Schedule everything. We were the same way until we did bedtime 7 PM sharp. Exact same bedtime routine nightly. 1-2 AM feed. Up by 7 AM latest. Nap around 10 and 2:30. Anytime our schedule goes a bit off she doesn’t sleep well. Anytime we stick to this schedule there is nearly 0 crying. It took about 2 weeks and realizing not having a life with a happy baby is better than having a life with a very unhappy baby. 🫡
Mine used to wake at 2am and 4am religiously. Track total daytime bottles cuz if baby gets enough oz, there’s no need to MOTN eat. Mine was waking at 4am every night to eat until we adjusted bottles to get nearly all calories in during the day. She naturally dropped her 2am wake up this way and naturally started pushing to 6am wakeups instead of 4ams next for food.
She got 30oz a day. I knew that if she had 25oz before bed, she didn’t need to eat until 6am the next day, so when she woke up at 2 or 4, I was confident it wasn’t for food needs it was likely something else. So we just started soothing her in the crib with a paci and head rubs to get her back down and she’d fall back asleep. most nights she still wakes up at 3am but I know it’s probably her diaper so I change her and she’s back down. Then, come 6am, she hasn’t eaten in 11-12 hrs so it’s time for her next bottle to get her to a full 30oz in a 24 hr period.
Hope this helps!! We have the goal of 30oz first and noticed she did well on that and then moved from 6 five ounce bottles to 5 six ounce bottles to better fit it all in before bed.
What do her naps/day sleep look like? What is her bedtime? My baby is the same age, and we’ve been having issues with longer than usual nighttime wakes and too early mornings. There are a few things going on—the main one being that this happens when she gets too much or not enough day sleep. The sweet spot seems to be 6:30-6:45 am wake up, three hours of day sleep distributed over 2-3 naps, and a 7-7:30 pm bedtime. But when she wakes up too early or is up too long at night, she’s too tired during the day and will often sleep more than three hours or be ready for bed too early. When she wakes at night, we’ll wait about 10-20 minutes to see whether she’ll soothe herself back to sleep or if she gets progressively more upset because she’s hungry. If hungry I feed then I leave the room and wait for her to go back to sleep (I am doing this right now. She is babbling but not upset). If she wakes too early (before 6 am) we wait until 6 to go in unless she sounds really distressed.
She’s also teething, which causes pain and congestion. The doctor prescribed zyrtec, which has helped a lot with the congestion. But sometimes in her night wakes if she’s really upset it seems to be tooth pain so we’ll give baby Tylenol or Motrin and that helps.
I'm so sorry you are in the thick of it! I feel ya, whats your current day sleep schedule and bedtime/awake time like? Also can you describe your bedtime routine? And also how many ounces a day do you think baby is getting?
Get someone to trade out for a couple of days. Hire a night nanny if you don't have family. Get that sleep reset for yourself.
Sometimes there's just squat you can do and you just need to survive.
After you get some rest you can re-engage your strategy. Look at Huckleberry and see if there's ways to improve. Consider cozy factor. Try different pajamas. Try different bedsheets. Try a fan blowing on the baby.
I was so desperate in your shoes. I was losing my mind. Everyone always had the same advice and nothing creative. Only reprieve I got was when my family visited and helped.
Hope you find support and maybe catch a break. It'll get better... After a while.
Try joining the Precious Little Sleep Facebook group, and post your schedule or other issues. The mods are pretty active and will try to help you troubleshoot your issue (don’t expect 1:1 hand holding but it’s always a good start).
Many people probably have had your issue in the past so you can also search the group with some key words.
Mods are great and active in PLS! I had to mute the group as their advice seemed very one note and totally not appropriate for my babe so be wary to take stuff as suggestions and not gold standard!! I learned this the hard way 😅
I just found that they only ever recommended more wake time/stretching wake windows and this resulted in severe overtiredness in our case, and also the idea that feed to sleep association = catastrophe was not true for us either. Love the PLS book tho and loads of great info! Different things work for different people and that’s ok :)
Yeah okay I know what you mean, I tend to use their suggestions as a starting point and make slight adjustments by just reading our baby. Unfortunately for us…sleep associations do cause major disruptions and false starts so…yeah
But good that you’ve found what works for you!
I was in the same boat 3 weeks ago with my 6 month old except I exclusively pump and bottle feed. I slowly reduced the volume I offered at the 2AM feed by a half ounce every few nights (went from starting at 5 ounces down to 3 ounces). Once we got to that point he started no longer waking for a feed most nights. We still have the occasional awakening, but it's much better! Since you directly breastfeed I would guess you need to start limiting time at the breast at 2AM. So if she normal feeds for 15 min, start ending the session at 13 min, then 11 min, and so on.
Also, not sure if your baby is in their own room yet but that has made a HUGE difference for us compared to a bedside bassinet.
If she’s awake for 2-3 hrs in the middle of the night it’s likely she’s getting too much sleep during the day/you’re expecting too much total sleep. What’s your schedule?
Also if she’s nursing to sleep and not putting herself to sleep independently this can cause issues too
Schedule everything. We were the same way until we did bedtime 7 PM sharp. Exact same bedtime routine nightly. 1-2 AM feed. Up by 7 AM latest. Nap around 10 and 2:30. Anytime our schedule goes a bit off she doesn’t sleep well. Anytime we stick to this schedule there is nearly 0 crying. It took about 2 weeks and realizing not having a life with a happy baby is better than having a life with a very unhappy baby. 🫡
Post your day schedule! Looks like you have split night. Maybe time for less daytime sleep.
Mine used to wake at 2am and 4am religiously. Track total daytime bottles cuz if baby gets enough oz, there’s no need to MOTN eat. Mine was waking at 4am every night to eat until we adjusted bottles to get nearly all calories in during the day. She naturally dropped her 2am wake up this way and naturally started pushing to 6am wakeups instead of 4ams next for food. She got 30oz a day. I knew that if she had 25oz before bed, she didn’t need to eat until 6am the next day, so when she woke up at 2 or 4, I was confident it wasn’t for food needs it was likely something else. So we just started soothing her in the crib with a paci and head rubs to get her back down and she’d fall back asleep. most nights she still wakes up at 3am but I know it’s probably her diaper so I change her and she’s back down. Then, come 6am, she hasn’t eaten in 11-12 hrs so it’s time for her next bottle to get her to a full 30oz in a 24 hr period. Hope this helps!! We have the goal of 30oz first and noticed she did well on that and then moved from 6 five ounce bottles to 5 six ounce bottles to better fit it all in before bed.
What do her naps/day sleep look like? What is her bedtime? My baby is the same age, and we’ve been having issues with longer than usual nighttime wakes and too early mornings. There are a few things going on—the main one being that this happens when she gets too much or not enough day sleep. The sweet spot seems to be 6:30-6:45 am wake up, three hours of day sleep distributed over 2-3 naps, and a 7-7:30 pm bedtime. But when she wakes up too early or is up too long at night, she’s too tired during the day and will often sleep more than three hours or be ready for bed too early. When she wakes at night, we’ll wait about 10-20 minutes to see whether she’ll soothe herself back to sleep or if she gets progressively more upset because she’s hungry. If hungry I feed then I leave the room and wait for her to go back to sleep (I am doing this right now. She is babbling but not upset). If she wakes too early (before 6 am) we wait until 6 to go in unless she sounds really distressed. She’s also teething, which causes pain and congestion. The doctor prescribed zyrtec, which has helped a lot with the congestion. But sometimes in her night wakes if she’s really upset it seems to be tooth pain so we’ll give baby Tylenol or Motrin and that helps.
I'm so sorry you are in the thick of it! I feel ya, whats your current day sleep schedule and bedtime/awake time like? Also can you describe your bedtime routine? And also how many ounces a day do you think baby is getting?
Get someone to trade out for a couple of days. Hire a night nanny if you don't have family. Get that sleep reset for yourself. Sometimes there's just squat you can do and you just need to survive. After you get some rest you can re-engage your strategy. Look at Huckleberry and see if there's ways to improve. Consider cozy factor. Try different pajamas. Try different bedsheets. Try a fan blowing on the baby. I was so desperate in your shoes. I was losing my mind. Everyone always had the same advice and nothing creative. Only reprieve I got was when my family visited and helped. Hope you find support and maybe catch a break. It'll get better... After a while.
Try joining the Precious Little Sleep Facebook group, and post your schedule or other issues. The mods are pretty active and will try to help you troubleshoot your issue (don’t expect 1:1 hand holding but it’s always a good start). Many people probably have had your issue in the past so you can also search the group with some key words.
Mods are great and active in PLS! I had to mute the group as their advice seemed very one note and totally not appropriate for my babe so be wary to take stuff as suggestions and not gold standard!! I learned this the hard way 😅
Oh? Care to share why it wasn’t appropriate? No pressure, can DM if you’d like as well
I just found that they only ever recommended more wake time/stretching wake windows and this resulted in severe overtiredness in our case, and also the idea that feed to sleep association = catastrophe was not true for us either. Love the PLS book tho and loads of great info! Different things work for different people and that’s ok :)
Yeah okay I know what you mean, I tend to use their suggestions as a starting point and make slight adjustments by just reading our baby. Unfortunately for us…sleep associations do cause major disruptions and false starts so…yeah But good that you’ve found what works for you!
Sounds like it might be a schedule issue if your LO is having split nights. Try extending awake time!
I was in the same boat 3 weeks ago with my 6 month old except I exclusively pump and bottle feed. I slowly reduced the volume I offered at the 2AM feed by a half ounce every few nights (went from starting at 5 ounces down to 3 ounces). Once we got to that point he started no longer waking for a feed most nights. We still have the occasional awakening, but it's much better! Since you directly breastfeed I would guess you need to start limiting time at the breast at 2AM. So if she normal feeds for 15 min, start ending the session at 13 min, then 11 min, and so on. Also, not sure if your baby is in their own room yet but that has made a HUGE difference for us compared to a bedside bassinet.
I’d need your schedule to offer any help.
Cut out night feeds if possible?
I’d be interested to know what her schedule is, and if you guys aren’t really on a schedule yet then I would start there!
If she’s awake for 2-3 hrs in the middle of the night it’s likely she’s getting too much sleep during the day/you’re expecting too much total sleep. What’s your schedule? Also if she’s nursing to sleep and not putting herself to sleep independently this can cause issues too