Why wont my daughter sleep through the night????

[Lauren mother of Gracie]

My 14 month old daughter wont sleep through the night !!!

She naps for 1 hour in the afternoon then will give her a bath at 7.00pm and put her in her cot at 7.30pm with a warm bottle of milk. 4/7 she will normally go straight to sleep but then wake up maybe 3 or 4 times in the night. She does go back to sleep however will normally have to give her a dummy because im so tired. She is then awake at 7.00am!!

Going back to work full time next week and really worried that im just not going tobe able to cope. Im also a single parent and always exausted from the sleepless nights.

Could really do with some advice before i go mad!!!

Does anyone else have this problem?

Look forward to hearing from someone!!

Thanks for listening.

Lauren

[Deb_in_oz]

what does her day look like?

my guess without more info is that at 14 mo she needs more than 1 hour sleep in the day and is overtired causing her to get to sleep but not have a good night sleep.

has she always been a short napper?  what time does she get up?  what time is her nap??  what does she do in the lead up to bedtime?

[Fife_Mum]

Hi Lauren,

Is she falling asleep with the bottle at night time? Maybe that is why she is waking for her dummy - because she does not know how to get back to sleep without sucking? I would suggest that if you think that is the problem you try to move her milk to before her bath and consider moving to a cup rather than bottle soon.

HOWEVER, I would not suggest it until you are settled back at work  :wink: because you'll both get less sleep in the short term  .

In the meantime, does she really need you during the night? Does she cry? Maybe having 3 or 4 dummies in her cot means she could reach one herself? My DS shouts out during the night, and will usually settle himself - I'm still woken up but at least I don't always have to actually get up.

Good luck, and I'm sure others will have more advice for you    You sound like you are doing a pretty good job already though - even though it doesn't always feel like it!

[katejude]

Firstly I'd like to say good on you!  A single mum and you've been getting up to a baby for 14 months.  You must be absolutely shattered.  I really feel for you.  It took my son 10 months to sleep through the night so I do understand.

Is the dummy the issue?  I know they are very useful but is she relying on you to come and put it back in?

I have a friend with a 14 month old and she only naps for one hour a day.  Maybe that is enough for that age?  Does she seem grumpy by bedtime?

[Poppy & Lily]

Hi Lauren,

You've had some great advice and I'm no expert,  but my dd used to wake up literally every hour because of the dummy :shock: ...my friend then gave me a tip..she told me to put a few dummies in in the cot with her and what i found was when she woke up she would locate one of the dummies herself and pop it back into her mouth herself..now she sleeps 12hrs straight!

Obviously i would have preferred it if I could eliminate the dummy all togeather but thats another issue :roll: it is working for me at the moment...next step dummy elimination :?

HTH

[Lilah'sMommy]

Here's another question-- has she ever slept through the night?  Is this waking a relatively new thing or has it been going on since birth?  There may be some developmental milestones and/or teething going on around this time, too.

I do agree, however, that maybe it's the going to bed with a bottle.  I know that until I used PU/PD at nine months, my DD would wake 2-3 times a night and have to nurse to go to sleep.  She would sleep through the night from about 2 1/2 to 4 months, then we hit a growth spurt, then beginning to crawl, then teething, all of which caused night wakings, and I just nursed her back to sleep because it worked.  Well, I was exhausted, and eventually it didn't work anymore and it would take me 2 hours to get her to sleep at night sometimes.  After PU/PD, she now sleeps 12 hours every night, and puts herself to sleep.

I think you might try the idea of putting some pacifiers in her crib to see if that works, but you might want to try solving the problem of needing to suck to sleep altogether with PU/PD.  This will be enormously taxing on you as a single mom, so if you decide you need to do this, enlist some help (mother, friends, anyone!).  If you do decide that you need to use PU/PD, I would say the sooner the better, because it only gets harder as they grow up.  If you need support for the technique, post on the PU/PD thread, and please feel free to pm me with any questions or frustrations.

HTH!