getting worse and worse...

[seaflower]

Hi, I have posted before and thanks to your wonderful advice managed to stop swaddling my 4.5mo DD, and to get rid of the paci last week.

The first few days after the paci were ok, her naps were only 30min (usually 45) but she would go down on her own and fall sleep within 5-10mins, barely any crying.

Then since last Wednesday it feels somebody changed her with a different baby!!! :shock: It started with her screaming for an hour one evening (when we were about to go out for dinner) and she didn't settle until 1:30am that night. The following day refused to nap, she would scream so much she would turn red and barely have any voice... nothing would calm her down apart from picking her up and walking with her up and down. None of the usual sh/p seem to make difference any more! It has been like this for the last 5 days.

During the night she was never a great sleeper, but now she is in our bed and i BFeed her whenever she starts moaning, which is every hour!!! I barely get any sleep, but to be honest have absolutely no willpower or energy to calm her during ht enight. EverydayI sya I will, and then the following morning I dont even remember when she woke up or what i was doing. Think I am in a semi-asleep state and can;t think! Tried settting the alarm but didn't wake up either

Sorry for the long post, I felt I was doing so great with her, and now dont know where to start from.  Feel so tired and discouraged... I guess I just need a friendly shoulder to cry on and somebody to tell me this too will pass. Last week I had to hand her to DH twice and just walk out as the screaming was getting too much for me... Felt like such a crap mother not beinn able to comfort my own child!

PS She is teething, and I tried all the standard remedies here, dont seem to make much difference   Thanks for reading...

[corrina01]

I think this is developmental.  My DD was about the same age as your DD, when she was a totally different baby for about a week.  Then it will all change back to how your DD was.  I have been through a hell of a week for the past week, as she is going through another developmental hell,  she was refusing to take any milk she was more interested in her hands.  But today she seems to have reverted to my little DD again.  I thought she was teething, but no sign of her teeth apart from her chewing everything in sight.

[jaybee]

It sounds like you have been doing amazingly considering how tired you must be - it can be so demoralising when you feel you have tried all your tricks and nothing works, but please don't feel like a crap mother! Sometimes I give myself a hard time when I don't achieve what I think I 'should' - then I try to step back from it and say 'hey, give yourself a break - sometimes you just have to do whatever it takes to get through the night/day and sod the rules!'
Hang in there!

[kirsty_167]

hi...it has to be an age thing relevant to the new tricks they can do!! My baby is 4 months and nearly 1 week old...he was wonderful napper and going to bed....now its all changed....sometiems he naps soemtimes he wont...sometimes he screams at bedtime....i have sleep trained him before and i think i am just going to do it again to reteach him he can go to sleep on his own.......and help keep him from getting so hysterical......i too have times i just thnk im going to end up being committed into an asylum (sp?) and have days i feel i could run away and scream and cry for hours...........then when we have a good day and/or a good night i feel better again.......lets hope we have nore good days than bad and the hard days soon pass!!!!

good luck ....
kirsty

[seaflower]

I still haven't tackled the frequent night feeding and waking, and she is in our bed (at least we get some sleep  :roll: )

One thing puzzles me - she keeps waking up every hour!

Last few days she is quicker to settle, just pick her up and rock her for a minute and she is off to dreamland again... tried not to feed her, be she still wakes up. Usually goes to bed around 6:30-7pm, and then is up around 8pm, 9pm, feed round 10pm... and then I loose track as I am too sleepy.

Any ideas why is this happening? She stops crying the minute I pick her up...

[cymonguk]

At a guess I would think this is due to her sleep cycles, usually you can time them to every 45 minutes it may be she is doing that, gets to the next fifteen minutes stage and wakes?

Agree it probably is developmental though.

[seaflower]

Yes, it is the sleep cycles, she doesn't seem to be able to resettle herself and wakes up. Tried leaving her for few mins but the moaning turns into a full-blown cry! She is waking up 45 minutes on the dot! :shock:

I got her into our bed for the lunch nap today and lyed down with her to settle her, then went back after 35mins, she did stur but cuddled towards me and continued sleeping       She is still asleep an hour and a half later... may try this for the next naps and see if it works!

If not, I'll wait her to grow out of it...

[seaflower]

I am back...

There has been some improvement, some of the naps DD (now 5 months) is taking are 1.5, even once or twice 2 hours long, most are still only 45 minutes. She is quite easy to settle recently, I just cuddle her, sing for 5 mins and she is asleep. If I lie in bed with her she wakes up after 45mins, smiles and goes back to sleep (cute or what )

But...

She is still in our bed all the time. She doesn't mind sleeping in her cot but it is too much hassle for me to move her in and out every hour, so enevitably ends up sleeping with us. She also keeps waking every hour or so during the night, and I keep nursing her to sleep. Sometims she'll only feed 2-3mins and falls asleep again... I was hoping these wakings will get less regular but a month later still not change.

I have been settling her back to sleep without feeding irst few times when she wakes up (generally until around 12am) and she still wakes up! What else can I do?? I know it is the sleep cycles, but how can I help hergo through them without waking up? (As DH says, we are like 'Sky News on the hour!')

I am back to work in January and really have to address the night wakings, but have no energy what so ever to even start   Thanks for reading my moan...

[corrina01]

It is just a thought, does she use a dummy?  My DD uses a dummy, and she wakes every 45 mins during her nap times.  She spits it out either just before sleep or during sleep.  I go in and replace it at the 45 min mark then she resettles herself.

I also use a pillow next to her so she can snuggle into the pillow, I have my scent on the pillow so she can smell me without me being there.  I have no issues with night waking though so I can't help you there, sorry.


EDIT

I have re-read your post again and see that you have got rid of the dummy.

[seaflower]

Hi corrina01, yes, we did get rid of the dummy few weeks ago

I usually leave her to nap on our bed, and as she is not really turning yet jsut put two pillows on both sides, so she can snuggle into them. Haven't tried putting my scent on them, may be some milk... :lol:  :lol:  :lol:

I do sneak in at aorund 30mins and stay with her so she can settle back to sleep, btu sometime she still wakes up. My life has turn into one constant 'getting her to sleep' state

[seaflower]

I am getting a bit discourged at this stage. Few weeks on and still no change   Naps are 45 mins (3-4 times a day), goes down at around 7pm and wakes up EVERY HOUR during the night!!! I feed her every 3-4 hour during the night. Started solids and got the first two teeth last week, so was hoping that would settle her, but NO!

It takes 2-3min to settle her during the night, and sometimes she is not even fully awake, but still wakes up. I know everybody says it is developmental, but how long until she grows out of it? It has been going on for ages at this point... Please, give me some positives stories of babies who outgrew it :cry: I am back to work next week and can't even think how will we cope without a proper sleep.

[cass*4]

Hi sounds like your having a rough time   Don't know if this'll help but hows her feeding during day? I had been topping my baby up before naps to lengthen them during the transition to solids then after a month thought why am I still doing this? She started waking up 3 - 4 times a night as well so I started giving her a bit of water before her sleep and she slept through the first two nights after that. She then got sick and woke up every night after  :cry:  but the last two nights have been good touch wood. Does sound like she is having trouble settling to sleep and transitioning through, one of my other kids had that problem too. Does she settle to sleep by herself? Have you tried putting her in cot at play times to get her used to it? My first two kids spent a great deal of time in our bed it was lovely.... till they started moving! At the end of the day do your best to get through it's all you can! Good luck and don't feel bad!!!

[Catzsz]

Hiya bird
Just sticking my two pennies in here cos im a bugger like that.

Firstly can you write down as closely as you can your routine during the day? Often what happens during the day has an impact on what happens during the night, its very holistic.
Are you on an EASY routine? And what do you do when you wind her down? In the meantime til you can get back to us and us to you do by whatever means neccasary get as much sleep in as possible, can your dh take over for a few nights or even just a few hours so you can get a snooze if you have to deal with this alone? I say that cos i bloody had to! :evil:

I wsuspect a few things, and this isnt a critasism cos trust me i realise and know how desperate it gets when your that knackered and dont know where to even start!

One is that its fairly inconsistant how your dd is going to sleep, maybe in her cot, in your bed, fed to sleep, cuddled etc. The key to the whole thing is consistancy so your dd will know by what your doing, where she is and what to expect from it.
I think you've also inadvertently become her prop, she NEEDS you to be able to go to sleep, you may be able to get away with it for one or two nights but by the third change in routine....she becomes to rely on it.

I agree it has a lot to do with sleep cycles, it takes twenty mins to go through three stages on sleep, often it takes twenty mins at least to get relaxed enough to get there hence the 30-1hr wake up.
Whats happening is that your dd will reach the lighter part of her sleep pattern, wake and because she is unable to get herself back to sleep she looks for you to enable her to. Does that make sense?
Aonther element i think is that it can become an inevitable pattern, her sleep rytham to wake at this mark so i beleive your looking at re-sleep training from scratch.
Get back with the info i asked you and we'll see if we can come up with somthing, your routine, how she goes to sleep? Her wind down routine?
Wake period? What you do when she wakes? etc.

Hth

[seaflower]

Thanks for the replies! There are few very valid points that you made, although I still don't know how to change them.

We used to be on EASY, then she started nursing every hour around the clock, currently we are on kind-of-EASY:) She eats every 3-3.5 hours, sleeps for 45 mins and stays awake for 1.5-2 hours. She also wakes up between 6am and 8am, it's different every morning.

So, for example, if she gets up at 6am, our day is something like
E 6am
S 8am-8:45
E 9am
S 10:30-11:10
E 12am
S 1pm-1:40
E 3pm
S qround 3-4
E 7pm
S 7:20-7:30
E around 10-11pm, depends when she wakes up
E  1-2am, 4am, 6am (i usually dont have the energy to fight with her wakings early in the morning so just feed her)

After 7:30 she wakes up every 45 mins, and after 12am usually every 1.5, sometimes 2 hours. The routie varies depending on when she gets up and how long she sleeps, sometimes after a 30min nap she would settle back and have a second nap 20 mins later.

She can sleep in her cot, the reason she is with us in bed is that it is much quicker to settle her during the night - it takes 1 min of shushing and she is off again. If she is in her cot it takes much longer. After reading your post I put her in her cot tonight to see if she stays and she is happily asleep.

To wind her down for naps I put her in her grobag, pull the curtans, turn on the music and sing to her, while gently patting her bum. She usually moans for about a minute and falls asleep. The night is the same, she just has a feed beforehand. We are pretty consistent of where she sleeps, it is always in our bed, but she does need somebody with her.

When she wakes up I go in, cuddle her and shush few times, or sing if she is crying rather than fussing. Again it takes her abotu a minute to fall asleep, but sometimes she wakes up few minutes later and we have to repeat the process.

I can see she is used to me, do you have any ideas how to stop that?

PS Sorry for the long post, it turned out much longer than I intended. :oops:  :oops:

[Catzsz]

Your poor mummy! No wonder your knackered! Have a big squish!

Firstly i strongly suggest you try and get a good couple of hours sleep in cos your going to need all the resolve you've got, and you need to keep it the same each and every time. Feel free to come back and have a really good moan cos i think you need to have that and it doesnt make you a bad mum....just a normal mum one.

You obviously know how easy works but i just wanted to point out that your dd will need to be on a 4 hour routine now, however because i think you have got a lot on your plate just work on it gradually, as the good sleep habits kick in it does start to fall into place.
The feeding before sleep is absolutly fine, as long as she doesnt fall asleep on it and it doesnt become a prop for her. If you feel it is, i'd drop it completly, if she's fed an hour or so ago she's fine....but i do understand the paranoia....been there!
The wind down, i'd suggest apart from the feed is just a quiet dark room and talk to her quietly in her cot/or your arms whatever works for you both so that she becomes nice and chilled out, the pitfall is the timeing, get her on her first yawn, if not her second take her straight up to her room and begin the wind down.
I cannot stress this enough cos it worked magic for us though not immediatly is introducing a luvvy. Pick somthing if she doesnt already have a favourite, have it with you to get your smell on it and try and associate it with the comfort she gets when you feed her kinda thing and then put it with her whenever she goes for her snoozes.

The patting/shhing still seems to be working for you to get her to sleep (Tracy rec pat/sh after 3 months, i also got away with pat/shh til dd was 8 months) so i would suggest setting up a camp bed on the floor in her room for a few days and try and stay strong, dont take her into bed with you, you go to her not the other way round.
When you put her down do your pat/shh thing but i'm going to suggest that you continue to do at least the patting thing for a full 20 mins after she's fallen asleep to get her past that "jolt" she'll have at the lighter part of her sleep cycle, then gradually ease back the patting and sneak off if its a nap. It may be worth, and you'll know best just being there ready to reasuree/pat back off to sleep if you can just before she fully wakes to hopefully get her back off to sleep or before becoming fully awake. I'm hoping that the patting for another 20 mins after she's flaked out will buy at least a good 1.5 hours kip, again trial and error to see how she'll react.

At night, to feed or not to, my dd who i finally got to be a good sleeper still didnt drop that last waking til 6 months. I'd use your own judgment, if you feel she's hungry feed her, use 4 hours as your rule of thumb from last feed, otherwise pat again til asleep in her own cot.
Sleep in her room for a night or two then see how you go back in your own bed (bliss).

Once you feel she's waking less and not needing you to pat so long start patting slightly less and less, leaving sooner and sooner until you can just put her down after her wind down and leave, but be prepared that it make take two weeks form start to finish, but you should start seeing improvments  within three days but whatever happens keep with it for that fortnight.

I think i mind you saying about teething? I just wanted to mention one of those amber knecklaces, i was bought mine from a freind, i didnt realise it helped dd with her teething till i forgot to give her it back after warming it in the sun....and im a sinic! Did i spell that right?

Good luck and shout if you have any questions.
Hth