10 month old hardly sleeps. Any advice appreciated!

[mummycat0]

10 month old dd would happily stay awake day and night if I don't "force" her to sleep! To add a bit of context, we've moved countries a couple of times this year for DH's work and won't be back home till she's a year old so we've really struggled to enforce a routine seeing as it all just resets as soon as she has to sleep in a different bed.

She's always nursed to sleep and we co-sleep, for convenience, otherwise she just screams her eyes out. Now she wakes up at 8am, has a 1-2 hour nap at 11am then refuses to get anymore sleep till 7pm. At 7, I'd nurse her to sleep then she wakes up every 40 mins- 1 hour crying wanting to be settled back. Sometimes it's every 15 mins. I promptly nurse her back to sleep as no amount of cuddling/shush-patting seems to work, but I'm very tired and neither DH nor I have had any sleep for a long time.

Am I doing something wrong? Any advice as to how to break this seemingly endless cycle, we're really at the end of our wits at the moment and any help would be much appreciated. Thanks!

[sparklekitty]

I have a similar non sleeper. It has got better recently.

The thing that I've found I that my DD needs quite a long time to wind down before napping so we cuddle, read endless amounts of books then I feed or rock her.

We also have a long wind down before sleep at night.

6pm dinner
6.30 quite play time and some stories
7 in the night garden
7.30 bath time
7.50 story time
8 bedtime - fed to sleep
Usually asleep by 8.20.

This has taken 11 months for us to work out! Plus it changes quite a lot. A few weeks ago it was all earlier and she was asleep by 7.30!

Not sure if that helps

[mummycat0]

We already do bath/story-time before bed, it usually all takes around 40 minutes and it does help her wind down.

Do you find that letting her wind-down makes her sleeping last longer? Honestly, I'm struggling more with lack of night-time sleep. She wants to be constantly sucking on the breast mostly for comfort not feeding.

[sparklekitty]

I think so, saying that she used to do exactly the same, comfort feeding every hour or two. I'm sure shell go back to it when she gets poorly next

[Cnix]

You need to night wean her and teach her to self settle IMO. This will not be easy but if you stick with it it will be worth it.

[SwivelHips]

Hmmm 10ths seems a wee bit young too only have 1 nap, plus if its only an hour its quite a short nap. If your DD woke at 1 she'd be awake at least another 6 hrs, so I'm thinking she's perhaps overtired waking so often after you put her down for the night? Definitely no expert but my DS at 15 mths can go about 5/6 hrs tops after his lunchtime nap. At that age it was about 4 hrs I think. I've always had to 'control' his naps from when he was tiny, even now I use the pram (but he's asleep within 5 mins so its great).
I think if you master the daytime napping the nightime will get better. Easier said than done though eh. Hope things get better for you, I know its a killer :)

[Flossie82]

I have a 10 nth who doesn't seem to need much sleep. Sometimes one half hour nap will see him through the day. Health visitor said not to worry if she doesn't seem tired, as some babies just don't need as much sleep as others!

Night sleep has been horrendous, although is gradually getting better. We now make sure she gets put down in cot awake (so have story after breastfeeding), so isn't dependent on feeding to sleep. It has worked well, but is tough and need to stay consistent!

[bigkidsdidit]

My DS woke every hour because I was feeding back to sleep every time. Once I night weaned and taught him to go to sleep by himself he slept 12 hours straight and has done since. I used Andrea Grace to help me if you feel like you need outside help.

Sympathies, it is desperate isn't it

[mummycat0]

Thank you all for the support. DH and I haven't had sleep in what feels like forever now.

I thought she might be OT too. I try my hardest to put her down for a second nap during the day but she always just rolls over, gives me a big grin, stands herself up and pounds on the headboard! After an hour of this, I tend to give up on 2nd nap!

As for night weaning, how does one go about achieving this? I generally try to cuddle and shush-pat her before offering the breast, but I find that the crying escalates so I give in.

She's definitely got more will power and determination than we do!

[Cnix]

My advice re night weaning would be do whatever you need to to get her through the night anyway you can without milk. So things we did : gradually reduce time at the breast, send dp in to her, hold her hand / stroke her back, give her a 'lovey' to comfort her, offer water, sing, rock her in the buggy! ( yes really ! ) once she realised that she wasn't going to get any milk the night wakenings reduced. Then once you've done that teach her how to self settle : gradual retreat is good at this age. Maybe get dh to help. Mine slept on her floor for a few nights then he just sat beside her and sang to her then we got to the stage amazingly at 10 months or so where I would just go in and say' its still sleepy time go back to sleep' and she did. I think you also do have to be prepared for a certain amount of crying until she gets used to the new regime but never leave her for more than a minute or two then it's not so upsetting for her or you. I hope it works for you ;-) also if you wanted outside help I recommend Andrea grace who helped us with early wakening but that a whole other story...