7 month old waking in the night

[Pickles mum]

Please help. My 7 month old has started waking regularly over night, from sleeping all night ( 18:30-06:00 since 12 weeks)!!

Thank you

How old is your child? 7 months
What’s his/her daily routine? Up 06:00-07:00, nap 09:00 for 1 1/2-2hrs. Nap again 13:00ish for another 1 1/2 - 2hrs. Bed 18:00-18:30.
What’s nap routine?
How long are naps?
What's bedtime routine? Time? Bed at 18:00-18:30. Bath, bottle then cot.
Do you bottle or breastfed?? Bottle
How much? or how long? 7ozs
If breastfed.. one side or both?? (at each feed)
How many wakes per night? Sometimes 2-3 for 15-20 mins, sometimes once for 2hrs!!?
What’s your LO like when waking at night? How long is he/she up?
When you go to him/her is she fussing or crying? Or is it a mantra cry? Fussing crying
What have you tried to settle?? I talk to her put hand on tummy if still crying gets picked up til stops then put back down....continue.
What do you do for A time and how long is it? Either plays on mat or activity centre or in highchair. Have older sibling who plays with LO.
Are there developmental issues such as teething or milestones? Just learnt to roll. Increasing diet.
Have you introduced cereal? Why, how much, and how many times a day? (for LO’s under 6 months)
Do they have a prop? If so what is it? Did have sound machine, trying to remove
Do they have a lovie? Blanket.

Thanks for the help
 

[Layla]

Hi there and welcome

Have you recently dropped the catnap? In your routine, if he wakes at 2.30 from his afternoon nap and is awake until 6.30pm, that may be too long of a stretch to bedtime. You could try adding a little more A between his naps so that his awake times are around 3 hrs and something like this:
6am - wake
9-10.30 - morning nap ( I would limit this nap to 1.5hrs)
1.30-3 - afternoon nap (could let him sleep up to 2hrs)
6/6.30 - bedtime

Also, if he's working on something new (rolling over), he will probably want to do at night too and eventually the novelty wares off. You could try lots of floor time during A time so that he gets to practice this skill then.

You also mentioned you're increasing solids - how many meals is he having at the moment? The introduction of solids can unfortunately cause discomfort and subsequently they wake at night. We didn't do baby cereal at all as it caused lots of night wakings from constipation for my LO. We stuck to milk first and solids about an hour later and I only gave her approx 1-2table spoons for breakfast at that age.

[Pickles mum]

Hi,
Thanks for the quick response.
I will definitely try the altered routine, I am currently putting her down as soon as I see her rub her eyes, think she would probably cope for a little longer.

The food issue-I think I have been a bit quick with introducing it. I have significantly pulled back today and put an extra oz of milk in her bottles, she was only having 3 bottles and I am trying to reinstate the fourth, with less solids-especially dinner time.

She only woke once last night, when her cry turned to "needing attention" I went into her room spoke to her, she calmed down. I just sat in her room while she settled again. Went off to sleep within the hour, a little fussing but nothing she couldn't sort out.

Her nap this morning was a little messy. Went down at 09:10, awake at 10:10. Tried calm talking, hand on chest, pu/pd, nothing worked. Not screaming uncontrollably but crying, with tears and not settling. When we reached her 1.5hr total nap time I stopped and got her up. Is this right?

Thank u so much for your help.

[Layla]

Yes, I would even go as far as cut dinner out altogether... she should be getting her calories from milk and solids is just for fun before 1.

With regards to the nap, I would have accepted 1hr nap and picked her up. For me, anything of 1hr plus is considered a good nap and hopefully because she didn't take a long (ish) nap in the morning, her afternoon nap would have been longer. She may have been a little undertired for that nap and maybe why she only slept an hour.

Oh and I am sorry I was referring to her as him in my previous post

Let me know how you go