6mo with too many NW:(

[lrj]

 hi all!

my LO is just a few days short of 6 months, and isn't sleeping through the night yet. i'm feeling very exhausted and frustrated and would like some help. here's the details...

4.5 hour EASY
3 hour wake time (just transitioned this week, and she does well, but def couldn't go longer)
breastfed (no pump)
solid nap routine, without props, usually sleeps for 1.5 hours, twice a day
falls asleep at bedtime without props
doesn't take a paci
started solids yesterday (but doing BLW, so i don’t think she actually ingested anything)
generally happy during the day, but recently is fussy while i’m cooking supper

so we usually try to have her awake from 7:30 to 7:30, although ideal would be 8:30 to 8:30. however, i can't seem to get her to sleep for more than around four hours at night (although the other day, she did go six!!). so, typical nowadays would be for her to be in bed at 7:30, then i usually DF at 9 and again at 10:30. then she usually wakes up sometime around 1, at which point i can often get her to go back to sleep without eating by shush/pat or by putting her in the bed with us (which needs to stop). sometimes though, she’s really hungry at that time, and i feed her. sometimes she will also wake up around 3. if she does that, she’s usually hungry, but once in a blue moon, will go back to sleep without eating (but only if she’s in the bed with us). then she wakes up around 5, always hungry. the last two days, she’s been waking up at 6 instead, but then staying awake for a full wake time, which is far too early for me. also, that makes for a 6pm bedtime which means she doesn’t eat dinner with us, and that’s not really a viable option.

so common NW times are 1, 3 and 5. she sometimes needs to eat at all three times (like a newborn?!), usually needs to eat at two of them and on wonderful nights, only at one of them. if it’s only at one of them, it’s the 5:00 one.

i’ve tried giving a paci instead of feeding her, but she has never taken one and still doesn’t like them. i’ve also been trying to feed her less each time, but it’s hard to measure. for the last week or so, i’ve been stopping her after the letdown is finished and more recently i’ve been stopping her toward the end of the letdown, but that hasn’t helped yet.

do i just keep trying to feed her less each time?
how do i get her to go back to sleep without putting her in the bed with us? or better yet, how do i get her to put herself back to sleep?
should i be feeding her at shorter intervals during the day so that she’s not so hungry at night? how would that work with EASY? would it be like EAEASY?
what do i do when she wakes up at 6am so that she doesn’t have to go to bed at 6pm? add a CN?


any tips on how to not act like a witch with my husband while this exhausted would be appreciated also...

[Erin M]

Hi there!
Ok, I'll start off by saying that 6 months is a fairly crazy time developmentally -- anything new on that front?  Any teeth or other sources of discomfort?

Have you had these wakings for awhile -- there is a growth spurt at 6 months which could cause some of your issues but if they're not new issues, it's doubtful that's it.  At her age we'd generally say she should go as long during the night between feedings (or longer) than she can during the day.  But you've got more than that going on.  I notice you're doing multiple dfs -- I'd probably drop one of them (the earlier one) -- I can't see that she'd be taking that much at one of them.  It could be that the more disturbed sleep earlier in thenight is making it harder for her to stay asleep later.

If you're wanting to get her sleeping all night in her bed you're going to need to tackle it head on for a few nights -- if you've got a few days where dh can watch her during the day so you can sleep a little, it would be ideal (you could explain to him that in the long run it will make you a happier person!) -- then set a time you won't feed before and tackle any other wakings with pu/pd or pat/shush.  What do you think?

[lrj]

that sounds good. i don't know why it didn't occur to me to do pu/pd at night (doh!). thanks!

as for setting a time to not feed before, would it be too much to just try going until 5? or should i try for an earlier time and then gradually move it back?

developmentally, she doesn't have teeth yet, but doesn't have major signs of teething other than occasional fussiness. she seems to be working hard on pushing up/crawling and sometimes she does seem to wake herself up because she rolls over or pushes herself into the headboard of the crib (although she may do that after waking). but she hasn't done that for the last few days and anyway was waking up this often from before that. she's probably been doing this 1, 3, 5 thing for a month or maybe two months already. before that she still had a lot of NW, but i'm not sure if they were on this pattern.

although, she's my first, and i've been known to miss major things in the past, so there may be something going on that i'm not noticing.

[Erin M]

although, she's my first, and i've been known to miss major things in the past, so there may be something going on that i'm not noticing.

Trust me, that doesn't end with your first.    But it does sound like a good time to work on independent sleep as there doesn't seem to be a whole lot to keep her up right now. 

As for the feeding, it's really your call.  Some babies really do still need a night feed at 6 months, others don't.  If you're repeatedly having to resettle (you get her to sleep and she wakes up 20 minutes later over and over) I would say she's hungry.  The idea is that once you try to settle her without feeding at a wake up, you push on until she's actually asleep again -- feeding her after a marathon pu/pd session only reinforces the idea that lots of crying on her part will lead to her getting fed.  Sometimes feeding at a certain point gives you the resolve you need to push on with pu/pd as well.  That being said, it's also perfectly reasonable to think that she might be able to make it until 5 w/o a feed.  I wish I could give you a totally clear cut answer, but babies are all so different!

[lrj]

sorry, one more question. 
do you think i should try to cut back on feedings and get her to sleep by herself at the same time? or should i tackle one at a time?

thanks so much for your help... i feel much better that there's a solution... 

[Erin M]

I would cut the feedings down to something more age appropriate -- the most often I would feed is every 4 hours, most likely she can go longer.  You can gauge that by seeing how she eats when you do feed her -- if she just eats enough to get back to sleep or if she takes full feedings. 

[lrj]

okay! we survived our first night!
she didn't do as bad as i thought she would. i aimed to feed her at 3 and 7 and she was awake from 2:30 to 3 (although not really screaming, just fussy) and then from 6 to 7:15 or so. but she really ate like she was hungry both of those times. so i guess i'll keep that up for a few days and then move them each back half an hour or so.
thanks so much for your help!

[Erin M]

Good luck!

[lrj]

hello again!
we've been steadily moving back her eating time, and now she can go from 11 to 6 or 7 without eating (in just a week!). but i'm having another problem 
for several nights recently, she's been awake around 3 for more than an hour. she's not really screaming her head off (although one night she was), she's usually just fussing. i can shush-pat her until she's quiet, but then after ten minutes or so, she starts fussing again. she'll keep up that fuss-shush/pat-quiet for 10 minutes routine for an hour or an hour and a half.
do you have any idea what that could be? she just got her first two teeth on the bottom and she seems to be working hard on crawling. do you think one of those things is bothering her? it's really hard to resist the temptation to nurse her back to sleep or put her in the bed with us just so i can keep sleeping, although i have resisted so far.

i know sometimes i need to just hang on until we're done transitioning and then the wrinkles get ironed out. is that the case here?

[Erin M]

Woohoo, great progress!

do you have any idea what that could be?

That can often signify that you need some more A time during the day.  How are your naps going right now? 

Your wakings could also be due to the teeth or developmental stuff -- though if she's generally not fussy, it's probably not teeth.  Developmental changes can definitely cause night wakings -- I might try increasing your A time just a tiny bit and see if that helps and just keep pushing through as you are.  You sound like you're doing great!

[lrj]

Okay. Feeling stuck. 
I tried increasing her A time by 15 minutes (to 3h 15m). She still did the 3am NW but was only up for 45 minutes or so the first night. Since then, it's been more than an hour every night. Also, she really struggles getting to the 3h 15m point. Sometimes she cries a lot going down for naps (which I assume is OT). Also, her naps have been getting kind of shorter. Instead of a 1h 30m nap being normal, 1h 10m is normal. So, I guess I really need to lengthen her A times more? I just feel so confused because 3h 30m is pretty long for a 6mo, right? And because she seems OT fairly often after 3h 15m.
Sigh. It's happened to me before that NW mean I need to lengthen A time, but she's never been so resistant to it being lengthened. Also, those NW have always been around 5am. But then again, things change so much! What do you think?

[Erin M]

Maybe too much at once?  You could always try just lengthening one of the A times (especially if she's giving you shorter naps) and keep the other ones shorter?  Sometimes that works -- it could also be that she's one who would do better with one A time longer than the others.  Her A times are on the long side for her age already so I'd hesitate to push them all that much more.  Any other possible culprits for wakings?  Teeth, foods, etc?  They might be your more likely culprit, especially given the shorter naps.

[lrj]

i think i've got it!

my guess is that when i tried to wean her off of the night feedings by shush/patting back to sleep, she became dependent on the shush/pat...? yesterday her naps were terrible, and i did pu/pd instead of shush/pat as every time i stopped patting she woke up. much to my surprise, pu/pd even worked to get her back to sleep after a short nap! (it's never worked for that before)
so last night, instead of the usual shush/pat, i did pu/pd and she fell back asleep after 30 minutes of that! believe me, i'll take 30 minutes of pu/pd over two hours of shush/pat any day.
feeling much better!!

Her A times are on the long side for her age already so I'd hesitate to push them all that much more.

so glad you told me this!! i would have had a screaming baby by yesterday afternoon...

wow thanks so much!! i could give you a hug right now!

[Erin M]

Woohoo!  Don't forget, you did all the work!