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HELP with sleeping!

Rachel - posted on 01/11/2011 ( 4 moms have responded )

My son is 6 1/2 months old. He co-sleeps with me and is EBF. He started on solids at 6 months and I give him cereal mixed with fruits about 6:30 every night. He goes to bed at 8. He sleeps for about 2hrs at a time until around midnight and then he is awake every hour on the hour. I tend to him before he starts crying and most times I am able to just latch him on and he uses me as a pacifier for a few minutes and he is back to sleep. I dont' know if this is normal. I can't figure out how to get him to sleep for longer periods. CIO is not an option for me. Until he was about 4 months old he slept in his car seat and he would sleep for 3-4hrs at a time. But since then he is up hourly. There are a few times a week that he wakes about 2am and won't go back to sleep for a few hours. I don't let him play. I keep it quiet and dark and continue to have him nurse for hours till he falls back asleep. I don't know if anyone has any advise that worked for them. I know he's growing and changing fast now. He will wake up and "practice his vocabulary" for a period of time and he's trying to crawl when awake and I do think he has 2 more teeth coming in. (he got his first 2 bottom teeth at 2 months) I do give him infant tylenol every 4/6 hrs. Any advice would be so great!

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Meagan - posted on 01/23/2011

We are doin the same thing my babe is 9mths old and she wakes up a few times in the nght and I just roll towards her and she finds her "booby soother" nurses for a few secs and rolls over and goes back to sleep,she is my third babe I have done this with and they do wean themselfs and sleep thru that night ,I am due again in May so I need to get her to the "I am ok with or without the boob stage" sooner than I would like but she will go to sleep on Dad -as long as I am not in her veiw.

Sofia - posted on 01/21/2011

im in the same exact boat as you. good luck

Mary Renee - posted on 01/17/2011

831

Aloha,

I am in the exact situation as you! Same exact feeding time, bedtime, and wake up times! My daughter is 8 months old. She WAS only waking up once or twice when she was 3-4 months old but now it is worse than when she was a newborn. I am co-sleep and roll over to nurse her to sleep in the side lying positiion but at this point it is REALLY uncomfortable (I have fairly large breasts and scoliosis, so side sleeping is HORRIBLE for me!)

I started Elizabeth Pantley's "No-Cry Sleep Solution." Haven't really seen any results but she said it takes ten days to see results. Here are some things advice of hers I'm taking.

Don't ALWAYS nurse him back to sleep. Sometimes, rock him back to sleep, sometimes nurse him back to sleep. She doesn't believe in crying it out, but she said to give it a try. If he nurses every time he will associate nursing with sleep and think he can't go to sleep with out nurses, where if you rock him, or try other methods, he will be more likely to grasp that there is more than one way to go to sleep, and eventually he will be able to sooth himself back to sleep on his own.

Another thing she said is that most babies need to go to sleep way earlier than people are putting them to sleep. I've been gradually moving her bedtime and our routine up by 15 minutes to a half an hour because babies should be put to bed around 6 or 7. Like you, I was starting her bath/bedtime routine AT 7 and starting to put her to bed around 8. She said babies get a second wind and then they sleep must more restlessly than if they were put to bed earlier.

Thirdly, she says two good naps (or at least one good nap in the early afternoon) if vital for babies to set their biological sleep cycles. I have a real hard time with this one as my daughter fights sleep no matter what (even if I nurse her in bed, still...naps are random at best!) but if you can get your little one to have a nap schedule and move up his bedtime, it might be a good start. Let me know if it works out!

Tameka - posted on 01/11/2011

325

Sounds like a normal baby to me, sorry! When you hear about Mum's bragging that their baby is a year old and has slept through the night since they were a couple of weeks old, they are an exception to the rule. Good on them for having perfect babies now lets get back to the real world.

It is one of those things that time will fix. Babies change their sleep pattern at around 6-7 months and by the sounds of things your son is right on track. What you're doing is right: you're trying to teach your son that dark time is sleep time and that is probably one of the hardest things to do as a parent to a baby. Don't feel too bad about what you think might be him not getting enough sleep. For the first nine months my youngest spent every night screaming she was tired but do you think she would do herself a favour and go to sleep?? Some nights I slept for minutes instead of hours while I rocked, patted, nursed, you name it to encourage sleep but was wasting my time. Now at 12 1/2 months she only wake a couple of times a night. She wakes because she is cold. She kicks her blankets off and will scream until I take off any clothes that cover her arms and legs. I'm grateful that it is summer now in Australia!

What you're doing is right. You are encouraging sleep and you're doing it in the best possible way. By the time he has his first birthday you will remember those painful nights with a smile and think that you've come a long way they weren't really that bad after all!