{Can you help me? I need ideas for getting baby to stay asleep at night!}
It was last night at three am. The baby started crying. I rolled over and asked my husband, “Will we ever sleep again?”
He calmly replied, “Probably not.”
James is 3 1/2 months old. As this is my third child, I expected him to neatly fall into the routine my other boys adopted: Sporadic sleep habits until about six weeks, then longer night-time spurts of sleeping, lasting up to 4 or 5 hours. By three months old, they were sleeping soundly almost every night.
This kid? Not so much. I don’t think I’ve slept more than four hours in a row since he was born. In August.
I realize, now, that I was lucky with Graham and Will. I had to go and test fate, and now I’m paying the price. Don’t get me wrong. I love, love, love my baby. But, momma needs some sleep!
I am desperately seeking any advice y’all might have for me for getting baby to stay asleep at night. I’ll walk you through the extensive list we’ve exhausted already, and I would LOVE to hear any other suggestions you might have!
We’ve tried:
- Anti reflux medicines including: Zantac, Prilosec & Prevacid (seems to help a bit)
- He’s been diagnosed with a milk protein allergy, so I’ve cut out dairy from my diet and when he gets formula, it’s hypoallergenic. (this seemed to help him adjust from being miserable to content, but he’s still not sleeping for long bits)
- He sleeps in an inclined position in a rocking bassinet
- We swaddle him for bedtime
- We’ve experimented with white noise (doesn’t seem to help)
- We’ve tried co-sleeping (but I’m too anxious about his safety for any of us to get sleep this way)
- He has a pacifier, but he spits it out
- When he gets really fussy we give him Gripe Water (sometimes helps to calm him down temporarily)
- Baths (makes him really, really mad)
- Waking him up during the day, if he sleeps more than 2 hours (rarely happens, but doesn’t seem to effect his nightime sleeping pattern)
We haven’t tried:
- Letting him cry it out
- Rice cereal
- Having him sleep in a different room
- Stopping night-time nursing sessions
What happens:
He goes to sleep (sometimes on his own, sometimes during a feeding, sometimes when we rock him). He wakes up on his own after two – three hours. Occasionally, you can pat his belly and he’ll go back to sleep. Usually, though, he won’t go back to sleep without either being fed or rocked with a pacifier. Then, when you transfer him back to his bassinet, he has a 50% chance of waking back up and us needing to start the process all over again.
So, now I gotta ask… What do you recommend? I’ve always found that moms offer the best advice, so let’s hear it! And, just so you know, we do have a pediatrician appointment in two weeks. So there’s that. And, I get it. I may just have to wait it out. But maybe I’m missing something obvious?
All I want for Christmas is a good night’s sleep,
Katie
Dear Katie and Jon,
I greatly sympathize, as my third child and only son (you know him well) was also a poor sleeper at first. I benefitted from a flexible schedule at the time, as I sat on the coach nursing from 4-11pm every night from the time he was 4-12 months of age, and he still got up 2-3 times every night. I was so tired that I usually feel asleep with my baby in the bed by the third night-time feeding. Now that this young man is 17 1/2 years of age, he has the metabolism of a horse and willpower of am elephant. This has served he well in school and sports.
I recommend the book The Happiest Baby On The Block by Harvey Karp, MD. As it may have many helpful hints. For me, attention, affection and lots of love plus time is what did the trick.
Here are a few good things to keep in mind:
1. This babies inability to sleep well is no indication of your quality parenting.
2. Some babies are just harder to soothe at first, they will outgrow this.
3. And, babies are experts at feeling and sensing their parents emotions, so when you are feeling overwhelmed, at the end of your rope or sad for any reason…it is time for your spouse or partner to hold the baby.
Hugs,
Jeanine
Hi there! I followed the healthy sleep habits, happy child book for my 2 little ones. My 2nd, a boy who is now 7 months was definitely a little harder to break than my 2 yr old daughter. Some tips I would give you are:
Try not to let him fall asleep to a feeding- a lot of times when babies fall asleep to a feeding they will startle awake and start crying because they aren’t in their moms arms. I always nursed my kids, woke them up and then tried to let them fall asleep on their own. I would rock them until drowsy and then put them in their crib. Sometimes that would mean crying it out. But at 3 months- the crying never really lasts longer than 10 minute.
Both my kids loved sleeping on their tummies. I know that is a no-no but they despised their backs! And my little guy had reflux issues too. It made it so much better when he was on his tummy. Obviously this meant no swaddle though.
I also do whit noise and dark black out shades for their rooms. When they wake in the middle of the night I wouldn’t turn on any lights or talk or anything like that.
Good luck! Sleep deprivation is so. Very. Hard. No one can even prepare you for it- especially when you have other kids to run after during the day! I hope it gets better for you!
Thanks for the note! I’ll definitely try some of the things you mentioned!