5.5. month old, early waking, sometimes mad, sometimes plays

[shimmer]

Started sleep training my LO as the night wakings were becoming ridiculous.  We have conquered most of them, but now she wakes at 4:30-ish and mantra cries/coos for an hour to an hour & a half! I try not to go in unless it becomes an "I need you" cry, and reswaddle her, but that's usually after an hour's gone by, and she'll usually fall asleep fairly quickly after I do this.   I tried getting her up one of the times, but she ended up rubbing her eyes and fussing for 1/2 an hour until I put her back down, so obviously she wanted to sleep... which she readily accepted (so then, why does she coo)?!  We've tried limiting her daytime sleep somewhat, but nothing is working,  Will it eventually iron itself out if we just persist with treating it like a night waking (only going in when th cries seem upset)?

Here is our routine:

8:00 wake/feed
10:00 nap
11:00 wake (I wake her)
11:45/12:00 feed
1:30 nap
3/3:30 wake (she wakes herself)
3:45 feed
5:30 catnap
6:00 wake (I wake her)
(depending on her mood, we may give her an extra feed here)
7:30 bath
7:45 feed
8:00 in bed

We usually wake her at 8 AM because she is asleep at that time after exhausting herself with the ridiculous hour-long early waking, and she has never been an awesome napper, so that fact that she'll do another 2 - 2 1/2 hours tells me she still sees it as nighttime.  What do I do?  Her sleep doctor suggested that maybe she doesn't "need" that much sleep at night, but there's no way 9 hours is enough for her... she gets too cranky.  I wonder if she just needs to gradually get used to having more & more better consolidated sleep... since her night wakings have greatly decreased; that maybe she is so used to such little sleep that she just needs time to start liking more?  I cannot start the day at 5:00 AM!  And moving her bedtime in EITHER direction has never worked. 

[Kimberly®]

Usually I wouldn't advise going in when she isn't crying but you said she settles quickly after you reswaddle her, have you tried going in right away and reswaddleing? It may be that she just needs that and with time, and when you stop the swaddle, she wont need you to go to her anymore. Sounds like she's having trouble transitioning back to sleep on her own.

[deenz]

My dd2 does this sometimes too... probably not for an hour and a half, but up to an hour (just playing/chatting).  I have pretty much never had to go in to her, and just leave her to it.  It has decreased as she's gotten older, and now often doesn't wake, or only does for a short time.

I agree that once she learns to sleep without the swaddle it should help her to go back to sleep faster.

[shimmer]

We've considered trying to wean the swaddle, but we just recently weaned the pacifier, and feel she needs something right now. We do have routines for bath nap & bedtime, but I worry that without the swaddle she wouldn't know what to do with herself as she is a very active (spirited) baby.   Plus, she is all over the place! Even when swaddled she ends up in some crazy predicaments.

Tonight she has awoken almost every hour & she is swaddled... sometimes it's mantra, sometimes it's pain (or sounds like it).  Would teething be doing this?  Even with the mantra cry?  She (& I) have gotten hardly any sleep tonight.  I felt her gums and they SEEM bumpy, but how can you ever tell?  I finally gave her Tylenol and we're crossing our fingers. 

How did ou wean the swaddle?  & how do I know if she's teething?  & what do i do if I'm sleep training & can't respond to every cry without ruining things we've already accompliashed?

[teezee]

have you started cereal with your lo? are you bfing? if so have you tried removing anything from your diet??