Author Topic: 6 months and still waking up at night  (Read 926 times)

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Offline jennhawaii

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6 months and still waking up at night
« on: September 09, 2013, 20:18:54 pm »
I am having problems with my 6 month old daughter waking up in the middle of the night.

Her schedule:
5 am- breastfeed
530-630- sleep
630- wake up and leave for the sitters by 6:45
7:45- arrive at sitters
8:30- bottle feed expressed milk
9:00- puréed food
9:15-11:45- nap
12:00pm- bottle
12:45- pick up
1:15 home/play
2:30- feed
3:00- solids
3:30- play
4:15-5:00 nap
5:30-feed
6:00 play
6:30 solids
7:00 bath
7:15 feed
7:45 bedtime story
8:00 bedtime

Baby only drinks from the breast or expressed milk. She nurses about 10 mins each breast. She was sleeping through the night at 3 1/2 months. At about 4 months we had family arrive and stay with us for 3 weeks. She started waking up once in the middle of the night. After the left, she continued to wake up like clockwork at 3 am. After reading Tracy's book I realized she was doing so because I nursed her every time. So i stopped nursing her for night wakings and made sure nursing wasnt the last thing i did before i put her in her crib. my daughter goes down for bed time easily. I lay her in her crib after a story with her lovie frog blanket. I leave the room and she babbles and talks to her frog for about 15 mins and goes to sleep. She wakes up once in the night and I do pu/pd. it's been a couple weeks, 3 I think, and her night wakings have gotten later. Right now she wakes up at about 4. I do pu/pd til about 5 and its time for her feeding already.

Within the last 3 or 4 weeks I think she has slept through the night until 5:00 or 5:30 once or twice.

She naps for the sitter just fine. But with me it takes about 15- 20 mins of screaming and crying, pu/pd.

I am desperate. Please tell me what else I need to do to help my daughter sleep through the night! I don't know what I'm doing wrong!

Offline Layla

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Re: 6 months and still waking up at night
« Reply #1 on: September 09, 2013, 23:18:33 pm »
Hi there and welcome to the BW

I don't think her waking up for a feed once at night is unreasonable - we had 2 night feeds at that age :). But if you think its not hunger, it might actually be schedule related which may be causing her to wake at night as I noticed that she's sleeping 2.5hrs in the morning and then nothing until 4.5hrs later (which is a long stretch for a 6mo).

I would see if the sitter can wake her from her morning nap and you then offer her an afternoon nap so that her naps are spread out a little more throughout the day. At this age the CN is hit or miss and some babies start to lose the CN. So without the CN try to aim for something like this:

6.30 - wake up
9.30-11 - morning nap
2-3.30/4 - afternoon nap
7pm - bedtime

The family coming might have been just a coincidence and also there is a large growth spurt at 4 months (as there is at 6 months) so I wouldn't be ruling out hunger just because she has slept through before. In any case, I would suggest tweaking her schedule as night wakings can also be from baby getting overtired due to not being on an age appropriate schedule.

Let me know what you think  :)
« Last Edit: September 09, 2013, 23:47:49 pm by Layla »



20/06/2012 - my angel baby

Offline jennhawaii

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Re: 6 months and still waking up at night
« Reply #2 on: September 10, 2013, 19:37:04 pm »
Layla,

Thank you for your suggestions. Yestersay I put her down for a nap at 2. She woke up last night at 430 am. It's a big progress from waking up habitually at 3 am. I nursed her and put her back to bed before heading to work. I'm just thinking she's hungry at that time? I guess I just hoped she would be able to sleep through the night by now. But I shouldn't complain about her sleeping 8 1/2 hrs! Thanks so much for your help. I'm just happy she has learned to put herself to sleep. 4:30 am wake up isn't bad  :)

Offline Layla

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Re: 6 months and still waking up at night
« Reply #3 on: September 11, 2013, 09:05:24 am »
Yes, it is quite possible she is hungry and I wouldn't hesitate to feed my 6mo  :). I would still encourage you to wake her earlier from morning nap and offer an afternoon nap (as opposed to evening nap) and put her to bed a little earlier. Otherwise she might get into a cycle of getting overtired and will start waking up more at night from that.

Good luck and let us know how its going :)



20/06/2012 - my angel baby