Help! 5 month old waking every 20mins

[ankica]

Hi,
I'm a complete zombie at the moment. For the past 2 nights my 5mo dd has woken up at 2am and then every 20mins until about 5am. She seems to resettle quickly with sush-pat or a paci but as soon as I get to bed and comfortable she cries out again - almost in her sleep but if I don't respond she'll wake completely. I fed her at 2.45 last night and that kept her asleep until 4.15 and after that I just used sush pat and dummy again.
She is on 4 hour easy exactly as in the book 7,11,3 and 6.45 feeds and df at 10.30.
What could be the cause?
Any advice would be great.

[linfran]

My lo will be 5 months next week but a month ago the same thing happened to us - in our case i think it was a combination of teeth and being overtired, not being the world's greatest napper.  Could you post your routine to see anything flags up?  How much does she eat at mealtimes?

My son had settled after the teeth and a bout of bronchiolitis but had get really fidgety at night again, waking up every hour.  He had been sleeping in a crib in our room but is a big boy (20lbs at 19 weeks) and a couple of nights ago I moved him into his proper cot in his own room.  Since then he's only waking once a night and that has been for a feed - seems he's happier because he's got more room and is a bit cooler being on his own - would something like that be a possible cause?

[ankica]

Thanks for the reply. I doubt that she's overtired as her daytime naps are generally quite good and she's always in bed for the night at 7pm. She's on 4 hour EASY.
E - 7am
A - 7.30-9.00
S - 9.00-10/10.30 sometimes only a short nap here

E - 11am
A - 11.30-12.30ish
S - 12.30-2.30 she usually wakes half way through but we can get her back to sleep for the full 2hours

E - 3pm
A - 3.30-4.15
S - 4.15-5.00 her catnap

A - 5-6pm
6pm - Bath
6.40pm - Dinner
7.00pm - Bed

DF - 10.30

She is exclusively breastfed and generally feeds very well. I think I can see her two bottom teeth coming through which could be the cause of some pain but this would be an odd explanation as she is completely fine during the day. She's already cried out 3 times tonight since I put her to bed almost three hours ago.

Sorry for the long post but I doubt I'll be able to function with many more nights like the last two.

[linfran]

It could well be the teeth - my lo was worse at night with his.  I reckon he had so many other things to distract him (plus the application of bonjela every three hours) which he didn't have at night.

If they're just starting to come through that's when it really seems to hurt them the most.

[llambden]

My 8mth son is waking up every hour - I think it might be teeth also.  He goes to sleep really good.  He sleep for a couple of hours and the then wakes up every hour for 4 hours then back to sleep for the rest of the night.  I have tried to let him cry it out but he just gets so worked up and it takes longer for me to put him back to sleep.  So now I just pick him up and rock for 3 minutes and put back in his crib.  This has been going on for 3 nights.  I hope it will stop soon.  He has always been a great night sleeper so I am hoping it is teeth.  I even give him Advil at night.

How long did it last that your baby was waking up through the night?  How long does it take for those teeth to come out?

[linfran]

My ds started fussing at 3mo old and it took three weeks for the first two littlw suckers to appear.  He got sick with bronchiolitis right after, although he had started to settle again.  My hv was really surprised his teeth arrived so early, she says it's usually between 6-8 moths that they appear ,although the grizzling can start far earlier than that.

I took him to the dentist yesterday (never too young to start I guess) and he says he could feel the top two front ones and a canine tooth on the bottom row which he says will really hurt to come through - the eye teeth and molars are the worst....oh joy!!!!!

I give him bonjela on his gums and infant paracetamol to help with th pain - the eye tooth is really hurting him at the moment.

[ankica]

I hope that her teeth come soon. Tonight will be the fifth sleepless night in a row. Last night she was a liitle better - only five wakeups I think (lost count in my sleepy haze). I feel that this week of my life I've spent in a trance - even to scared to go anywhere that involves driving as I know that my concentration level isn't great.
Fingers crossed that these teeth come soon and the wakeups don't become habitual.
I'm handling the wakeups the BW way. No stimulation, just ssh/pat and paci if she needs it - she settles really quickly so I hope that I keep seeing improvement and get at least 4hours of unbroken sleep.
I know that nobody can fix this for me but the support on this site is excellent.
Thanks