Baby was sleeping through the night, now she isn't! Please help!

[jasmine_bay]

At 3 months DD was sleeping from 7:30pm to 7:30am with usually one nursing at 4am. She'll be 5 months next week. A few weeks ago, she started waking up more frequently. Now when I put her down to bed, she wakes up at 8pm, 9pm, 10pm, 12am, 3am, and 6am. If I nurse her, she'll go right back to sleep. I've tried to give her a pacifier, even holding it in her mouth, but she doesn't like it and will keep crying. The only way I can get her back to sleep is to nurse her for a few minutes. I don't know what to do! I've asked my neighbors and the moms in my playgroup, but they don't know what to do either.

My DD knows how to soothe herself to sleep. We have a bedtime routine, like all the books suggest. During the day, she's fine. I just put her down in her crib for her morning nap and she went right to sleep without a fuss. She'll occassionally fuss for a few minutes for her afternoon nap, but nothing major. If she cries for more than five minutes, I pick her up. Her naps are usually an hour long.

I don't know if I should let her CIO longer. I've read Weisbluth's book, Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Baby, but didn't see anything that addresses this in particular. I can't bear to let my daughter cry for hours on end! The most we've ever let her CIO is 10 minutes. I'm second guessing myself as to what to do. The past week, she's been sleeping with me. I've been so tired getting up with her that it's just so much easier to have her in bed and nurse her back to sleep when she wakes up. Please, please help!

[slknight]

I know you must be frustrated, but it sounds pretty normal to me. I think a lot of babies go through a sleep shift around 5 months. Could be that she's starting teething and that's waking her. You could try some Hylands teething tablets or tylenol and see if that makes a difference.

[psophia17]

She may be headed towards a growth spurt and waking up from hunger - since she was pretty much sleeping through before and will only go back to sleep after nursing a bit, maybe that's the problem.

Have you tried a full BF session before you go to bed, rather than for a few minutes each time she wakes? An additional feeding might do the trick, if that's what the problem is.

[jasmine_bay]

I tried the Tylenol last night, but it didn't seem to help. I tried Tylenol again tonight, but she's been waking up every half hour! I let her cry for about 15 minutes but couldn't bear it anymore so went in and picked her up. As soon as I picked her up, she fell right asleep in my arms. I set her down, and she starts to scream, so I picked her up again. She promptly goes back to sleep. I set her down, she screams! I just put her down for the third try, and so far so good.

Part of our bedtime routine is that I give her a full nursing right before she goes to sleep, so she should be able to go for at least a few hours before the next nursing. I don't know why she's been waking up so frequently! I'm praying that this is just a phase and that it'll pass. I feel like I'm back to square one with the whole sleep training.

[sbjf]

The very same thing happened to us. My son was a champion sleeper, going 10-12 hours straight every night from about 8 weeks till maybe 4 months or so. Then suddenly he was waking up numerous times per night. At first I thought it was just a growth spurt (which it may have started as), but it never stopped! I believe it was a growth spurt followed by practicing how to roll in his sleep, followed by teething all this resulted in about 3 months of horrible sleep.

Once he turned 6 months he started doing better at night, only waking really once for a feeding and going right back to sleep, and now that he finally cut that first tooth his sleeping is consistently better.

Growth spurts cause them to wake frequently because they're hungry, develeopmental milestones (or practicing them) cause them to wake frequently because they'r practicing and excited, and of course teething is painful. I think that some babies go through all 3 of these things at once or back to back.

I bet she is able to sleep some in your arms because it soothes her and helps her forget the pain of teething, or forget the excitement zooming through her brain due to milestones.

Dh and I couldn't do cio so we took turns each night being on duty. I'm a sahm but I still needed to be able to count on at least 2 or 3 nights of solid sleep a week. So dh is on night duty on the nights when he is off the next day (he's off 3 days a week b/c he works 4 10 hr days) and I am on night duty on the nights when he has to go to work the next day. We sleep in separate rooms for now so that the one who is not on duty can sleep without hearing the baby or anything.

I think you mentioned that you are nursing though so I don't know if this will work for you, unless you pump and can give bottles. Still though, even if you need to wake to nurse your dh can still be the one on duty, having him get up get the baby bring the baby to you so you can nurse, then he can be the one to bring the baby back to bed and deal with rocking or patting, etc.

I really believe that babies at this age simply NEED us for whatever reason and are not just crying for no reason so I didn't do cio, I would let him fuss for a few mins sometimes before going in to see if he can get himself back to sleep and sometimes he could, othertimes it just escalated so I had to go in.

Believe that this is only temporary, your baby will not need you during the night for very long.

To help me get through this crappy sleep time I had to actually change my attitude about it. I was very resentful of his waking at first, then frustrated because I just didn't understand how he could go from such a good sleeper to so lousy a sleeper, then I decided that he is too sweet to resent for long, lol, so I go in lovingly now and care for him as he needs it.

Good luck!!! Email me if you like anytime!

[StaceyKim]

It is not for everyone but I personally like the book SOLVE YOUR CHILD'S SLEEP PROBLEMS by Dr. Richard Ferber.

IMO, I don't think your DD is hungry at 8pm, 9pm, 10pm, 12am, 3am, and 6am. Babies wake up in the middle of the night and have moments of light sleeping but go back to sleep. Are you going into her room right away? Maybe try waiting before going in...she may just fall back asleep. If you do go into her room, do not pick her up but talk to her and try to calm her down.

Good luck!

[HannaAddict]

Although so frustrating, this is completely NORMAL. Your daugther has the exact same schedule as our son did! Just keep doing what your doing: comfort her when she needs it, nurse her to sleep if you need to, and get through this normal bump in the sleep road.

I wouldn't do CIO, it won't solve the natural ebb and flow of baby sleep patterns. It might just exhaust and wear your baby down eventually so she will collapse. No matter what the sleep gurus say, we can't make babies sleep like little adults (but the sleep gurus can make a lot of $$$) :) All babies do this in one way or another, you can't train them out of the developmental stage sleep disturbances. I don't think she's "hungry" but needs comforting.

You said your daughter can soothe herself to sleep and was a good sleeper in the past. Hurray, she will be again. Really! Without resorting to CIO. She doesn't need to be trained, she just needs help getting over the rough spots. She still takes naps (great news because there are times those will disappear too!). Our little guy is/was a naturally easygoing good sleeper. Then the five and half to six month age hit and with it, the same crazy waking. In looking at the boards, talking to friends and our pediatrician, this is just what happens to babies. With all the developmental things happening, then teething at some point (7 mos at our case), there are good reasons for your baby to have sleep disturbances. We slogged through, I nursed him to sleep when he would wake-up like he was a newborn again, he slept with us sometimes too. We got more sleep and no one felt badly or was traumatized with a nursing sessions at the wake-ups until about 3 or 4 am and then he would co-sleep until about 7 am. Then, there would be glorious days of great sleeping again and we would remember what a naturally good sleeper he is! And then, back to wake-up calls and the need to be comforted and nurse. Now at 8 and a half months old, we are back to better sleep patterns but I'm sure we will hit some more turbulence at some point. It is very, very hard though. Sleep deprivation is tough and it was a shock to us that once he'd started sleeping great we would ever backslide.

But trust your instincts, your instincts are right on. If you can take a mid-morning nap when he naps, do it! It helps!! Good luck and here's to sweet dreams again.