How do I get ds to sleep longer? [Archive] - Cloth Diapers & Parenting Community

MamaStace

04-23-2006, 09:25 PM

:( My 6 month old is up EVERY TWO HOURS! NO JOKE! He hasn't yet doubled his birthweight, but this just can't go on. I"m exhausted and a wreck, as is the rest of my family. I've tried to give him extra food during the day and nurse him more, but now i"m not convinced taht EVERY Time he gets up he's tired. I can understand the 2 times he gets up at night and is really hungry, gulping down milk, but the other times? He doesn't know what the heck he wants! And he won't sleep with me( at least then I'd get some decent sleep w/out jumping out of bed every hour-2 hours). He has trouble sleeping unless he's in his crib by himself, but it has to be on HIS terms. Does that make sense? I"m so tired.

I have to go back to read no cry sleep solution. Im just too tired to make sense of anything. We stayed at my parents' house this weekend (dh is out of town) and he had everyone up every two hours. Listening to my mom say this is not normal for a 6 month old (no kidding! Dd didn't pull this!) didn't make me feel any better. :( I hate the thought of CIO, but I just don't know what else to do. Any ideas on how long is too long to CIO if that's what I choose to do? What other options do I have? If this keeps up I don't know how I'll be able to function. It was so much easier with dd b/c she was our only child!! Now I have to be up early in the mornings to care for dd and the girl I babysit. I Just don't know what else to do.

vick

04-23-2006, 09:48 PM

Sorry mama - that's gotta be rough {{{hugs}}}

Have you talked to your pediatrician? What did they say?

Hillbilly Bunny

04-23-2006, 09:53 PM

My dd and ds started doing this at that age because thay were teething ;) My dd still does this some nights. She usually sleeps about 4 hours, then 3, then 2 until we fimally get up. Sometimes she will wake every 1-2 hours and that is usually because of her teething! She did this last week and we finally gave her some tylenol before she went to bed and she only woke up 2 times that night! poor thing, I think she need the rest!

rds989

04-23-2006, 10:25 PM

I'd really recommend the book Happy Sleep Habits, Healthy Child, by Marc Weisbluth. You need to take his recommendations w/ a grain of salt since you know your kid best, but it's still really useful. He was my friends pediatrician, and she loved him!

Being routinized and intentional about our kids' sleep habits has been one of the best things we've done for our family and our sanity! Good luck!

flobee76

04-23-2006, 11:20 PM

Being routinized and intentional about our kids' sleep habits has been one of the best things we've done for our family and our sanity! Good luck!

I completely agree!! DD has really thrived on a routine and sticking fairly close to a sleep schedule. I only wish that I applied some sort of routine earlier in her life. She was the kind of baby that had several night-wakings. When she was teething- that was the worst! Some nights she would want to co-sleep, others... she just wanted to cry. Tylenol and Hyland's Teething Tabs saved me!

wbkt8

04-23-2006, 11:34 PM

yeah we had teething starting about that time. i hate teething (guess dd doesn't care for it so much either) but it just makes sleeping horrible.

we cosleep and that helps some but on the bad nights it's just hard.

oh as far as doubling birthweight....well, i guess we had a couple pretty good months between her hitting 2x & before she started teething, but i haven't noticed a single correlation between her weight/eating solids/etc. and how well she sleeps.

how is his napping? my dd is/was a crappy napper but i find that it does help if i make a really concerted effort to make sure she gets a good nap (or at that age naps). i see you have other kids so i know it's easier to do when there's only one. i would take molly for carrides to get her to nap & then sit in the park across the street, etc. so she'd sleep on the really bad days. or take her for long walks (she's almost always sleep in the stroller).
((hugs))

katie

mommy2zander

04-24-2006, 01:01 AM

Hugs to you while you work through this...

I wonder if trying co-sleeping again might work? We have a rail on the side of our bed that was really great when zander was small... I've also heard mama's recommend removing the bedframe and lowering the matress to the floor for safety... I understand if this still won't work, but I just thought I'd throw it out there just in case...

I hope this stage passes quickly!! as pp said, Hylands teething tablets are great!! :D

FitMommyOf2

04-24-2006, 08:40 AM

(((Hugs))) mama,
I've btdt with Mason when he was 4 mo. old and up until 1 month ago he didn't sleep properly through the night, nor having good naps during the day!..
I realized that as strange as it sounds, but if he sleeps 2.5-3 hrs during the day (mostly 1st nap 1hr, 2nd nap for 1.5-2hrs) he sleeps much better at night! Also how we set the routine he now goes to bed between 5.30-6pm and it works great. [Eventhough eventually I'd like to have him go to bed around 7pm as otherwise my DH hardly sees him..]

I can only recommend the book 'Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child' by Marc Weissbluth, M.D. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0449004023/sr=8-1/qid=1145885902/ref=pd_bbs_1/103-7599423-8151831?%5Fencoding=UTF8

It helped me a lot w/the routine and isn't a total CIO book, but he explains to some extend the CIO is ok if that's what you want to do. (I sometimes have to let DS cry for a bit [~5 mins] and then go back in and he calms down much better OR often enough he falls asleep w/in those minutes.

GL and feel free to PM me if you need someone to talk to! :)

turtle2who

04-24-2006, 08:00 PM

The marc Weisbluth book is really good- I need to read it again! Having the same type of problem although thankfully not every two hours! Sometimes it feels like it though. A friend of mine did a modified Ferber method with her son when he suddenly went to every 2 hours and had gone longer before that. She decided she needed to sleep and he had just gotten into a bad habit after being sick and waking up more often. Once he was better he didn't stop waking up!

When he woke she would go in and comfort him for 3-4 minutes then leave. If he cried she'd wait 5 minutes before going in- then would comfort him again for 3-4 minutes. Then she waited 7 minutes before going back in for 3-4 minutes. Then she waited 10 and if he was still crying would comfort him for 3-4. Then she would continue with 10 minute intervals until he fell asleep. She said the first night was roughest. She got Daddy to take a shift now and then and her son responded really well to that. He was so happy to see Mama the next time that he settled right down when she comforted him and went to sleep! LOL Anyway- she did say it took a few days and she had intended to nurse him after 6 hours to geet him through till morning but a couple of nights he slept right through and she realized that he didn't need it. He has slept though the night ever since- that was six months ago!

I am going to work on this with my ds when I am home with him this summer. He'll be over a year old and still waking 2-3 times a night! Ugh. I am sooo tired! I don't want to let him cry but I need to sleep!

If you try this let me know how it goes!

havanadaydreamin

04-24-2006, 08:13 PM

Hugs...I'm sorry that you have a lousy sleeper!

DD will be 1 in a couple of weeks and she still wakes up 3-4 times a night. She usually sleeps about 4 hours, then is up every 2 hours until we wake up for the day. She is a terrible napper as well. I think that if she wou ld actually sleep during the day, she would sleep better at night.

I'm crossing my fingers that she might get better once she is out of her crib, so I was thinking about moving her to a bed at the end of the summer. I think that she really just hates her crib!

MamaStace

04-24-2006, 08:45 PM

MomsHelpingMoms

04-25-2006, 02:19 AM

Routine, routine, routine. Maybe it might need some tweeking though so that you all can get some sleep (can't hurt to try right?). Maybe 7:30 is too early for bedtime. I know many parents put there kids down at that time, but it just doesn't work for us. I have a 6 mo too (10-18-05) and she naps 3 times during the day. She has never had to wake up and cry at night (yet) because she is very content with her routine. If she awakens, I give Cam'rynn her pacifier and walk out. I NEVER PICK HER UP. Here is her schedule {It isn't hard or too scheduled, it is her natural schedule and I just stick to it}:

7:30am-wake up, change dipe, milk
8:00am-stimulation
9:00am-rice cereal & chill time (to unwind and
prevent overstimulation)
9:30am-nap
10:30am-wakes up, change dipe, milk
11:00am-stimulation
12:30pm-veggies and fruit & chill time
1:00pm-nap
4:00pm-wakes up, change dipe, milk
4:30pm-stimulation
6:30pm-rice cereal & chill time
7:00pm-nap
8:00pm-wakes up, change dipe, no milk
8:30pm-stimulation (but not too hyper)
9:00pm-bath=chill time
9:30pm-rice cereal, milk bedtime

If she isn't awake by a certain time, I wake her up. She sleeps until 7:30 or sometimes 8 (and yes, sometimes a quarter to 7). She has been on this schedule since she was 2 months old (I would have started earlier but I was hospitalized after childbirth for a severe infection). She is happy and has almost tripled her birth weight from 6lb14oz - 17lb4oz. Not all babies are the same though. I just thought maybe by hearing someone else's routine, it would help.

wbkt8

04-25-2006, 07:10 AM

((hugs)) mamastace...i know any sleep issues we have always seem that much worse when dh is out of town. it's hard having to do it all.

it sounds like he's got a good routine and i would serious suspect that his waking is something like teething. is he showing any other signs (lots of chewing, drooling, nasty poop, etc.?)....maybe some pain relief would help you both get some sleep.

he's also probably going through a lot of developmental milestones to and that's always wrecked havoc with my dd's sleep.

just fyi - 6 months was about the time that dd consolidated to a 2 nap schedule so i think what he's doing is pretty normal.

if you nurse him how long does it take for him to go back to sleep? i'm not a lot of help here since we co-sleep & i've always nursed dd to sleep/back to sleep. i figured nursing her was the easiest for me but that was also partly b/c of the cosleeping thing...i wouldn't have enjoyed stumbling to the crib 3 times a night either.

hope you get some sleep soon.

katie

Carrie

04-25-2006, 07:41 AM

5-6 months was a really hard time for us too. We also used Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child, and we followed it pretty much by the book. That did involve some crying, and it was really hard, but worth it. Not so much for our own sleep, though I have to admit it was nice, but for my twin boys' well-restedness and happiness. We also consulted our pediatrician. Although we cut out night feedings (this was per our ped., not HSHHC), they actually gained weight when they started sleeping through the inght. Even if you don't want to do CIO HSHHC can still help. The No Cry Sleep Solution didn't help us much. It is helpful if your DC is having a lot of trouble falling asleep, but I don't recall that she had much advice about getting them to stay asleep.

newuanda

04-25-2006, 11:27 AM

Thanks for all of your hugs and advice. . .

We do have a pretty good routine. DS naps in the morning for about an hour, then at 3:30 I put him down for his second nap (usually 1-2 hours). At 7:30, it's his bedtime. (he eats, gets a bath, nurses before bedtime) He's usually alert when I put him down, and he puts himself to sleep. That's the part I don't get. He's fine going down, but if he wakes up on his own he just wants mommy. And I've rocked him, cradled him, walked him thru the house, but unless I Nurse him he just screams. Last night I Thought surely he won't scream forever, but after 45 minutes he was still going strong and I felt AWFUL. (DH is out of town so I'm having trouble coping with everything this week!) I finally took ds to bed with me last night and we dozed/nursed for several hours. USUALLY when i've tried this he fusses after he's satisfied his belly until I put him back in the crib. Go figure.

I've heard other good things about healthy sleep habits, healthy child. I'll add that to my reading list!!! :)

thanks, mamas. I'm glad i'm not the only one.

So weird that sounds exactly like last night with DS. He's the same way. He's still waking up at 11 months and I'm not sure why. We wait about 5 minutes, go in rock, etc. etc. etc. Do all that stuff. Just not working. I get so tired of it all and I'm just dead during the day. I'm going to have to find that book. In a way it makes you feel like you are doing something wrong as a mother when other people have babies that sleep just fine through the night when they are 4 weeks old.

momeeboys

04-27-2006, 01:15 AM

11 mo here. He wakes up a lot during the night. I do what works for us, and that is co-sleeping. Hopefully it is teething.

MamaStace

04-27-2006, 06:50 AM

So weird that sounds exactly like last night with DS. He's the same way. He's still waking up at 11 months and I'm not sure why. We wait about 5 minutes, go in rock, etc. etc. etc. Do all that stuff. Just not working. I get so tired of it all and I'm just dead during the day. I'm going to have to find that book. In a way it makes you feel like you are doing something wrong as a mother when other people have babies that sleep just fine through the night when they are 4 weeks old.

You're so right, I feel like a failure of a mother!!!!!! I was up SIX times with him last night! Tho i suspect he's not feeling his very best. He cried in bed nursing so finally I said (in total exhaustion) if you're going to cry,, you might as well cry in your crib and let mommy get some rest. My dh (who came home yesterday!!) finally rescued ds and took him for a little walk and changed his diaper in the wee hours of this am. This just can't go on . . .I checked out Healthy Sleep Habits Happy child from the library. PLEASE let it hve some answers!

vick

04-27-2006, 10:19 AM

I was getting frustrated with DD's sleep, to the point wher I was considering kicking her out of our room and into her own room, but yesterday someone posted this Kellymom link about nightwaking (http://www.kellymom.com/parenting/sleep/4mo-sleep.html) over at MDC. It's written about a 4-month-old, but I think the logic behind it carries over to any age, especially the "milestone" ages where they pick up new physical skills or have a new cognitive skill (i.e. separation anxiety and the development of sense of self around 9-10 months). I read this yesterday and it was like absolution - I was immediately back in zen mommy mode and completely okay with her nightwaking :)

~Woollybottoms Mama~

04-27-2006, 10:34 AM

I thought I was the only one with a babe that had to put himself to sleep in hiw OWN little bed. I tried the co-sleeping thing even as an infant and he squirmed and wiggled until I laid him in HIS bed. Totally weird. He also has never really let me rock him to sleep either. My daughter was the total opposite, so I was :banghead: pretty much until I gave in to how he was. Caleb would wake up at night too (and still does occasionally but he goes right back to sleep within minutes) and I was always wondering what he needed. He was full, dry, etc. Getting him up would actually disrupt the whole sleep pattern thing. They get to expect just getting up and that develops into a hard to break pattern. I had always been a anti-pacifier person from day 1. My daughter NEVER used one. Caleb tends to be a self-soother, so this worked really great for us. He only wanted it at bed time, just long enough to fall asleep. Nursing, rocking, cuddling, all that great stuff just did not work with him. I also found keeping the room totally dark helped him to go right back to sleep too. It is weird how 2 kids in the same house can be te-totally different. This time will pass though -- I promise. :goodvibes:

LimeInTheCoconut

04-27-2006, 12:25 PM

Yup, we're going through a similar thing here, and it's definitely due to teething. I have an amber necklace on the way...is it EVER going to get here? :mrgreen:

In the meantime, we have discovered one thing that seems to be helping, in addition to the Hyland's teething tablets and the Anbesol: a white sound machine. Ds still wakes up, but it's much easier to get him back to sleep those times that he wakes up and isn't hungry. (If he's hungry, he can usually just nurse back to sleep.)

Ours is called a Sound Spa, and we got it at Walgreens for 19.99. It's also an alarm clock (not that you'll want to be using THAT function!). The speaker is really crappy, but the ocean sounds works well for ds. Just make sure if you get one that it will play continuously, not just shut off after 60 minutes or whatever.