6 month old = No Sleep!

SoonToBeMrsCatron · August 2014

I am in desperate need of some suggestions! I am a first time and stay at home mom of a precious 6 month old girl...who never sleeps!!! Or so it seems. I know WHAT the problem is, I just don't know HOW to fix it

Every since DD was born she nurses herself to sleep every time. I have tried stripping her down, tickling feet etc, but after she gets enough she goes to sleep until I lay her down then WIDE AWAKE. However she did sleep through the night the first two months, now at 6 months she wakes every two hours at night. Sometimes I can rock her and sometimes I have to nurse her and she will go back to sleep, but for only 2 more hours or less. I also cannot get her to take good naps during the day which I know makes the problem worse. She just takes 15-30 minute catnaps only a few times a day no matter what I try. I even tried Cry It Out once, but she screamed forever and never would sleep and I just could not bear to let her cry any longer. Is there something I can start doing to get her taking naps and sleep better at night without nursing her to sleep, but without crying it out???

EmeraldCity84 · August 2014

I went through the exact same thing, still am going through it actually, and though you don't want to hear it, CIO worked. The first night, she cried about 15 min then slept 9 hours, and by the end of the first week, she cries about 30 seconds before she is asleep for the night. (Started this 3 weeks ago. Of course there are "off" nights where I still nurse her because I feel like she's genuinely hungry in the middle of the night, but for the most part she is sleeping all night again.) I feel like it was a miracle for us.

Melody330 · August 2014

I could have written this post. My LO is seven months old and I am at my wits end.

How did you try "CIO?" If you haven't read a book about it it's safe to assume you probably did it wrong. We just started using Ferbers book- and it's going great. He had a lot of sleep associations like your LO seems to and was waking every 90 minutes on the dot at night.

I highly suggest you read up on different sleep training methods and choose the right one for you.
Unfortunately there is no quick fix

sweetnsourlala · August 2014

My LO is 7 months old. I had the same sleep issues with her. As far as during the day goes, I keep her up for 3-5 hours straight depending and she will nap for 2 hours! At night time I feed her some baby cereal about an hour before bedtime. Then I will breast feed her to sleep and to assure myself she is completely out I will pick her up, burp her and then scratch her back for 5 minutes which always let's me know whether or not it is okay to lay her Down because she does not like it. She will sleep 6-10 hours y doing that. Wish you luck!

LilyGR · September 2014

I nannied a baby from 4 months to 18 months, and I also have a daughter of my own. what I have found works is teaching the baby a new way to fall asleep. This is not easy at first, but once your baby gets the hang of it, it is quite easy. When I left the nanny job, the 18 month old baby would walk to her bed and lay down and go to sleep when I told her it was nap time. Super great.

So to start, you should nurse your baby until she is full. When she is just holding your nipple in her mouth, and sucking every so often, that usually means she is done. Then you stop nursing her, and hold her laying down in your arms. She won't like that, she will want to get down and play. But just hold her and walk around. I like to sing a little song while I do this to help the baby say calm.

She will try to squirm away, and she will cry. However, if you can keep her in your arms and walk around for 30 minutes, she will most likely fall asleep. If you do this every time you put her to sleep, she will learn that that is how to fall asleep. She will fall asleep more quickly (in about 5-10minutes) once she is used to this method, and you will get some welcome relief.

I sing the same song every time, so that the baby knows that when she hears that song, it is time to sleep.

My baby is 6 months old, and half of the time her dad puts her to sleep. It is so nice.

I have my baby's mattress on the floor next to my mattress (also on the floor). This way, I don't have to lower her into her crib, I can just crouch down next to the mattress and gently set her down. This also makes is very easy to feed her in the night. I don't have to get out of my bed and walk all the way to where my baby is. I stay half asleep, and then it is easy to fall right back to sleep again.

hpatalano · September 2014

We have had success without CIO (no judgement, to each their own). Personally, my husband and I had done lot about the negative effects of CIO and weren't comfortable with the risks associated with it. Because it is controversial and there are some convincing studies we decided try every possible solution first before doing it. I'm happy to say that we found a non CIO method that is working for us!

The method is from Dr. Harvey Karp (Happiest Baby on the Block). We were exhausted and feeling like bad parents because our son would wake up every 2 hours every night. We did everything his Pediatrician said to do but it just didn't work until we bought the Happiest Baby Guide to Great Sleep and followed every step. Now our son (6 months) does one "Dream Feed" and then sleeps 7 hours straight, wakes for another feed and then sleeps 2 more hours. We still have to wean one of the feedings but it's a HUGE difference.

I really suggest the book but here are the highlights:

Basics:

Establish a night time routine
Set up sleep associations (most importantly a low rumbling white noise, high pitched noise won't work.
Make sure he is napping correctly

The Golden Stuff!

Snuggle, nurse, hold, rock or whatever else you need to do do comfort your baby to sleep. (Yes, you don't have to put him down asleep). Then once he is laying in his crib do a gentle, giggle or tickle his feet so he opens his eyes briefly and falls back asleep. Babies get upset when they don't wake up where they went to sleep. It's confusing. Also, this will still teach them to self soothe. When you put them down you want them to be fully out or you will wake them and they will start crying. You need to do this EVERY time they wake up and go to sleep.
Wean their night eating (if dr. says it's OK):

Do a dream feed. Wake your baby up between 10:00 - 11:00 pm and feed him. This is called a dream feed. Babies sleep the longest, deepest sleep on their first 6 hours of sleep. Research has shown babies who are fed between that time are able to "reset" their longest sleep making their deep sleep from 11 pm - 5 pm and fitting much more comfortably into your sleep.
Keep a sleep log of when they wake up normally for a feed and set your alarm and feed them 30 minutes to an hour before they normally wake. For example, if your son wakes at 1 am, 3 am, and 5 am you would set your alarm at 12:30 am, 2:30 am and 4:30 am and wake your baby and feed him. The point of this is teaching your child that they aren't rewarded with food when they wake up at night. If you feed your baby sometimes and not other times they will be confused and the message won't be clear.
Begin shortening each feed by two minutes each night until you no longer feed them at that time.
If they wake on their own, don't feed them. The message has to be clear, waking up and crying doesn't equal food. You won't have to worry that they are hungry because you woke them up and fed them multiple times.

Eventually you wean the dream feed and white noise (we haven't gotten there yet)

This whole process takes a lot longer than CIO and it takes a lot of patience and not a lot of sleep during the multiple wake ups but it worked for us and we feel good about it.

Hope this helps and hopefully we will all be rewarded with a good night's sleep soon!

PrimRoseMama · September 2014

CIO was not compatible with either of my babies' temperaments. Checks just pissed them off more & the level of hysterics associated reaffirmed my belief that it was not a humane way to teach either of them to sleep.

It might work for others' babies, but based on my own research & working with a sleep expert from university recommended by my pedi-- just not my cup of tea.

Different philosophies & all that jazz. We bed share & nurse to sleep. I found as soon as I stopped trying to force my needs on them & met their needs (closeness/comfort/pacifier/breast) that boom-- bed time was a breeze.

Just to say, there is no arbitrary age or time that a baby should STTN. Yes, it would be nice for us, but it's not about us.

TL;DR : CIO felt like torture in this household. It didn't work & made bed time an awful situation. I chose to bed share & use the Wait It Out method to meet their individual needs.

rmurphy24 · September 2014

Thank you for the ideas!! My LO is a little over 5 months old.. was sleeping for about 6-7 hours straight through the night and now he is AWAKE every two hours. I am so glad that I am not the only one going through this! Love the point about not trying to make our children fit our needs, rather let's try to solve theirs! My LO loves to snuggle momma and as a full time working mom, often times co workers tell me "Maybe he is awake because he misses you" which just breaks my heart! But if that's the reason he is awake, who can be upset that your LO needs a snuggle!?? Yes I am exhausted.. but one day I will look back and WISH that I had this time back when my LO was waking me up to snuggle!

radiohd18 · September 2014

I highly recommend reading Dr. Ferber's book, even if you decide not to do his method. And it's not called Cry it out per se... it's either Progressive Waiting or Extinction. Progressive Waiting is when you wait 3, 5, 10, 15 minutes in between 2 minute checks. The baby sees you are coming back to check but realizes that crying isn't going to get results. When you do a 2 minute check it's your opportunity to make sure the baby hasn't gotten sick, hurt or has a dirty diaper. If the baby is fed, diaper changed, and put down in the crib sleepy but not asleep, the idea is the baby will learn to sleep on their own. The first night is tough but now our LO doesn't make a peep when we put her down at night, she just turns her head and goes to sleep. When we first started the method, I would come in for a check and she would just stop crying and look at me. She was fine, she just needed to learn how to go to sleep. Before I read this book, I swear I was up ever 45 minutes rocking, singing, patting, shushing and just holding her hand every night.

Extinction is when you put the baby down and don't come back until several hours later or morning.

I really think it's important to do proper research before beginning any sleep method. The book doesn't just give you directions, it explains and reasons why learning to sleep by oneself is so important.

And, I also read The No-Cry-Sleep Solution and I'm currently reading Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child.

jackieoickle · October 2014

Wow!!all this advice is so confusing!! just go with it! It may be exhausting getting up throughout the night with babe but eventually he or she will sleep through the night. I just go with his cues. Sometime he wakes in the night and as soon as I pick him up he stops crying and just wants to be rocked back to sleep. Sometimes he's hungery so I feed him. He will sometimes go a week or two with perfect sleeping from 7 pm until 5-7 am. Then we have a few week where's he's up a few times. I Myself am open to suggestions but I find some of these suggestions extremely complicated. But hey if it works for you then go for it!! I totally know what you're going through, my little guy hasn't been a perfect sleeper and at almost 7 months we're still working out the kinks. it's frustrating and exhausting but just keep telling yourself it won't be like this forever. That's what I keep telling myself!

good luck!! Oh and for me, my son use to go to bed from 8-9 pm, one night he ended up falling asleep by 7pm and he slept much better. We do go through a week where he's up a lot, this time around its due to teething. sometimes moving bedtime to an earlier time time definitely helps. I've read this on other fourms from other parents with sleep issues. Also I have a bedtime routine that we follow every night, this has made a big difference as well. Keep it simple

it's works for me (most of the time)

sweetmama101226 · November 2014

PrimRoseMama said:

CIO was not compatible with either of my babies' temperaments. Checks just pissed them off more & the level of hysterics associated reaffirmed my belief that it was not a humane way to teach either of them to sleep. It might work for others' babies, but based on my own research & working with a sleep expert from university recommended by my pedi-- just not my cup of tea. Different philosophies & all that jazz. We bed share & nurse to sleep. I found as soon as I stopped trying to force my needs on them & met their needs (closeness/comfort/pacifier/breast) that boom-- bed time was a breeze. Just to say, there is no arbitrary age or time that a baby should STTN. Yes, it would be nice for us, but it's not about us. TL;DR : CIO felt like torture in this household. It didn't work & made bed time an awful situation. I chose to bed share & use the Wait It Out method to meet their individual needs.

I agree, I am trying to find ways but I see that every time I pick up my LO from his crib and hold him and goes right back to sleep. He wants to be with me and there is nothing wrong with that. Your comment made me feel relieved because every one is like pressuring me to make him sleep in his crib ( and when I mean by every one, I mean my family) Thanks for this comment hehe

anon1mois · December 2014

Thank you hpatalano for describing that method, I'm downloading the book from iTunes now!!

My bubs has never been a good sleeper, the most he has ever slept in his life is 4consecutive hours. The usual is 1.5-2 hours though, I think he's only ever done 4 hrs 2-3 times! So after 6 months I'm exhausted. I'm booked into a residential sleep school in mid December, and did a day stay at a sleep school at the end of September. The day stay seemed to be work on the day but unfortunately my bubs just hated the methods, the 2 months following it were almost as bad as when he had colic, waking every 45 mins on the dot! I was just a mess! So about 2 weeks ago I said, "that's it, no more tricks, if I think you're hungry I'm going to feed you, you want a hug you're getting it!" And we're back to 2 hour stretches. Not great but better!!

As a research psych I have been thinking about cry- feed associations but hadn't really considered how to break them. I'm going to try some of these methods I think!

(And CIO methods aren't a good fit for us, my son has bad eczema and a disability- but no judgement for those that use it

)

PaoPao820 · January 2015

I'm having so many of the same issues. I am at 8 months EBF and he will take naps in the crib, the stroller, and the car but in the crib it never lasts long. I get 2-3 hour chunks usually. And he can't seem to ever put himself to bed unless in the car or the stroller. I feel like he can self soothe since he does it in the stroller and the car seat but won't when we're at home or elsewhere. I just don't know. I try to go with the flow but sometimes all I want to do is sleep and I get so impatient and annoyed.

fsumom · January 2015

My 7 month is the same way but he seems to nap better if I lay down with him which I try to do. At night he often wakes several times to nurse but sometimes he is just nursing for comfort. We co-sleep or I'd never get any sleep.

sweetmama101226 · January 2015

fsumom said:

My 7 month is the same way but he seems to nap better if I lay down with him which I try to do. At night he often wakes several times to nurse but sometimes he is just nursing for comfort. We co-sleep or I'd never get any sleep.

We co-sleep too. Obviously, I lay him on his crib but as soon as he wakes up to eat then for some reason he might be asleep but won't take his crib lol. So we do whatever it takes so he can be comfortable and us as well, so we sleep.:)

sweetmama101226 · January 2015

PaoPao820 said:

I'm having so many of the same issues. I am at 8 months EBF and he will take naps in the crib, the stroller, and the car but in the crib it never lasts long. I get 2-3 hour chunks usually. And he can't seem to ever put himself to bed unless in the car or the stroller. I feel like he can self soothe since he does it in the stroller and the car seat but won't when we're at home or elsewhere. I just don't know. I try to go with the flow but sometimes all I want to do is sleep and I get so impatient and annoyed.

What I do when my baby doesn't want to sleep and its 9PM, I just wait it out. I know i'm tired but I just lay in the couch and rest and just watch tv with him and he plays in the couch while i'm there until he gets tired! which is not too long. I also use my nursing chair ( i forgot the name) to make him fall asleep faster and sing to him too. try anything!

*LrCg* · January 2015

This is our 4th baby and honestly I've always nursed our kids to sleep and we never had issues of them not sleeping then or when they were done nursing. In fact, after I was done nursing (after they were over a year old) I would rock them for a short time (maybe 5 min) to sleep and still no issues. My friends tease me that that hate me because all my kids are great sleepers. I don't say this to rub it in, I say it because I think people automatically think they're doing something wrong by nursing to sleep. What is your schedule like during the day? Perhaps you aren't getting them to nap PRIOR to them being tired? And being over tired during the day will make them bad sleepers at night. I work 1-2 days a week and we have a nanny come in. She's great but she doesn't follow my schedule (she thinks if she can keep him up until he crashes out and the less he sleeps during the day the more he'll sleep at night) and I can tell because our baby doesn't sleep well for her and then sleeps bad that night for us (he'll wake up 2-3 times during the night!) and it will carry over to the next day. I recently had to have a sit down with her and basically say FOLLOW THE SCHEDULE!!! He's now much happier and is consistently sleeping 7pm-7am (waking once to nurse at 3:30 am and falls asleep while nursing).

Anyways google schedules for 6 month olds. I just always followed our baby's patterns and based it off them. Here's what we do: 7am wakes up & nurses, 9am nurse and nap (anywhere from 30min-1 hour), 11:30am nurses, 12:30pm nap via rocking to sleep (anywhere from 1-2 hrs), 2:30pm nurses, 4pm cat nap via rocking to sleep (maybe 30 min), 4:30pm nurses and 6:40pm dressed for bed and nurses to sleep for the night.

sweetmama101226 · January 2015

*LrCg* said:

This is our 4th baby and honestly I've always nursed our kids to sleep and we never had issues of them not sleeping then or when they were done nursing. In fact, after I was done nursing (after they were over a year old) I would rock them for a short time (maybe 5 min) to sleep and still no issues. My friends tease me that that hate me because all my kids are great sleepers. I don't say this to rub it in, I say it because I think people automatically think they're doing something wrong by nursing to sleep. What is your schedule like during the day? Perhaps you aren't getting them to nap PRIOR to them being tired? And being over tired during the day will make them bad sleepers at night. I work 1-2 days a week and we have a nanny come in. She's great but she doesn't follow my schedule (she thinks if she can keep him up until he crashes out and the less he sleeps during the day the more he'll sleep at night) and I can tell because our baby doesn't sleep well for her and then sleeps bad that night for us (he'll wake up 2-3 times during the night!) and it will carry over to the next day. I recently had to have a sit down with her and basically say FOLLOW THE SCHEDULE!!! He's now much happier and is consistently sleeping 7pm-7am (waking once to nurse at 3:30 am and falls asleep while nursing).

Anyways google schedules for 6 month olds. I just always followed our baby's patterns and based it off them. Here's what we do: 7am wakes up & nurses, 9am nurse and nap (anywhere from 30min-1 hour), 11:30am nurses, 12:30pm nap via rocking to sleep (anywhere from 1-2 hrs), 2:30pm nurses, 4pm cat nap via rocking to sleep (maybe 30 min), 4:30pm nurses and 6:40pm dressed for bed and nurses to sleep for the night.

I nurse mine to sleep too and it's not bad. However, he goes to daycare mon-fri and when I pick him up he wants to sleep 5:30pm-6pm which I think its super early but I let him obviously. I don't think he gets his full time naps when he's in day care so makes it a little hard for him to nap correctly.

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