Hi Everyone - sorry this is a bit long, but thought I'd give the complete picture.

My DD is not sleeping to well at the moment. It started tuesday week ago, when she didn't want to be put in the cot and started crying. Now this isn't your normal cry - its more of a whine - almost for the sake of it. She will (eventually) go to sleep in my arms or rocking her in the chair, but even this doesn't work sometimes. This is very unusual for her and we don't understand it.

She will also wake in the middle of the night crying and won't go back to sleep, or if she does she wakes herself back up within 5-10 mins. This is starting to drive us insane! She also generally won't sleep in our bed either.

We thought it might be new teeth - she hasn't had any pop up in a while - panadol and/or bonjela make little difference to the behaviour. And she didn't do this with any of her previous teeth.

We thought it might be because at childcare she sleeps on a mattress on the floor so we tried that - no change in behaviour and it didn't last long anyway because now she could get up.

We thought it might be growing pains. But here panadol doesn't help. We give her a bath with lavendar baby bath oil, which helps her sleep better a little. I give her massages, which she enjoys.

Oh, and for the last couple of nights this behaviour is not only at bedtime but leading up to it (which leads me to believe shes overtired). She hates getting dressed and tries to take her clothes off, and she hates her nappy being changed unless we can do some serious distraction.

Last night in the middle of the night she woke up. DH went in and patted her back to sleep (which is what he usually does). She woke 10 mins later. I went in and rocked her waiting for her to go into a deep sleep. I was in there for about 15 mins when she suddenly started crying again - nightmare maybe???

Does anyone have any ideas on what the problem is??? I tried ringing Tresillian this morning but was in a long queue and I wasn't able to wait.

Please help!!

Laura

DH Rob
DD Zoe 04/03/04

Hi,

Sorry I can't help as I have never had this problem with my DD's but I just wanted to say that you can call a MACH nurse. If you ring 13 22 81 and ask to be put through to the booking line for baby health clinics, once through to them if you ask to speak to a nurse you will be put through to an answering service. You leave a messge and someone calls back. I have always had a call back within the day. If you see a particular MACH nurse you can leave your message specifically for them.

Also, while you are speaking to the booking line ask about doing a 'sleep seminar'. It's a half day seminar run by a MACH nurse. I didn't find it all that helpful but to get into QEII they like you to do it. And if they feel you need a referral to QEII they will do it from there.

Hope this is useful!

Rach

<a href="http://lilypie.com"><img src="http://b1.lilypie.com/ndFCp10" alt="Lilypie Baby Ticker" border="0" /></a>
<a href="http://lilypie.com"><img src="http://b5.lilypie.com/KRQip10" alt="Lilypie Baby Ticker" border="0" /></a>

We had a similar problem with Sophia a while back - she's around the same age as your girl. We started putting her to bed a bit earlier at nights and encouraging longer daytime naps, and the problem resolved pretty quickly.

Thanks for the advice. We'll try the earier bedtime, and Tresillian think its a toddler thing - and we should do controlled crying. At this stage I'm not as against it as I was when she was younger. We'll see how she goes.

Thankyou!

Laura

Hi Laura,

My DD has been doing a similar thing - except she actually does go to bed (about 7pm) and stay there quietly for up to 1/2h before starting to cry. It's usually quite distressed crying and can take up to an hour(ish) of interventions before she settles for the night.

I have been (relatively) happy to go in and give her a cuddle because for practically the whole time she's been doing this she's had a cold with an extremely snotty nose and therefore can't breathe while sucking her thumb which is her usual self-settling technique.

Only once have I had to resettle her during a daytime sleep, tho her naps are varying from day to day from 1.5h to nearly 4h.

When you said Tresillian told you it was a "toddler thing" what did they mean?

Steph
DD Alex (March 04)

Hi Steph, I was hoping you'd reply seeing our DD's are the same age.

The toddler thing was that they're getting independent now and now what they want to do - and what they don't want to do. For instance, my DD loves cupcakes - we make them together, and sometimes she asks for one just before dinner (or when shes already had one) and so I tell her "no, you can't have one now because we're going to have dinner very soon". This doesn't go down well and she gets really upset and throws a bit of a tantrum. So with the bedtime thing its that their asserting their independence and they can keep themselves awake if they want to as well. She knows that when I put her in the cot that its time to go to sleep but she doesn't want to. She wants to keep playing and reading or whatever she was doing at the time.

Zoe's bedtime is 8pm - basically because we all don't get home till about 5:30pm, and then its dinner and a bath - she doesn't have any time to just 'chill'. But I am going to try an earlier bedtime now - probably 7:30 for starters - especially as daylight savings is coming up soon. Zoe hasn't been sick since she started - she had just gotten over a cold, but is fine now. I do think her teeth are moving around a bit - I can see them, but other than that she hasn't got a runny nose or a cough.

I think I may have to stop the cuddles for a while as well, which I don't want to do, but it may not help her understand what 'bedtime' is. We do have a cuddle while she drinks her cup of milk before bedtime, and usually we sit together and read some books before bedtime as well. Oh well, we'll see how we go tonight.

Laura

Hi Laura

My bubs are a bit younger than yours so I'm not sure if my comments will help.

One of my girls is very wakefull & will continually cry. We have found after checking her nappy, checking she's not hungry, checking she doesnt have colic, reflux etc etc, that all it is that she wants a cuddle....Yes a cuddle. As soon as we pick her up she stops crying & will sleep in our arms & then when we put her down again she is fine until she wakes & wants another cuddle.

My understanding is the worst thing I can do is pick her up to sleep in our arms as this teaches her not to sleep in her cot. It is very hard but what we have been doing is now when she cries, we go in & leave her in her cot & put the dummy in her mouth & pat her to calm her & it seems to be working.............so far. (I think the key is to make sure she falls asleep in her bed & not our arms & certainly not our bed cause its a hard habit to break once you start putting them in your bed.

Cheers, Lilymurray

ME 29
DH 28

<a href="http://www.snugglepie.com"><img border="0" src="http://www.snugglepie.com/ezb/266945.png"></a>