why is he still waking so much?

my 20 week old boy is still waking every 2-3 hours at night for feeds and i am so exhausted! i dont agree with controlled crying so don't want to go to sleep school..as many are suggesting i do..but i am just buggered and don't know how much longer this will go on?
i co-sleep.. he has a dummy so if he wakes i pop it back in his mouth and cuddle sometimes he gets back to sleep
otherwise its a feed. is he waking because he wants a feed or because he is now use to this? hummm i just wish i had one of thoses bubs that likes to sleep 5-6 hours! it would make so much difference.. i cant wait to start solids at 6 months even though gp suggested i try now..maybe this will help? arrr sleep schools sound so appealing but i could not let my boy cry himself to sleep! i have pinkys book maybe i should try the no-cry solution? humm love to hear your thought!:confused:

Hi guccibabe

Dont know if I will be much help, but I have been having the same problem as you for the last 2 weeks. My little boy was born the day before yours so are the same age. Connor has sleept through (9 -10pm till 5:30 -6am) since he was about 6 weeks old then slowly went to 1 night wake now its 2 or 3 times. He is breastfeed with one formula feed at night. The last two weeks I have noticed he has been really fussy in the afternoon when he feeds and thought that he might not be getting enough milk so I have started feeding him more frequently to get my supply up. A friend suggest giving him rice cereal/farex (my GP also recommended) around 5pm then a bottle before bed and see how that goes. Tried it last night and it didnt make a difference, he still woke up twice. Although he was in bed early 8pm. Maybe try the solids if your happy with that. Although I have heard it wont necessarily make a baby sleep through. When Connor wakes up in the night, I try to settle and if that doesnt work I feed him and he has been having a good feed each time I feed him and then goes straight back to sleep. If your baby has a good feed when he wakes, I would say he wakes because he is hungry, if he just kinda sucks and doesnt drink much it could be a comfort thing. I hope things work out for you soon, maybe try some different things to see if it helps. I have only had this for 2 weeks and am starting to feel exhausted, I feel for you.

Good luck

Don't know if this will make you feel better or worse. But, I have NEVER had more than 4 hours straight sleep from Tehya since she was born and she is nearly 18 months old. We went to Tresillian, we tried CC. Nothing.

Tehya is well fed, warm and comfortable but she still wakes up. I take her into my bed and give her booby then we go badck to sleep together. Usually after her first wakeup we are awake every 2 hours or so. This first one can be anywhere from 11pm until as late as 1 or 2 am.

Eventually i know that she will sleep. As will your little man. It's just getting to that stage that is the killer :)

Likewise with Tehya, Kate. A there is not much that she doesn't eat.

Your baby is likely going through a developmental stage at 5 months of age and this means they can cry more, sleep less, be more clingy and mum at her wits end! It's very common at that age and as the others say, often nothing can help it but your comfort and patience. Some people choose to introduce solids and formula, sometimes this does make them sleep more but this is only because their poor body is working harder trying to digest the stuff. Hang in there, it will pass - and yes there will be more stages but there will also be the good times in between too. Grab a copy of 'The Wonder Weeks' which is written by two dutch paeds - it has a graph which shows the (I think 7 or 8) developmental milestones babies have, when they hae them so you can expect them and it's spot on to the week or two. Incredible. It tells you why they have them at each stage, what you can do and when it will end. Print off the graph and stick it on your fridge - makes for easier coping knowing why and when the end will be!!!

My DD was the same around 5-6 months.She also had a dummy and i was always having to dig round the cot and find it. I was also giving her milk if she didnt settle. I found that when she started to walk she slept longer periods.Even now at 18months she wakes during the night,however most times she self settles.I found reading pinky's books comforting.I dont even bother to try control crying now,i just go with the flow of what she and i want.I figure in another couple of yrs she will be sleeping through!
Goodluck,i now wonder what my new to be bundle is going to bring me in terms of sleep.

Hi Ladies,

I have a terrible sleeper too. Mine sleeps for a couple of hours and wakes up continously through the night. I have to hold her from 6pm to at least 8pm so she does not wake up. It is just exhausting. I have given up her cot now and take her to bed with me but sometimes this does not work. I just have to continuously pick her up and rock her. I have tried everything except for the tresillian which I am going to next week. I am so sick of hearing people say their babies sleeps 6 hours or more. This infuriates me as I am always tired, sick and just plain grumpy. I have a feeling this is going to last for a very long long time.

OH, and i forgot to add that she sleeps 1/2 an hour to 45 minutes 3 times a day so there is absolutely no time to rest whatsoever.

So not only does she hardly sleep through the day but she hardly sleeps through the night. I dont get it

angelique, your daughter is not abnormal at all. A study found that 'sleeping through' for a newborn was on average 5 hours - and think about it - to get an average, some babies would have slept more and some less. Unfortunately if you have a baby that sleeps less, it can be very energy demanding! Babies are designed to wake often as a survival instinct.

As I mentioned above, many women do choose formula and those babies can sleep more, but only because their body is struggling to digest it. So perhaps your friends have babies on formula? But some babies are just programed to need more sleep and some less too. Pinky told me of her son who was exactly like my daughter, stopped sleeping through the day before hitting one year of age, very little sleep overnight but always stacks of energy. They are still like that to this day, only Pinky's son is an adult and my daughter is 4. Some are just like that. Some are just being babies and will grow out of it. Some are going through developmental milestones.... its the joy of parenthood LOL but just the stuff they didn't tell you ;) I guarantee that your friends aren't being that all accurate too, all babies have settled and unsettled periods and I bet you it wont last. My second bub slept really well until about 4-5 months and we've had rough sleep since, but I know he'll get there. He still has a nap during the day at 2 years of age, but it's getting less. But I can too relate of all my mothers group having peaceful showers, cooking to their hearts content, gardening etc and I couldn't put my baby down to go to the toilet. Its very hard, harder without support. Have you tried a sling?

Guccibabe, I know exactly how you feel! Unfortunately I don't have any advice, as my 10 month old DD still does this... But I too felt totally at the end of my rope at about the stage your son is at, and I found that once I relaxed and accepted that she was happy and healthy and just slept like that, it got easier to cope with. Hope things get better for you soon!

Hi Kelly,

Thanks for your feedback.

I am formula feeding my daughter and have been for months now. She sufferes from Colic too so that can't be helping with her sleep problems. She seems to not have energy after her 1/2 hour day sleep so needs to be forced back to sleep with rocking. I have no idea why she keeps waking up. I have tried a sling, I have tried everything. She does not like slings anymore and feels umcomfotable in them. I am lucky I do have support so that makes it easier to cope with but still, it is hard. I can't believe some mothers have time to cook!!! Yes, I too cant go to the toilet, especially and night when i need to the most!! I hope those mothers with babies that sleep know how lucky they are. I am put off having more kids that is for sure!!!

Have you tried elevating one end of her cot at night? I have heard that this works with formula babies...

Matilda has always been a child who has needed less sleep than her mummy. Its exhausting, but unfortunatley normal. Just not spoken about. Matilda was waking every 3 hours at night until she was 4 1/2 months old and then every 4 hours until she was, wait... she still does most nights ;)

*hugs* take it easy on yourself.

Thats the thing isn't it - we jam pack our lives, our society is fast, rushed and busy and that means we need every ounce of sleep we can get to catch up with ourselves - then introduce a baby! But these little beings dont carry our burdens or pace of life yet, so they need less sleep to recharge their batteries which is a problem for us mummies and daddies! We need it because we are absolutely buggered, but babies are different.

Just thought I would pop in with some things that have helped me with Maggie in the past, she is not a great sleeper and likes to change the rules on me (having that happen again, but that another story LOL).

Maggie had reflux, so I found she napped really well in her high chair (not laying flat) when she was about 3 months old. It is one of those hi/lo ones, that reclines. I would pop her in it reclined, get the music going and push it back and forth with my foot. Managed to get some good long naps with that method for a couple of months. If she stirred I would just jiggle the chair a bit and often she would go back to sleep. The pram can work well with this as well, I still use the pram now depending on her mood. It is funny she still does not like to go to sleep lying down.

As for the long evening feeds, I learnt (with the help of BB & Pinky) to embrace them. Treat it as a site down time, watch some tv, read a book, talk to DH etc, rather than getting frustrated about all the things I "should" be doing. I know that it is easier said than done, and I still have my moments when it frustrates me.

Hope some of that has helped.

thanks for all your words and advice! welcome to motherhood huh! i guess i just loved my 8=10hr sleeps post pregnancy/birth!! body still adjusting:) will keep fingers crossed it wont last forever!!

Gucci,

just know that you're not alone hunny! Charlie's gone from 10-12 hour sleeps to less than 4 hours in total recently. I so hear ya on missing the long sleeps! Lol!

Milo has done this too - for the past 2-3 weeks my baby has been waking, screaming, at least 2-3 times a night, which he has not done since he was 8 weeks old. I am really missing my 10-12 hour sleeping baby, who now is not sleeping during the day much either, so has gone from 13-15 hours sleep a day down to around 10-11.

Its driving me insane. I now have to go to bed at 8pm every night in the hope of getting some sleep before it starts up.

*hugs* Rachael... sometimes when they get sick like Milo has been it takes them ages to start sleeping again. I hope thats what it is for Milo & in a week or so he gets back to his good sleeping for you!

Hi everyone,

I went to sleep school for the last 7 days and it has been great. Very hard for the first 3 days but after that my daughter settled and she has gone from waking every 1-2 hours to sleeping at least 5 hours a night but is terrible at getting from one sleep cycle to the next in the day. Basically, my day is just settling her over and over again so she can get some rest. I guess this is just her and I am learning to live with it. Oh, and she can go to sleep by herself too (well, sometimes). But this took a lot of crying and training. She is just one of those hard babies and the nurses made me feel so much better and helped me to undersand her more. I cant complain though, 5 hours is heaven compared to 1-4 hours of broken sleep. I also dont run to her when she wakes, I give her time but sometimes that does not work either.

I am forever learning!!