Settling at Night

[Ondine]

The past few nights my 4 1/2 month old daughter has decided that she doesn't want to go to sleep. She goes down great during the day. I can just put her down when she starts to show her tired signs, put the dummy in and walk out and she will sleep for a few good hours. But at night, she becomes quite distressed at this process. She normally has her last feed about 7pm, but yesterday she fed at 6pm, then 8pm and she was still awake and screaming at 11pm, when my partner gave her a bottle. Even after this, she did not settle. I was so distressed myself, that I packed a bag and stayed the night at my mothers to get away (I left Kelsie to Ben to settle). When I got home this morning, it had taken him until well after midnight to calm her down and get her to sleep. I think she wore herself out with all the screaming.

Has anyone got any suggestions as to how to settle her at night or have had similar experiences and can shed some light at the end of my tunnel???

It really upsets and frustrates me at this time of night because I become tired too?

Ondine

[Shelz]

Hi Ondine,
My bubs did exactly the same thing at that age, she is now 51/2 months old and sometimes she will still just decide she doesn't want to go to bed but has no problem during the day to settle down for a nap.
She was doing this just before we went on holiday at Nanas, but at Nanas she went down for her night sleep without a peek!
I don't know what it was maybe it was all the attention she was getting all day and was just tired and ready for bed.
My daughter has always been on the feed, play, sleep routine and I was feeding her at 7 pm to go to bed at 8pm at 4.5 months and sometimes she would get hypo after I feed her so made sure if she was not tired or showing tired signs just to keep her up a bit longer or sit down with her for half and hour and read a book just so she would settle. I now feed her solids and b/feed at 5.30 - 6.00 and she goes down to bed at 7.00 pm (most nights).
Know how you feel you are at the end of the day and are just worn out.
Hope your bubs has been OK lately just haven't been on this site lately and saw your question and it sounded exactly like my baby Tru.
Let me know who things are going if you check this.

[melzy]

Hi there, I was shown some great techniques to use on my daughter when she was as young as 8 weeks old by child youth health nurses. What I am going to write is a bit lengthy but bare with me...

First of all my daughter was wrapped and I don't know if your bub is. Apprently they feel more secure wrapped whereas if they are unwrapped they tend to wake themselves up etc with their arms etc. If not, you could try wrapping first.

Ok, the actual techniques were:
With bubs wrapped, have bubs laying on side with its face facing the wall because apparently they get quite stimulated with everything around the room etc but a blank wall is quite boring.

(Gee I hope this is going to be easy for you to understand :) )

I would actually rock bubs while it was laying on it's side and do small taps on it's bottom in the rythym of a heart beat. du dum, du dum. Make sure your hand stays on bubs at all times. (You could rock the cot with one hand and just tap bottom using the other if preferrable - try both!!) After say a minute or two, stop the rocking and just tap the same rythym. After a minute or two you stop the rocking and just have your hand there and just leave it there for a short while. (I actually got a towel in the end, rolled it up and placed it half way down bubs back so that bubs would think that my hand was still there and it felt reassuring for bubs. Make sure of course that suffocation can't occur or towel can't move. I didn't put it straight down back but on angle so that towel was wedged into cot barrier so there was no chance of danger.

I know it sounds like a complete pain in the rear end but it worked an absolute treat for me.

Don't use those mobile things that hang over their cot. they are a more of a pain - for you. They last what, 10 minutes, bubs is relaxed, nearly asleep when suddenly, it stops. What does bub do, wake up crying and you are up too. Instead, put a clock, a noisy one, in bub's room near bed. It's constant, never stops - don't be afraid it can't read the time yet (lol). Another good one is a little radio. Some days I would have just old music on really low or even better still, put the radio out of tune the whole night. It's amazing how they say bubs can relate to these sounds - similar to what they hear when they are in our belly.

Anyway, I hope you haven't fallen asleep with my long reply but I really think you should give it a go. All bubs would cry when you put them down, after all, don't we all like to be cuddled :D

If I haven't explained myself clearly, send me a private email and I would be only too happy to give you my number to chat.

Oh how we long for a night without interruptions.

[Ondine]

Thanks for the suggestions! I have tried the staying up a bit later if she doesn't seem tired - this sometimes works and other times I end up still awake at midnight!!! I have also tried the patting and rocking! This usually calms her down, but doesn't always put her to sleep. :( I have found that gently stroking her head works most the time. :)

She has been sleeping better since she started daycare last week. I think she is just exhausted from all the activity. We normally get home just after 5pm. I bath her straight away then dress her in her pyjamas and she is normally ready for a catnap of 40 minutes to an hour. When Ben gets home, she is normally ready to get up and have a cuddle and a play, before having a feed and going to bed about 8pm. Sometimes I have to go and put the dummy back in a few times, and other nights she is so tired she goes straight to sleep.

At the moment, our latest battle is the number of times I have to get up to replace the dummy through the night. It usually starts at about 4am. I try to let her self-settle, but if I leave her too long, she wakes right up and I can't get her back to sleep! And if I let her make noise, I can't sleep - so anything for a little more sleep - I get up and put the dummy in! I sometimes wish I had never started the dummy! But then again I cannot imagine life without it!

Well here's hoping for some better sleep from here on in. Thanks again.

Ondine