Struggling with sleep

[Priscilla]

I'm hoping someone can give me some advice as I'm going nuts.... but then again, I say that at every post!!! :P Oh and this is a very long post.....

My prob is that Cameron who will be 9mths on Friday is a really **** sleeper. Has ALWAYS been. I've experimented with different routines, bedtimes, volumes of food but NOTHING works. I can handle him not sleeping through. I can even handle having to rock him to sleep. But it's just that he wakes every 40mins!!!

For the last few months, he would wake every 40mins from around 7pm to 10pm. Then he would wake every 2hrs, and I think it's because we co-sleep. From 5am, he would be back to waking every 40mins until about 7am when we get out of bed.

We moved up to Cairns a couple of weeks ago and the first few nights was better. He go to bed at 7pm and wake every two hours until morning. Believe me, that was BLISS!! Then one night, after going down at 7pm, he slept FOUR HOURS!! I thought "WOO HOO!", then at 11pm he started waking every 40mins all the way until 1am when I'd had it and just brought him into bed with me where he went back to waking every 2hrs.

The last week was him waking every 40mins until I bring him into bed with me where he'd wake every 2hrs, until 5am when it's back to 40mins. HELP!!

I'm experimenting with later bedtimes, which results in his daytime naps going for longer than the usual 40mins. Last night, he didn't sleep until 10:30pm and today he took one 20min nap and 2 x 1.5hr naps!! I put him down for a nap at 4:45pm this arvo and he's now still asleep at 6:30pm. Now I'm worried of either of the two outcomes:
1. He'll wake from his nap and will not go back to sleep until 1am;
2. He's taking this to be his nighttime sleep, which means he may wake at 4am and be full of beans.

He's on three solids a day. I make him congee which is just really really really soft and mushy rice. I alternate between chicken, pork and fish congee - so just throwing in a chunk of mean when I'm boiling the rice and mash the meat. I give him fruit for arvo snack and he's also gets a breastfeed one hour before his solids.

I'm so sorry for the long winded-ness but I'm sooooo tired from having to wake every 40mins. CC doesn't work as he's a bloody persistent little boy and will just keep screaming.

What can I do??? His inconsistency is really confusing me. I'm so jealous of mum's whose babies sleep through - even the ones who wake once or twice.

[Mahjong]

Hi Priscilla.

Firstly, I want to say that I sympathise with you. My son was and still is a terrible sleeper. He was pretty bad at 9 months also.

Ive just been looking at your bedtime/nap time routines: When Wyatt was your son's age, his routine for naps was like this:

5-6am wake up
8-8.30am - Nap, usually for around an hour
Play time, feed time during awake times. Go for a walk or play out side or inside with mummy
10.30-11.00am - Nap - Usually 1.5-2 hours
Afternoon play etc...

That was on a good day. You can also swap and change times, but I found that letting Wyatt sleep after 2-2.30pm, he would be up all night. Maybe it is worth looking into? It's all trial and error. Just remember that you are the Mummy.

Wyatt went to bed 6-6.30pm every night. He did wake during the night several times though, I can count on one hand the amount of times he has slept through.

Does your son have a dummy or a anything that comforts him when he sleeps?

I know it's hard, but have you looked into Controlled Crying? We found that we had no choice at that age. As long as you know that he's not wet/cold/hot, teething or sick/has a tummy ache he will be OK.
Another thing we have found is when Wyatt eats particular foods, it can distrupt his sleeping due to wind/tummy ache. Once we started working that out and cutting those foods down or out, he started settling down a bit more. Worth looking into. Peas, beans and anything high in sodium are the shockers.

Good luck!

[misskittyfantastico]

I don't know what your postion is on them, but have you looked into places like Tressilian (sp) in WA we have Ngala...I've never used them myself but I know a lot of people who have had great success....I'm not sure who it is in your state but Bub Hub would probably have it somewhere...I'll go and have a looksee.
Here might be somewhere to start.

http://www.bubhub.com.au/servicesparentingclinics.shtml

Good luck.

[BiLL|z0r]

If you do use a sleep center be warned the first thing they will do is cut out cosleeping and letting them come into bed with you. They are very very pro controlled crying. We've been to 1 (long story - just do as they say) and it's very hard to let your baby cry in front of everyone and just ignore him.

I'd just work out a routine and stick to it hard. That what made us sane (well more sane anyway). Wyatt now thrives on his routine and even tells us when it time to go to bed.

Is he bottle or formula fed? We went though 5-6 different types of formula before we found 1 that was good to his tummy. Others gave his reflux, blocked him up, wind etc. We ended up with Karicare AR Sensitive.

[ozzysmum]

aw hugs to you :hugs:
i totally sympathise - ozzy has only very recently got down to 3 or less wakings per night and it was truly exhausting. he still doesn't sleep all the way through but the last 2-3 weeks it's only been 2-3 wakings rather than a timetable very similar to yours. I found now that he's crawling and trying to stand and all that he's more tired and therefore sleeping better - i let him use up LOTS of energy in the day. we also don't have any naps (not even ten minutes) after about 2 pm and i'll even wake him up if necessary.

do you have a night time ritual? we do the standard bath/bottle/book/bed routine and it's taken months but now by half way through his bottle he's struggling to stay awake. I give him one formula bottle per day as part of this routine (he's breastfed the rest of the time) and have found it works really well (for us).

the two main problems he seems to have staying asleep are tummy pains (he'll wake up crying then fart like a demon for about ten minutes while i give him cuddles then go straight back to sleep) or what i assume to be baby nightmares where he wakes up really really quickly and very upset. sometimes a dummy straight in the mouth fast enough and he'll drop off again, other times (when it takes me too long to get there and he's really woken himself up) it can be a struggle getting him to go back down - i tend to BF him to sleep when he's like that.

best of luck - i know there's not much advice other than controlled crying; i figured it's just nice for you to know that other people are going through it too and it will, one day, be better :hugs:

[BecH]

Hi,


I have a very similair sleeping problem with my 9 month old. Someone recommended this website to me www.askdrsears.com and it has tips for helping with settling, good foods for sleep, issues that could be interfering with sleep, ect. Basically I just follow a nighttime routine, bath, feed, quiet play, top-up feed, wrap loosley below arms, put on lullaby and rock to sleep. Sometimes she wakes once but often it is a lot more often. I too failed with controlled crying and Dr Sears website explains why this may be so.

Try and rest during the day, I know it can be impossible. Sometimes when I am completely exhausted I pat her in her cot while she cries because I just feel like I physically can't rock her. Often after this I end up having to rock her but she sleeps for much longer, it seems to reset her clock.

Good luck, PM me if i can help,

Bec

[Priscilla]

Sorry this is another long post. Thank you all so much for your advice!!! I know its a terrible thing to say but it's good to know that there are others out there whose babies are as terrible sleepers as Cameron.

I called a sleep clinic last month and found that yes, they are very pro-CC. I do want to do it - actually, I should re-phrase and say that I do wish that it would work on Cameron. But he's just too persistent and it does break my heart to watch him get so upset just for a cuddle.

Cameron doesn't take the dummy or the bottle. Doesn't really have a particular blanket or toy that he needs. Just wants me to rock him back to sleep. Sometimes, I have been able to pat him off to sleep and once in a blue moon, I have seen him just put himself to sleep.

I really don't think it could be the foods. I have tried different foods and he still has the same sleeping pattern. It doesn't get colicky and he seems to be able to burp and fart without any issues/problems. He's not a whinger or a sook during the day.... all in all, he's a pretty good baby when he's awake.

I've taken some advice that you've given and he has one 3-4 hour block of sleep during the night which I'm hoping will be permanent. I've made sure he's been up for at least four hours before bed, during the day I have been trying to wear him out - esp in that block before bed - so I've been tickling him and really making him laugh. In conjuction with that, I've brought his dinner time later and his bedtime is now around 8:30-9pm. However, for some reason, he's decided to wake at 6am! Anyway, his routine now is:

6am - wakes
6:30am - I manage to pull myself out of bed and give him a bf
8am - breakfast. One bowl of congee.
9-10:30 - he'll start his nap for 40mins anytime between these two times I guess, depending on how tired he is and how stimulated he has been in the morning.
11:30 - bf
12:30-1pm - Lunch. One bowl of congee
4pm - nap about 40mins
5pm - bf
6pm - bath
7pm - dinner
8:15-9pm - final bf and bed

Last night, he stirred at 10:30pm and I just patted him back to sleep in his cot. At 11:30pm he woke and I bf'ed him back to sleep. At 1am he woke and as I was so tired I brought him into my bed where, as soon as he hit the bed he stopped crying and went to sleep. Slept all the way through until about 5:15am and started to stir. I rocked him back to sleep and put him into his cot where at 6am he woke for the day.

This routine so far seems be working so far. Thank you all for letting me know what helped you as obviously, taking your advices has helped me!!!

I'm keeping my fingers this sleeping pattern continues and if it goes bum-up again, I'll be jumping up and down asking for advice again!!!