Trying GW for night wakings and rocking to sleep a 13mo

[Wispa]

Hi!
This is my very first post here. I've come across the GW technique here whilst trawling the Internet for a solution to my 13 month olds terrible night sleeps.

Some background.... He has never been a good sleeper, nights and naps, but has much improved over the last 5 month or so and we now regularly have proper naps and some sort of routine!

He always used to be able to go to sleep independently for naps, I just put him in his grow bag, close curtains and in the cot he went. Nights were a problem, as he fell asleep nursing but would only wake once at night at maybe at 5am so we were nearly at the STTN stage!

Then, I think he needed an A time tweak as he would no longer go in his cot awake, and if he did, we had 30 minute naps only. Then we moved house, he hit wonder weeks and teeth were always popping up.  He was taken for naps in his pram while we packed boxes and everything went to pot. Night wakings went from one, to him waking every 2-3 hours, sometimes he would go back to sleep after feeding, other times he'd be awake for 3 hours in the middle of the night, which again impacts his daytimes.....and mine.

I'm absolutely fed up, tired and worn to the ground. I need to get my little man sleeping better, so we're all happier.

So....back to the GW. We started 2 nights ago. He took 50 mins before falling asleep in his cot with just some shushing and letting him know I'm there. Great. Morning nap took 20 mins, even better! Afternoon nap i had to go to the shops so he slept in his pram. Last night it took about 30 mins, so I was really happy things were going in the right direction.

But then at 1230am he woke, but put himself back to sleep, until 1am when he was properly awake. I went to feed him, as he has done the last few weeks, but he was wide awake even after a feed. I wasn't sure what to do at that point. I'd read "do whatever it takes" but then I thought that would confuse him by rocking him one time and then expecting him to self settle the next time. What should I have done then?

As it turned out, he was awake for 2.5hours and actually wouldn't sleep being rocked, but slept in his cot eventually (330am). Only until 6.30am though. So I was beside myself with no sleep, so I fed him again to get him to sleep, and then I had to wake him at 9am.

Can anyone please offer any advice? The long NWs are the biggest problem here. But will that be solved if I succeed with the GW and getting him to sleep independently?

Thanks to anyone who managed to understand my garble!!

[KiusMum]

Hi Wispa..

Welcome to BW..U have come to the right place, so dont worry help is on its way.. U seem to have few props going on like rocking , night feeds, etc. You will need to eliminate them, before your LO can STTN..GW takes a while..sometimes a loonnng while  , so dont worry if things dont seem to work in the beginning..just stick with it and it will work out..

For us to help you out..could you please post your routine?? how many naps does he have? 1 or 2 during the day and whats their length?

Sending Hugss your way..

[Wispa]

Hi
Thanks for replying! Finally got some time to tell you some more, hopefully!

Our 'routine', all give or take 30mins I'd say (or if not these times, these sort of intervals)

7.30am wake and breastfeed followed by breakfast
Activity, including getting dressed etc. watch for yawns and sleepy signs.
10.15am - 11.30am morning nap (sometimes a shorter nap, but then has earlier and longer nap in pm)
12.30pm lunch
Activity, baby group, visiting people etc
3.00pm - 3.40 pm afternoon nap
4.00pm snack
6.00pm dinner
7.00pm 15mins quiet play, heading towards bathtime, breastfeed and bedtime. normally falls asleep feeding, if not, will be rocked or walked.
8.00pm, usually asleep.

And not part of our routine, but is becoming a ritual...
12ish, wake up.
3.00am wake up
6.00am wake up

Some wake ups will last an hour or two and I've been medicating him I case of teething pain and feeding and rocking back to sleep. ANYTHING to get him to sleep again at that time of the night. On nights when he is awake for so long, it impacts his wake up time the following morning and we get stuck in a late cycle.

This is night number 4 of GW, sitting beside his cot after I've fed him.....
First night it took 50mins and he woke once but i fed to sleep again, only up for 30mins.
Second night it took 40mins and he woke at 1am and didnt sleep again till 330am, awake again at 630am. Again fed to sleep as a i was a wreck.
Last night it took maybe 35mins and he only woke at 530am! I did feed him as he is used to it and didnt want him to be hungry.
Today he was really tired, but took just 2 mins to fall asleep!

I know I should be trying not to feed at night, but think I'll tackle that one at the weekend when I can hopefully catch up on sleep while OH watches LO?  Or If bedtime self settling works, will he no longer wake through the night?

I can but dream!

Any thoughts please??

[KiusMum]

Routine looks ok,except for the nap part. I think at his age nap Shuld be atleast 2.5/3 hrs , he seems to be getting less than tht during the day , hve u tried moving to one nap u might find he sleeps better on 1 nap than 2. There's a link here somewhere @ the 2-1 transition, will post @ it in a bit.
Also regarding GW it's oks of u want to tackle 1 thing at a time, I hve a 19month old who was used to feeding @ night and rocked to sleep. I did the GW first and got him sleeping with only patting in the crib and then moved to weaning the night feed it does take longer though so be prepared for that let me know wht u think

[Smurfette]

HI there

As someone who is/has going through very similar experiences (including moving houses!) I would be careful about moving to one nap too soon. The fact that you're getting a long nap in the morning is good. I see more problems with the long A time to bed on a 40 min nap. You might want to try bringing up the bedtime a bit to see if that helps things.

And I agree with ppl that GW can take a long time. Too long for me and I had to change techniques, but it looks like you've had progress already!

[Wispa]

Well LO was always a 30 minute napper, and used to be better at nights, so I feel I'm being spoilt with anything over an hour! Lol. His naps are erratic wrt lengths, but I've not noticed any patterns. On days where he has refused a second nap we found his night time was awful, so Im reluctant to drop that on purpose just yet.

Wrt the A time before bed, we were finding that with a shorter time he just wouldn't fall asleep (whilst feeding!), but now that he will go off independently, maybe we could tweak that. What sort of A time is appropriate? If he has a better nap, can we increase the A time?

So last night he woke once, at 230am, I put him back down but he only slept for 15more minutes before waking again. I figured he needed a feed, so fed just one boob, and he self settled in his cot afterwards. Was that the right thing, or should I have put him down again?

He woke at 630 and chatted, maybe snoozed a bit longer, or was quiet at least, until just after 7am so not too bad! He seems tired all through breakfast though, so maybe there is room for improvement still. Fingers crossed!

Smurfette, what technique did you end up using? Oh and house moves disrupt everyone, I can understand why the LOS suffer.

[irish3680]

I understand loving the longer morning nap after a history of 30 minute naps. My kids always did best with a shorter am nap at this point and a longer pm nap. My son is 13 months and his routine is:

6:00 am: awake
9:00 - 9:45: nap
12:00 - 2:00/2:30: nap
5:00/5:30: bed

He still gets OT when awake longer than 3 hours. He has to be awake by 2:30 pm during the week to pick DD1 up from school, hence the earlier schedule. But it works for him. I do have to wake him from the am nap every day to protect the pm nap, but it is worth it.

[Smurfette]

Smurfette, what technique did you end up using?

I went through a bunch of them, which was probably my biggest mistake, but eventually WI/WO was the best and I had to stay out for longer and longer periods b/c DD was just to stimulated with me in the room.