How to handle lengthy awake time at 2 am?

katncrack

So my nine month old has started waking at 2 or 3 am and stays awake for a few hours.  If I try to settle her and walk out she cries and cries hard so I can't just leave. I do feed if she is hungry, but she will still stay up.  I'm working on her naps and bedtime to make sure she is not getting overtired.  She is moving a lot now, standing etc. and this could just be waking and wanting to try out her new activity.  Anyone else have this going on and how do you deal with it? Thank you. 

LadyXaverian

If she wakes up at that hour and won't go straight back to sleep, I try to keep her calm and quiet in hopes that she'll go back to sleep sooner than later. I usually sit with her in the chair in her room in the dark and stay there, if possible.

IrishEyes0530

SarahL77:

If she wakes up at that hour and won't go straight back to sleep, I try to keep her calm and quiet in hopes that she'll go back to sleep sooner than later. I usually sit with her in the chair in her room in the dark and stay there, if possible.

This. DS usually does it if he's teething. The longest he's been up in the middle of the night is 3 hours. It's awful but he does usually sleep in when he's up like that. I guess I don't have much of an answer, but you're not alone!

kacelle

Do you respond immediately when she starts crying?  I've found that if I walk in the second DD starts to make noise to comfort her, it's next to impossible to get her back to sleep.  You could try giving her a few minutes of fussing/crying before checking in and see if she settles herself.

fancynewbeesly

I put a book in her crib. This has happened a few times, and after she is changed and her needs are met--she will fall asleep on me but as soon I put her in the crib, she flips--I distract her with a book and usually she falls back to sleep looking at it.

 

This doesn't happen often--usually she sleeps straights through, but maybe once every 2 weeks, we have her waking up in the middle of the night. 

gbaby26

I agree with the other poster....let them fuss it out for a few minutes. My lo has woken up but fussed and put herself back to sleep. If I go in it is all over. Before I go in, I tend to let her work it out, if she cries harder or the time is longer then I would like then I will go in to settle her. I have noticed that if my hubby goes in she will go right back to bed, but if my baby sees me, I AM DONE! LOL.

sheryn2

This is us the past week.  We think it's teething, but LO also hit lots of milestones the past week.  At 2am if she won't go back to sleep, I keep it quiet: rock, maybe sing.  DH rocks LO or walks.  Once last week on a particularly bad night he took her downstairs to play.  LO is also not going to bed easily for the 1st time ever.  She doesn't like to be held up against my shoulder anymore so last night (during a hail storm) fell asleep in my lap with her head on my stomach.

I hope you find something that works for you and/or that this phase passes quickly.

nfrtny

DS is finally sleeping straight through thank God, but, when we were still in the stage of waking in the middle of the night and he wouldn't go back to sleep, I would either wake DH up and he would walk with him for however long it took (DH has way more patience with that then I do) or I would take DS to the living room to play with non musical toys in the dark and I would rest on the floor next to him. 

jesstellina

DD did this several times last week. She was teething and just so thrown off on her sleep schedule. She wasn't napping well, and I think she was overtired at night. Plus she's a crawling maniac and wants to dart around the house at all hours of the day and night.

When she first starts crying, we'll let her go for a few minutes. I try nursing her, walking around, coming out to the living room and rocking in the recliner with her. Sometimes I"ll give her to DH if I'm really tired, but when she's up at night she only ever wants me, so she cries for him. Eventually she starts rubbing her eyes and fussing, so I either rock or nurse her back to sleep.

Fri night was awful. She was up from 10:30 PM - 3 AM because NOTHING was working. She was fighting sleep so bad that she would scream bloody murder when either of us would hold her. We let her play in the dark for most of that time, but eventually we were so exhausted that DH put her in the car and drove around with her. Still took her half an hour to fall asleep, but then he was able to transfer her into the crib when they got back.

mrszundelli

Mygosh this post has perfect timing....just experienced this for the second time last night.  We actually ended up sleeping on the nursery floor till about 8am.  DS woke at 1, fell asleep when I took him to the guest room bed (so did I for a little bit), when I woke up to put him back in his bed he woke up again.  Nursed him back to sleep right away, then in an hour he was up again.  So back to the nursery (he sleeps in our room) where we laid on the floor and he played then nursed pretty much all night.  He's teething and hasn't pooped in 3.5 days, so I'm attributing it to that.  It's awful I know...I'm exhausted!  I always leave the lights off and I just let him look around or play with some quiet toys.  I hope you find what works for you!  GL and now I know I'm not alone!