marlene i really sympathise, having been through the same thing with ds (now 4) and currently having similar problems with dd (6 months).
i think around this age there is an increase in awareness and some bubs find it more difficult to get to (and stay) asleep. they may also be fighting sleep because being awake is so much more interesting - my ds certainly seemed that way! he's a brilliant sleeper now, but i endured two years of sleep deprivation to get there...
i hear you on the problem of taking AGES to get to sleep. i can get dd to sleep by feeding, but laying her down after is a different matter. after several nights of getting to bed after midnight i've given up on the cot for now (she was starting off there, then coming into bed with me later) and am taking her straight into bed where i lie with her and pat her back to sleep. she then wakes at least every two hours - often more frequently - and is fed or patted or rocked back to sleep. EXHAUSTING.
have you started ds on solids yet? there's always the hope that it might help!! best of luck getting through this difficult time. i hope things improve for you soon.
Thankyou everyone for your support and suggestions. Last night was a little better with 3 hours between waking....if he could stretch it out to 4 hours I would be even happier.
I will definently try the suggestions posted here, but I'm sure its just a matter if waiting it out.
Marlene.
(And LOL at your little comment under your username - man, I can relate to that!
You're right, wait it out. No doubt there's some sort of developmental 'shift' going on there. I remember at 4 months Natty's great sleeping turned to crap. It is soooo hard. I know you said your DH is useless (and I understand, LOL!), but is there someone else like a parent or friend who could help you out for a couple of hours so you can catch a little nanna nap one afternoon or something?
Marlene two of my 3 children went through this at about 5 months (the other child is still kinda over wrought easily)... and i put it down to over stimulation and the new degree of awareness during this age. What I found helped was increasing times of 'sensory deprivation' (ie reducing the amount of sensory imput: sight, smell, sound etc). So I increased time spent in a dimmed room, in my rocking chair, in silence with no new smells etc or in a bath, with just a candle light, no sound except the water, and me saying as little as possible, slow movements etc). Some babies i find just need a bit more 'time out' from the world at this stage of their development. They need time to process all the new information that have have been exposed to during the day.
Imagine that you are a tourist in a foreign land where everything is new... absolutely everything... even the colour of the sky (imagine it was green)... and all the local customs... it would become exhausting for us after a while and the same happens with babies. I remember travelling overseas for the first time and "wasting" (not really) a day inside my hotel room just reading a book. I felt that I needed to centre myself... I needed to stay in a place where I knew what to expect and where I could control my environment a bit more. If someone had insisted that I drag myself out and keep exposing myself to more new sights and sounds (foreign languages) I would have thrown a hissy fit too! The stress of exposure to "newness" is a learned skill and easier to deal with when you are an adult. I'm not saying that this is definatley the issue here... but it might be... it's common at this age. Maybe just try slowing down life for a little while... contracting your son's world (limiting the number of new activities, places and faces) and I'm sure (if this is the problem) then this phase "shall pass" too.
Last edited by Bathsheba; October 12th, 2008 at 01:23 PM.
Thanks Bath...I think you may have hit the nail on the head! Jack is a very active (probably over-active) baby. He is doing things that just amaze me, things that his 8 month old cousin isn't even attempting to do yet....I think his brain is just miles ahead of his body, he gets frustrated easily ...and now that I think about it, the extra stimulation of having his brother, sisters and their friends around all school holidays has probably sent him a little bonkers...you can actually tell he wants to be up and running around with them, LOL. School goes back tomorrow, maybe he will start to sleep a bit better soon.
Can i just quickly say that if he is a very active baby, then my advice would be to KEEP the wrap for as long as possible!
And try to be proud of the fact that you have a super-intelligent being, whose body will catch up soon, hopefully.
My other suggestion is based on your initial example... when he wakes around the 930 time, do you ever BF then??? dunno, just a thought.....
And not to discourage another suggestion made about sippee cups.... my DD wasn't fooled by any of it - after about 10wks of age and despite many attempts - breastmilk came from mum's boobs only!!! But also some constructive advice around this too..... if you are thinking of trying EBM through a cup, choose the cup wisely, as some of them just don't let the EBM through very well and the "creamy" bits get stuck in the holes IYKWIM.
Thanks Kym....yes, I am very proud of him, he just amazes me more every day. Yeah I do BF at the early (9:30) wakeup, I BF most wake ups...so he is getting plenty of milk.
Last night was no better, but, I am feeling better about the wakeups. I'm trying to take it in my stride and not stress so much.
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Yeah I do BF at the early (9:30) wakeup, I BF most wake ups...so he is getting plenty of milk.
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