My 14 month old is awake and screaming every night - family in crisis - help!

[glitterdust]

My dc3 slept through until about 2 months ago. Now he wakes screaming at about 3 am, and doesn't stop. If we go in and cuddle him he immediately settles and sleeps on us, but starts screaming again the minute we put him back down. He's not cold, not teething. Everyone is exhausted, we're barely managing at work, and the other 2 are starting to struggle at school/nursery. Largely we leave him to scream now, but he just doesn't stop! We're staying with family this weekend and wanted to stay with friends next weekend but am beginning to think its not fair to disturb anyone else....

[FaceLikeAPickledOnion]

I could have written this post! Ds the same age and exactly the same situation. We're going away with family and friends next week too. I should be looking forward to it but I'm not because of this.
Hope someone comes along with a solution

[Sheshelob]

Feel your pain!

Separation anxiety, I'd say. We had it around the same age. So leaving him to scream isn't going to work as he just wants you. Has he started walking recently/about to start walking, as the world seems like a really big and scary place around this time. So he just needs his parents a bit more to reassure him.

We found taking turns meant that at least we each got sleep every other night. Going to DS for the time he needed us helped to settle him, then we did gradual retreat until he grew out of the waking phase (he started nursery and we moved house about two weeks after the waking started so it lasted longer than normal with us).

He's now 16 months old and sleeping through again.

This too shall pass. La force!

[FaceLikeAPickledOnion]

Have you seen this Op (i've just seen it on active threads)

wake to sleep

I'll give this a try tonight

[glitterdust]

It's worth a try isn't it? He's tottering around v happy and pleased with himself this morning! We all have gritted teeth [buhmm]

[FaceLikeAPickledOnion]

And if their body clocks aren't out enough already, I've just found out the clocks go forward tonight too.

Still, worth a try though

[cloudhands]

That sounds hard and very stressful. Sounds like he is trying to relieve some stress and tension by crying, as opposed to crying because he actually needs something (ie food drink etc. )
Maybe he's crying because of some separation fears that come up on the night. There is a method of gradually helping him get to a point where he feels safe to be without you that doesn't involve leaving him alone to cry (which would make separation fears worse)
Check out this article here Helping young children sleep

When I tried this method with my Dd her sleep improved after the first night and she was sleeping through the night after a couple of weeks. She has slep through ever since!

Wishing you a peaceful nights sleep soon.

[glitterdust]

Thank you. I entirely agree, it must be separation anxiety +- anxieties about the world. flapo - will you let me know how you get on? It's actually just so nice to hear there's someone out there, and someone that's been thru it before, thanks sheshelob, because anyone I speak to about it just wants to tell me how it shouldn't be happening when their children have all been perfect sleepers from 6 weeks [buenvy]

[Sheshelob]

Not one baby I know has slept through since 6 weeks. They are well lucky bastards

It gets easier. At 16 months, our boy can give us a bit more a clue what's up if he can't get back to sleep, which makes things much easier if he does wake up.

It will pass. And then sleep shall be yours!