I don't know what to try anymore

[hayleystar]

Phi all,
I'm in serious need of help and support. My dd  is 6.5 months old. The last two months her sleeping has gone down hill and continues to get worse. It's gotten to the point I don't know what to try and I'm exhausted. She was previously on a 4 hour easy routine, she settled herself to sleep and woke once or twice in the night.
Now she really has no day routine. I put her down for her first nap after two hours and she wakes after 30 mins (have tried a time of anywhere from 1.5 - 3 hours but she always wakes after 30 min)" have tried to resettle her, and wake to sleep technique but nothing gets her back to sleep. So I get her up, then she's tired and grumpy after an hour or less so she has to go to bed, then it's another 30 min sleep, this cycle continues all day until 6pm where she is so tired and screaming she goes to bed for the night, then after a few hours starts waking every two hours.
I'm really at a loss of how to fix this. The 30 min naps have been going for about 6 weeks now.

She eats three good meals a day. Breast feeds are a bit all over the place but I try to do four hourly.
She now crys  every time I put her down, for a nap and I have to pat and soothe her to sleep.
How can I fix this? I'm so exhausted, have washing piling up and can't spend anytime with my other children as this one needs so much time and doesn't sleep.
Please help

[anna*]

(((hugs))) sorry you're feeling so exhausted. Babies are hard work!

OK so she definitely needs at least 3hrs A time to do a decent nap. So the first thing I would work on is making sure your A times are definitely long enough. She may even need longer, like 3hrs15. If she wakes after 30 mins, try to settle her for say 10 mins or so but then get her up if she's not settling. After a short nap don't cut the next A time too much she will still need to be up at least 2.5hrs.

Is she an independent sleeper? She is getting a lot of solids, remember that milk needs to be her main source of calories for now, could her tummy be troubling her? How do you settle her when she wakes in the night?

[hayleystar]

Thank you so much for replying! I definitely have not been giving her enough wake time so that gives me a good place to start! Thank you. I also never know how long to keep her up after a 30 min sleep, she always seems so tired! So thank you I will aim for the 2.5.
She started her unsettled days and nights before solids but I could try cut back a bit on them. I the night I feed her to settle. She has a very quick feed then back to sleep

[anna*]

So you are feeding every two hours in the night?

[hayleystar]

I was feeding every two hours but have been using pupdvto resettle her and got her down to two night feeds plus a dream feed at 10. Can't quite seem to get her out of these feeds. Have kept her up two hours this morning and she went straight to sleep which is already a massive improvement

[anna*]

I think 3 feeds overnight (2 plus DF) is probably more than she needs :/ how did the rest of the day/night go?

[hayleystar]

Yes she certainly does not need so many feeds at night. I can tell because she's never very interested in her 7 am feed.
She woke from her nap after 30 mins. I kept her up another 2.5 hours and she went down again ok but woke again after 30 mins. Will try again tomorrow. She has to sleep more than 30 mins one day!

[anna*]

((hugs)) she will. She may need an even longer A time. Lets see what happens over the next couple of days.