Need advice...can't believe my toddler STILL doesn't sleep.

[spanishmiss430]

I am new to posting on the forums here, though have been reading Mothering since I was pregnant 3 years ago.
I have a biological DS, who just turned two. He has always been a terrible sleeper - colicky infant, only slept in a sling with a swaddler and singing and bouncing, nursed every 2 hours around the clock for 6 months, has never slept through the night. But lately his sleep is getting worse!! He is taking over an hour and a half to go down for every nap and bedtime and is up SO many times at night. He no longer nurses. He just wants us to be there all the time. He sleeps in a crib in our room, though once he starts waking up all the time, he just comes in bed with us - though that doesn't keep him from waking up again and again.
I have read SO many sleep books and tried so many things...we are at our wit's end and totally exhausted and frustrated and getting resentful of DS. Which is horrible! He must be exhausted too.
It is hard for us to try some of the suggestions we have received because we have three older foster children and DS has to share a room with us due to space constraints.
I am open to any suggestions or maybe just hoping for reassurance that we are not terrible parents and that we are not alone...

[7thDaughter]

You are working hard at being a great mother to a high needs child! You are not alone. Many of us have experienced these behaviors and struggled to meet our children's needs.

I have a few suggestions -- you may have heard these already. My daughter was helped tremendously by cranial-sacral therapy by a D.O. (Dr of Osteopathy) who was experienced in working with children. The treatment balanced out her nervous system. After her first treatment she slept for days, and it had a lasting calming effect. You could also look into a children's chiropractor; they also do body work to align and calm children's nervous systems. For years I took the kids for treatment twice a year, just like a dental appointment.

Another thing I've read about: I call an "apple sparkle" drink. I mix 1 tsp raw apple cider vinegar with 1 tsp organic honey, in a glass of water, and have my kids drink it with their meals. (Not for babies!) The apple cider vinegar helps regulate calcium metabolism, & the honey is a very gentle sedative and makes the vinegar palatable. Calcium regulation is essential to the nervous system. I just started with this, so I can't speak to results yet. Dr. DC Jarvis wrote a book in 1960 about folk remedies, and he witnessed this drink helping high-strung, temperamental children regulate their nervous systems so they could slow down and grow. He said in 2 months the difference was astonishing. Normally I don't recommend sweet drinks, but this may be worth a try, with just enough honey to cut the "zing."

My prayers for you and your little one.

[Ophelia]

I second the cranio and chiro advice. Also, have you checked into food sensitivities/intolerances? These can definitely affect sleep, and since you said colic that is a huge red flag to me.

Hop on over to the allergy forum

[sunnygir1]

Have his 2yo molars come in yet? My dd was a horrible sleeper, but she got a lot better around 2-2.5. Her teeth were in, she was night-weaned, then completely weaned at 27 months when I was pregnant.

Unfortunately, it is hard to know which factors helped the most, we moved her to the next room around 18 months and night weaned around the same time. We all slept better with her in the next room. Sorry that's not an option for you.

Maybe you could try putting up a screen or curtain between his crib and your bed? My ds is almost 13 months, and his crib is in our room. He almost always wakes up when we go to bed, so then he winds up in our bed for the night. On some few blissful nights he sleeps 1-3 (sometimes up to 5-6) hours in the crib before he wakes up and comes to our bed to nurse and cuddle.

I love co-sleeping, but I also love sleeping, and sometimes he really keeps me up nursing and wiggling, etc. I know how you feel, and I hope it gets better for you soon.

Oh, do you have a fan or white noise machine in your room? Ds definitely sleeps better with the fan on for noise.

[LadyCatherine185]

I would also look into food sensitivities, especially considering he was such a colicky infant.

And I second the 2 year molar check.

What about dropping his nap? Maybe he is ready for that, and make his bedtime a little earlier.

my DS was always a horrible sleeper too until we nightweaned and moved him to his own bed. But I think something else is going on with your DS if he is nightweaned and sleeping in his own space and still waking up. Good luck, I hope you get something figured out soon.

[spanishmiss430]

Wow! Thanks so much for the great suggestions!! I actually heard a few new things, which is refreshing.
We already go to a chiropractor regularly but have not tried cranio-sacral work and I talked to DH and he thinks we should try it! I will start trying to find one near us tonight.
We do have a humidifier that we run for white noise. We are considering moving him from a crib to a bed (a bed in our room, not our bed)...he seems to really love being in bed and doesn't even always want us to hold him, just wants to be in bed.
His two year molars have been coming in but are mostly in now, and he's just always slept terribly, teething or otherwise.
I did a lots of elimination diet stuff when I was nursing, hoping to improve the colic - no go. He doesn't have any other symptoms, which is why we haven't given a lot of thought to allergies - he has great skin (no exzema, no diaper rashes), never really spit up, no constipation or diarrhea...
You have given me food for thought. And it felt good to get it off my chest a bit. Thanks so much!
Sometimes I have to remind myself to love and care for my son as an individual and tune out the voices telling me, "He should have been sleeping through the night 19 months ago...this is what you get for not letting him cry it out when he was little...you're spoiling him...he'll never sleep in his own bed..." Blah blah blah. Hard to ignore after a while.