "reason" for not sleeping is going to elude us for ever and I should just accept the sleepless nights are here for some time to come!

[helenfinnandben]

Things seem to be going from bad to worse here. Last night was horrific (particularly as i had my first night out so had  a late night and was a little groggy from too much wine!) - he was up most of the night on and off and we ended up sleeping in till 9 which has totally thrown out the 4 hr easy today and he has only done 20min cat naps so expecting even worse tonight. I'm afraid we gave in to the dummy after 2 nights of ditching it when he was just back to the hourly wakings without it. I know we should probably try ditching it and be really firm but we're both so tired and afriad his crying will wake our toddler that we can't bring oursleves to do it. Maybe I should start with daytime naps without the dummy and work from there....... I'm going to write down the EASY starting from now as haven't done that for a while. If at first you don't succeed, try try again i guess!!!!

[hrk]

I hate to be a pest, but are you sure it isn't reflux?  Maybe using the paci to soothe the throat; bottles too?  May not see improvement if it is the case; Tracy says that in bwsayp.  I kept trying tweek for MONTHS with no improvement.  Two nights on the right dose, and we had our first sttn.  Mind you we had weaned EVERY ap tool we had used prior to the right dose.  ONLY thing that was left to blame was reflux.

There are a lot of symtoms listed and nwings are just one of many...ours were constant nwnings that did not get better w/weaning bottle/paci, frequent eating, discrepent behavior/temperament between awake/sleeping times...

A great book I read before coming to this site was Colic Solved.  Helped me identify silent reflux as the problem.  Gives lots of reasons for "colic."  May want to check it out at the library.  Perhaps rule out any medical issues... 
Best regards,
Jean :-)

[*Nicola*]

Hiya

Been away for a few days.  Whats the routine looking like now?  When are NW's, what's he doing and what are you doing when he wakes? Are you back with the dummy?

Interested to see response re PP xx

[helenfinnandben]

Thanks Jean - I really don't think it's reflux - he's not distressed or in pain when he wakes and it's only a problem at night - he's happy lying down at all other times. I am keeping it in mind but like you say - need to rule everything else out first

I thought things couldn't get any worse but last night was horrific. We decided to make a plan and stick with it ie. earlier DF, S/P when wakes, no feed before 3am, no dummy. So we gave the DF at 10.15pm. He settled back fine. Woke at 12.45, S/P back to sleep then woke at 2am. After 20 minutes of screaming and him being really distressed I fed him and put him down by about 2.45. He was then WIDE awake and no amount of S/P would get him back off. We left him to try and get himself back to sleep and he just kept shouting and whinging, tried S/P but it had no effect whatsover other than winding him up. By 5am he was still awake and I was crying in a heap on the floor in his room. We couln't get by on so little sleep so we gave in - gave him a dummy - still no sleep. Took him into bed and after some inital resistance he slept until I woke him to feed at 7.30. Exhausted doesn't even touch how I feel today. I just don't know where to go next. I feel like we totally failed - he spent 4 hours being totally distressed for nothing as we gave him the dummy in the end.

I am fairly sure this is dummy dependency as he did settle once given it.

I'll chart the day for a few days and pray for a better night tonight but he's so utterly shattered today that i can imagine sleep is not going to come easy as when he's O/T his sleep is even worse.
I'm at the end of my tether here.....

[monopod]

Oh hon, I'm so sorry I have no good advice to offer as we are fighting our own fires here too and my brain is fried from emotions and accumulated lack of sleep, but I wanted to post and give you a big {{HUG}} anyway. Please take care. I will pray for you all.

[helenfinnandben]

Thanks. Big hugs to you too. I have just got Ben off for his nap - screaming till he settled which is new - normally naps aren't hard to get him to sleep - I hope last night hasn't traumatised him for life! He's in his car seat (I've just decided to day to settle him in his room in the car seat so he gets all the usual cues if we're due to go out but he needs his nap) as have to take Finn (DS1 aged 2 1/2) to his gym class in 30 mins. The one posistive we can take from last night is that despite all the noise Finn slept through it all - so we know we can at least get away with some controlled crying if the time comes for that a few months down the line!

[*Nicola*]

Helen,

Lets see what your EASY looks like and we can reassess from there.  TBH I think your issues are dummy and consistency related.  If you are using the dummy then I would advise you to give it to him right away otherwise he is crying needlessly and doesn't understand what is happening.  Similar advice regarding taking him into your bed.  I totally understand how desperate you can get overnight (BTDT) BUT letting him crying, trying to settle him for ages and finally giving in and taking him into your bed only serves to teach him that if he cries long enough you will take him in with you/give him the dummy etc.   Big (((Hugs)))

Just wanted to add in ... Tracy and the BW technique doesn't advocate controlled crying at any age.  It would be worthwhile developing a plan for NW'ing, getting DH on board and sticking to the plan for a week or so, deal with the crying then and you will see results

xxx

[helenfinnandben]

Thanks Nicola - I know that giving in was wrong and sends out an inconsistent message - hence feeling guilty! I'm wondering whether if he settled first time with s/p but not second that he was hungry at 2am and if i'd fed him then rather than trying to keep going with the s/p then he'd not have been wide awake after. Today i've decided to try and settle with s/p but if it's not working then give the dummy before we get to the stage of being worked up. Do you think that's still being inconsistent?
Am getting the easy written down today so after another night and day i'll post it.
Thanks again for your help and support!

[helenfinnandben]

ps do you think we could start by ditching the dummy in the day only or is that too inconsistent? It's how we weaned ds1off it when he was about 14m old but then he wasn't dependant like ben and was a pretty decent night sleeper!