5 month old won't sleep

bethalamo

My little one has had trouble with naps since hitting that notorious 4 month mark. However, she is 5 1/2 months old now and things have gotten really bad this past week. She's gone from taking 4-5 hours worth of naps a day (split up into 3 naps) to anywhere between 45 minutes to 2 hours worth of naps a day. She seems to be cranky constantly and has become super high maintance to fall asleep. She often wakes up as we place her down in her crib, and then is up for hours, cranky again. She was going to bed between 8-9 every night, but now fights and fights, keeping us up to midnight a lot of times. It is becoming a nightmare and both her (and I) just seem cranky all the time. Any suggestions?

 Background--I read Babywise when she was first born and it wasn't for us. She had reflux and eats right before going to sleep, otherwise there is no tummy time because she spits up everything if she eats right after waking up. She also has no interest in eating right after waking.

She has been a co-sleeper in the sense that her sleeping area has always been right next to my side of the bed. Sometimes she'll feed off me in the middle of the night as she stays asleep. But usually to get her to sleep, I feed her a bottle on her side on a boppy (left over of the breastfeeding days).

 I have never supported just leaving her to cry it out. However, I do think kids reach a certain age where that is appropriate...just don't know if this is the age yet? I have tried just setting her down in the crib with a binky and blanket, this only wakes her up more. Today I left her in there for an hour, and all she did was kick her legs. She seems to get tired if we let her "play it out" getting all her energy out in her gym, then will fall asleep well. But...I don't want to be doing that at 11 at night!

 Very open to suggestions and what has worked for others. I know some people can put their kids in bed and they know to fall asleep. I have no idea how to get my kid to that point. Up until 3 months, I had to always hold her upright for a half an hour after every feeding due to the reflux, so she was never trained to fall asleep just being set down.

 Thanks so much!

Jennyanydots26

What worked for us is that we had to teach her how to fall asleep on her own. We used to rock her or nurse her to sleep and she used a pacifier. When she was 5 months, we decided to let her CIO. So we did the same bedtime routine that night and just put her down awake without her pacifier and with a little stuffed teddy bear. She cried for about 20 minutes maybe. Now we do that for all her naps and bedtime and it has really helped. Her naps extended and she dropped 2 night feedings.

She usually just cries now for a few minutes and we can tell the difference between her "I'm crying because I'm tired" cries and her "I'm really upset" cries.

Some babies need time to wind down by themselves in their crib - if your baby needs to kick her legs for a while before falling asleep, then that sounds fine, but try to account for that when planning your bedtime routine (i.e. if she needs to be asleep by 7, then have her in her crib by 6:30). You will probably find that the longer you do this, the more quickly she falls asleep. We do "Naked Baby Time" in order for her to get her energy out before bed. We bring her into her bedroom, strip her down to her diaper and put her on a big fleecy blanket on the floor and play with her for about 10-15 minutes. She gets really hyper and wriggly and silly. Then it is bath, pjs, feed and bed.

Try CIO whenever you feel comfortable... alot of people start trying that around 5-6 months. Good luck!

celiabwatson

I don't believe in CIO and haven't used it with either of my children. 

Anyway, my daughter used to sleep great and is currently the same age as yours and has dropped all napping for the last week. She's teething. It's just a grin and bear it phase for us. I feel confident that she'll go right back to normal napping when the teeth come through. Good luck.

l_elizabeth

She could be teething. But also keep in mind, that at her age she needs about 14 hours of sleep total. How long is she sleeping at night? My LO sleeps 11-12 hours at night, so his 2-3 hours of napping during the day is completely appropriate. I think the tendency is for us to want them to nap more, but they don't always need it.

And I don't think many parents "just let their kid cry." You should read Ferber. I see so many parents completely against CIO, then at their wits end try it without reading a word of the book. It's a great read actually, makes a lot of sense, and is not just a distinction method. You can let them cry in intervals of time, going in there to check/soothe baby. Ultimately your LO needs to learn to go to sleep on her own, without your help. It's your job to teach her how to do that by providing her the environment she needs to sleep. You can't force her into sleep though, so I really do think it's hard to do without a bit of crying. Some babies are very easy and won't ever need formal "sleep training" and most aren't. Once you teach her, your life will become 400 times easier.

I think all babies should be in bed by 7:30 at night, anything later is too late and they become overtired. I've read a number of sleep books, and not one promotes putting LO to bed later than 8. Once they get overtired, it's really hard to get them to do anything easily.

MollySm

I would start putting her to bed earlier at night.  My daughter is only 3 months, and used to be going to bed around 9:30, but just recently got super cranky at night.  We've moved her bedtime up, and have found that she goes down easily between 6 and 6:15.  Anything after that and she's overtired and can't sleep easily (cries and cries!).  It's hard because H doesn't get home until 6 some days, but after the last 2 days of keeping her up a little later so he could spend time with her, and having her scream and cry through the whole bedtime process, tonight we're going back to 6:00 bedtime.