[Kay1]

I have posted in this section a number of times now, sorry for the repeat business.

Things are a little better in that we have not had a night of hours of screaming for a while now. But I still need some advice and I think I'm too tired to think of anything sensible myself.

At the moment DS3 is sleeping really well during the day - hooray. He is sometimes very easy to settle (I just sit next to the cot) and sometimes hard (20-30mins of rocking his body with my hand or banging on the side of the cot - yeah, I know weird but it works). He has good long naps and wake up happy.

Nights - he goes to bed at around 7pm with a bit of a bedtime routine beforehand (feed, book, wrap, cuddle/song and into bed). He will almost always cry for at least 30 mins (with me there, rocking, banging, sitting etc). Then he often wakes every 45 mins after that, sometimes will go an hour and a half. I give him a feed and burp him and he goes back to bed (sleepy but not fully asleep). From 11pm he might sleep 3-4 hours and then another feed (so between 1-3am) which he again settles well after. Then he wakes up at 5-5.30am. This is the part that is killing me. I find he will not go back to sleep at this time just with a feed so I have been putting him in bed with me and feeding him hoping he'll go back to sleep. He hardly ever does. He will suck furiously for the entire 1.5 hours until I have to get up. I can't sleep during this but at least I am horizontal. He is perfectly happy as long as I am there with him and feeding him or playing with him.

The problem is I then have to get up and get the other kids ready for school. By this time he's been awake for 2.5 hours and he's miserable. So he pretty much whinges and cries through the morning while I am rushing around and then I finally get him down at 9.15-9.30am after the school drop off. Sometimes he is too overtired by this stage and can't settle.

How can I improve this situation? Ideally I'd love to have him sleep til later, that would allow me to function much better (I find I REALLY need that 5-7am sleep) and he would cope better with the morning. I just can't figure out how to do that. I don't think keeping him up later is the answer, I've never been able to influence my kids' wake times by changing their bed times. Also he's exhausted by 7pm. I can't let him have a nap before school drop off because it takes me 30 mins to settle him and I don't have time. Plus I'd only have to wake him up again to go to school.

He is on one solid meal a day, he has about 2-3 tablespoons of puree at about 6pm. He also has some fruit/veg etc to suck on. He loves his food and would probably eat more if I let him but I don't want to rush it as my supply can be sensitive.

He seems otherwise well although he hasn't pooed much since being on solids. I have tried prune juice, pears etc but he still hasn't gone in days.

[axiomae]

Hi OP,

How old is your LO?

[Kay1]

Almost 6 months.

[KRT]

This does seem to be my default suggestion, but have you tried an earlier bedtime for him? I know it's a difficult time of day, especially with other kids, but if you could move his bedtime earlier he might not be so overtired when he goes to bed and so will settle a bit more quickly and tend to wake up less.

That would also free you up for an earlier bedtime yourself, to try to catch up a bit more!

Some other ideas: have a look at his total sleep over the day, and how it's split over day and night. Maybe you need shorter day naps?

Try a weekend where he gets his morning nap as soon as he shows tired signs - four hours is a looong time for a 6 month old, and it might be setting him up for overtiredness at the beginning of the day. Maybe if you have two good days you could change his routine a little - even better if you can get a friend to do the school run on the Monday!

I hope something works for you soon!

[Dylan's Mummy]

This is the thing I hate most about having to do the school drop off, it just doesn't help with bub's sleeping pattern. My bub is 10 months now and up until the school holidays started he would wake up at around 6am, sometimes earlier and by the time I had to leave at 8.30 he would often be really grumpy, but he would fall asleep in his pram for 45min while I wen to and from school. When I got home from school, he was still asleep and I would park the pram under the house nd stay there with him. Sometime I would catch the train or bus to the shops and he would wake there. I was giving him his lunch early (at around 11 am, give him a BF at around 11.45 and would aim to put him to bed at around 12. He would hen sleep for about 2 1/2 hours when I would haver leave for the school pick up. I would use this sleep time to have a bit of a nap myself. He would often be grumpy by late after noon but was happier if I put him in the high hair while I cooked dinner or put him in his play centre (not sure what it's called but it's similar to those walker thing that the baby sits in but this one isn't a walker, it's round and has things all around it and his sits/stands in the centre). His dinner was at 5pm, husband would bath him just before 6 and he would be ready for a BF at 6.30 and bed at 7.

Would your bub sleep in the car while you are doing the school run, even if you had to have a bit of a drive around.

This above has all gone out of the window because of having different sleeping patterns during school holidays, he was having a 2 - 3 hour sleep at about 8:30/9:00 and another another at around 2pm.

I have now got to try and get him into the school run sleep pattern again.

[axiomae]

I was going to suggest all the same things as KRT - sounds like one overtired little one! Can you try to get him down for a nap after about 2hrs in the morning from when he wakes and have someone else do the school run for a few days? Might give him a chance to 'catch up' and start waking at a better time. I'd also look at total sleep in 24hrs - maybe he needs shorter day naps.

Good luck!

[Sassy Girl]

I would try a later bedtime. He probably keeps waking as he's not tired enough to sleep for a long period of time. I also never put my babies to bed at 7pm as it was far too early for the four of them. They all went to bed after 8.30pm from birth. The younger three all slept through the night from birth but I attribute that to co sleeping not the time they went to sleep.

[Loz07]

PPs have some good suggestions.

Agree maybe look at bedtime, or does he need a late afternoon catnap (finished by 5pm) to see him through to the 7pm bedtime? And total sleep for 24 hours, weekend catch up etc.

Is the room getting light? Birds? Is he cold? Can you put an extra blanket/layer on after the early morning feed?

Also, I hate to suggest thsis, but... Is the wake time fairly consistent? Can you try waking before him for a couple of mornings, and trying to pat/settle him through the wake up for another sleep cycle?

GL

[Kay1]

Thanks for all the suggestions.

The thing is we just came out of 6 weeks of school holidays where he did go down as soon as he got tired (usually about 8.30am). He'd have a nice big sleep then. But he was still waking just as much (or more) at night and just as early in the morning.

Would your bub sleep in the car while you are doing the school run, even if you had to have a bit of a drive around.

He would but we are only in the car for 5 minutes (its only just too far to walk and very hilly) and we only leave at 9am. If I left earlier I'd have to drive around til it was time to drop the bigger kids off. Also I have to go into preschool with DS2 so have to get DS3 out of the car then anyway.

The last couple of days he's had a short nap at 9.15/30 then a big long one at midday. I have to wake him up though at 2.30pm for pick up. This means by 5pm he's really tired and needs another short nap. Its really hard to get him have this one but if he doesn't then he's too tired to eat before bed. If he does have this third nap then he's waking up close to 6pm so an earlier bedtime isn't really feasible. I start at 7 pmish but he's not usually asleep til closer to 8 pm. I think if I made it any later than that he'd be overtired again plus I'd have no time in the evening at all. My older two had very early bedtimes at his age, but they were both rotten daysleepers and needed it. Perhaps I need to skip that third nap and give him solids in the afternoon and try a bedtime of 5.30-6pm? I just fear he'd be up even more....

Is the room getting light? Birds? Is he cold? Can you put an extra blanket/layer on after the early morning feed?

Also, I hate to suggest thsis, but... Is the wake time fairly consistent? Can you try waking before him for a couple of mornings, and trying to pat/settle him through the wake up for another sleep cycle?

Its not light when he wakes and I have blockout blinds on anyway. The birds are very loud when they start but he wakes before they do and has white noise on very loudly in his room. He's not the sort of baby to respond to me patting or settling him through a wake up. Once he's up, he's up. I have tried not feeding him when he wakes and he's not having it. I've been successful a handful of times (if it was literally 30 mins since his last feed) but generally he'll just fuss and carry on til I feed him.

I might look into getting someone to take DS1 to school for me, I can walk DS2 to preschool in the pram and that way I could try to get him to sleep in the pram at 8.30am. I don't think I could get someone to take him every day though.

The only aspect of his sleep I'd really love to change is the early wake up. I mean, I'd love fewer wake ups but its just the 5am start that is making things difficult. Guess its just one of those things I have to live with until he decides to change it.

This post has been edited by Kay1: 02/02/2013, 03:07 PM

[Stoked]

OP, I can't help with the naps and such but this:

Then he often wakes every 45 mins after that, sometimes will go an hour and a half. I give him a feed and burp him and he goes back to bed (sleepy but not fully asleep). From 11pm he might sleep 3-4 hours and then another feed (so between 1-3am) which he again settles well after. Then he wakes up at 5-5.30am. This is the part that is killing me.

sounds very familiar! My now 9 month old had the same nighttime sleeping pattern from about 4 to 7 months. The only difference is that most mornings he'd feed to sleep and sleep for another hour or so after the 5-5.30am feed.

I thought it was just a phase and he'd grow out of it. He didn't. However (!) at the 7 months mark by sheer dumb luck we discovered he has a number of allergies, particularly to cow's milk and eggs (through my milk). Once I went dairy- and egg-free he started sleeping in 3-4 hour blocks and no longer wakes up every single sleeping cycle after going to bed in the evening. The moment I introduce dairy or eggs back into my diet, either deliberately (we tried goat's milk) or accidentally, the old sleep pattern returns again. We're seeing an allergist in May to confirm the diagnosis. Worth a thought?