Night waking nightmare

[chlobo]

My DD is 5 months old. She has been sleeping for good long stretches at night for quite some time now (probably 6 weeks 11-12 hrs/night). She has been a nightmare to get to nap during the day.

Anyhow, the last few nights she has started night waking. She is breastfed so I've tried to nurse her back to sleep with mixed success. She usually falls asleep but then wakes up when I put her in the crib. After the third time she woke up last night I nursed her and she fell asleep in my lap so I left her there. Needless to say I didn't get much sleep. She lasted about 2 hours and then is was "morning".

I know folks said this is normal for this age. Can folks tell me what strategies you use to get your kids back to sleep? My husband wants to let her cry but I think she will quickly escalate too much and then will be impossible to console.

Anyone have any suggestions?

Carren
(mom to Isabella 11/7/03)

[jec2]

Carren,

We went through something similar a few weeks back and had one night where I was up just about every hour or so. We were EXHAUSTED Thankfully, it didn't last long. I chalked it up to a develpmental spurt. I just did whatever I had to do to get him asleep but mostly nurse/rocking or just bringing him back to bed w/me for snuggles. Now, DS is sleeping like a champ at night--we've had a slew (slough?) of 11 hour nights and a few nights where he puts himself to sleep. I know my DS is not a CIO. He would most likely sit and cry for hours upon hours. But, you need to do what is fine for you. However, I bet by the time you read this, his sleep schedule is already changed (I hope so :))

Best,