about to snap....will he ever STTN?

[beatgenxer]

gaaaaaah!

i have a 13 month old and he has NEVER slept through the night. seriously. the longest he's ever slept is four hours....once.

like most moms here, on a good night he'll wake up 3-4 times....on a bad night of sickness or teething or whatever, it's every hour at least.

here's out routine:

• 7pm  upstairs to bathe, chill on the bed, wind down
• 8-9pm  somewhere in there he falls asleep nursing
• wakes about a half-hour after falling asleep and nurses - sometimes i fall asleep with him, but most nights i sneak downstairs after that first waking to get work done - which means i go to bed between 11 and midnight
• wakes during the night and nursing is the only way he'll fall back asleep
• wakes up for the day sometime between 7:30-9am (i love black-out curtains!)
• naps once for about two hours, though i have to nurse him at about the one hour mark to help him fall back asleep

so obviously his problem is he can't help himself fall back asleep, but i don't know how to help him learn that. i've read the No-Cry Sleep Solution, but he won't take any substitutes (never took a bottle or a paci either), so i'm not sure how that book is any help.

i can't keep doing this. i'm one of those people that needs sleep - i can skip meals, but i can't skimp on sleep. it's affecting my work (freelance at home, but it's designing and editing and attention to detail is a must) and my ability to be a good mom and wife and friend. i fly into rages very easily because i'm so overtired. i snap at everyone and it makes me so sad :(

i don't want to end co-sleeping, and he only nurses for comfort/nap/night (he loves solids and basically self-weaned all the other feedings). i'm ready to wean totally, especially since he bites me in his sleep at least once a week (he's even drawn blood a couple of times.).

so is there some way to help him sleep better?

can i wean and still co-sleep?

HELP!

[lifeguard]

Sounds exactly like ds. At about 14 months I nightweaned using the Jay Gordon method. I did over Christmas so that dh was not working & could help out. He would go to ds in the night when he woke up & offer him cuddles & water. Ds was not thrilled but after a couple nights it got much easier. We went from 5-7 wake ups a night to about 2 within a week.

[Sfcmama]

Hang in there, mama! The one main technique I took away from the NCSS was to not let DD fall asleep with the nipple in her mouth (since she also refused pacifiers). It sometimes takes a handful of tries, but eventually it works. On a good night (which we are seeing more of), she nurses and then detaches herself semi-asleep and then rolls over to fully pass out. When she wakes in the middle of the night, I offer her her lovey and she can sometimes resettle. Other times, dh can get her back to sleep with a shhh and/or jiggle. While I still do end up eventually nursing her back down a majority of the time, she is slowly being able to get back to sleep on other ways. (and by slowly, I mean maybe once a night or every other night)

Hth!

Ps - I'm totally using your post to start nagging dh again about blackout shades ;0)

[amyhulen]

My DD was the same way and I dealt with it for 3 1/2 years. Finally I had had enough. What worked for me was very strictly adhearing to our bedtime routine, making sure she had an extra comfy bed (we had to add a layer of memory foam to her mattress) and geting her to bed earlier than I thought she was ready for 8pm is the magical hour for us. And most importantly I weaned her off the nursing and co-sleeping by dragging a sleeping bag into her room and sleeping right next to her with my arm on her soothing her back to sleep every time she woke up. She was in a toddler bed which made this possible. She fought me for several days to a week but eventually she started sleeping for stretches of time and after about a month I would simply sit next to her bed while she fell asleep then I would quietly sneek out. Finally when she was ready I would sit by her bedroom door until she was sleeping. These days at almost 6 years old it's a story or two, a kiss and lights out.

I swore I would never have a terrible sleeper or a picky eater but I have both in DD #2.

Good luck mama, I feel your pain and you too will get through this. A week or two of suffering is well worth the extra sleep you will get down the road.

Another option may be to side car a bed on your side you can sleep with your hand on him and sooth him back to sleep in your room. Though I found cutting the ties to the family bed to be the best way for us.

[D_McG]

It was at that age that I started refusing to nurse DS between his bedtime and mine.  It cut his waking in half (maybe down to 1, or two wakings).  If he woke between his bedtime and mine he got DH or me minus my boobs. 

With DD I did that much earlier and I never had the sleep issues with her that I had with him.  For us, the wake up-insert boob plan was a failed experiment :)

That's not to say that they embraced the new rules joyfully.  But they were snuggled and sung through it.  I figured that it was at worst a bad plan.  And even a bad plan was worth a week's effort.  I could tell within a couple of days that it was the right choice for us.  Sleep, glorious sleep!

[Bebe's Mom]

I am trying to nightwean my DD gradually, since she is still really wanting to nurse at night...I am mostly CLW, but I really want to have her STTN and  night  weaned by the time she is 20 months( I would prefer to have her night weaned at 18 months, but I don't know if that is a realistic time frame.) She is almost 15 months now. We transitioned her to her crib when she was around ten months old, first just for naps and then at night. At first, she would only sleep in the crib for about an hour, but gradually she started sleeping for longer stretches in the crib. (I had to transfer her because we weren't getting any sleep, what with all the kicking and waking to nurse) She is in our room, so I don't have to go far to pick her up or soothe her.

She continues to wake up every few hours most nights. The first time she wakes up, I nurse her for 10 minutes tops, usually I can get her back to sleep before 3 minutes have passed. Sometimes I can get her back to sleep just by rubbing her back. If she wakes up again before 3 a.m. I do the same. If she sleeps until 3 or later, I take her into the bed and let her nurse for a full session, but I try not to let her go for more than twenty minutes.

We have had a few setbacks due to teething-she was waking up every hour, etc..we had to start giving her meds to help her sleep at night, which helped, but she was still waking more than usual..but the last few nights we have turned a corner. She seems to be taking a break from teething, and we have not had to medicate her for the last few days. She slept from 10 p.m. until 6 a.m. the other night, and last night she slept from 8:30 to 3, no waking. This is a huge improvement! When we were cosleeping full time, she was waking 5-6 times a night, and refused to sleep without my nipple in her mouth most nights. My back was killing me form being curled around her like a shrimp, and every time I moved an eyelash, she would wake up and start screaming or kicking my DH. It was awful.

I know you don't want to stop co-sleeping, but with part-time cosleeping, you have some serious sleep time to yourself, and you still get to cuddle with your lo. It has worked out really well for us, hope this helps you. I know exactly how you are feeling!!

[dalia]

I was having some of these issues and the only way I survived was to go to bed earlier myself. I know you have other things you want to get done but maybe you can work something out. helped me immensely.

[beatgenxer]

thank you everyone for taking the time to reply! that night after i posted, DS woke up every 30 minutes and then cried from 5-6am. this past weekend was TERRIBLE!  

dalia - i go to bed the same time as him every few days, simply because i pass out as i'm BFing him to sleep :D

we're in a lull between teething episodes, so we might try closing up the all-night milkies shop from 11pm - 6am for a few days to see if he'll play along with that. if not, i'll just have to wait a few more months and try again. whomever told me that he'll sleep better once we starts moving around on his own was a liar-liar-pants-on-fire! 

[iheartwren]

I wanted to chime in that the Jay Gordon's plan didn't work for us -it was just too sudden and we were up  for hours trying to soothe a crying baby.  Around 16 months we decided to take a more gradual approach.  Every two days we would push back her first feeding by a half an hour.  For example she used to first eat at 9:30ish so we said no eating until after 10.  Then a few days later it was 10:30.  We got her to sleep by rocking, bouncing, patting whatever.... It worked for us-there was definitely some crying but we continued with the plan until around 4 am which seemed to be a point where nursing was the only way to get her back to sleep at the time, but what an improvement.  We went from 6 or more wake-ups a night to 1 or 2.   Just another idea that might help