Any idea how to make Beans sleep?

[SarzWix]

I had this with my eldest, and found that giving him baby porridge for supper worked wonders. He was a hungry lad too and the beefed up milk wasn't enough to keep him going through the night. The HV wasn't impressed that I wasn't sticking to the recommended schedule for introducing solids, but she agreed it was the right thing to do after he started sleeping for 8 hours through the night.

[janeyo]

We found dream feeding worked til they were about 9 months old when they used to wake up. It's amazing that you can feed them while they are asleep, no winding or anything.

I have been lucky with both mine doing 12 hours plus a night from 8 weeks (try getting a nappy that can cope with that when they are tiny lol), but do have friends who had problems with their little ones sleeping. The end result was to swap the night-time waking milk for water, or do half and half, and they eventually stop waking up as their little brains tell them it's not worth the effort to wake up for water!

Worth a go?

[Glutton4...]

My Nan always swore by putting a little brandy or whisky in our milk - never did me any harm (hic!) honest!

My Dad would drive me round the block in the car to get me to go to sleep, but my Mum just had to turn the vacuum cleaner on near my sister to get her to sleep! Weird huh?

[di]

Just read someone's comment avbout a monotonous song...sorry have had a drink or two & all names are but a blur!
When I naanyied in Turkey they had a way of getting babe to sleep...You had to sit with legs outstretched & straight.Plop babe between said legs & monoytously sing(or drone!),"Ahh...Ahh...Ahhh...fizik..."...over & over again,until the poor mite would give into utter boredom & miraculously drift off!!!Had to rock your legs simultaneously to the "singing".Strangely it actually did seem to work,however I must add that I wouldn't reccomend itr to one with an already fairly dodgy back!

[petal]

almost forgotten how tired u get with a baby - I suppose we just went with the flow - any change of routine, like going to grandparents always unsettles them, is he teething? is he breast fed or on the bottle ? I used to top mine up in the end with formula as the breast milk just didn't seem enough - especially with the boy- greedy thing he was!

[HeyWayne]

Well, as per normal I got in from work and after getting changed had a good old play (he was in an extra happy mood tonight). We then fed him - after some protestation (he was tired - but I'll come to that). He ended up with half his food - spaghetti bolognese, over his face and hands (food is fun, until you're one) and looked like a glamour model that'd gone mad with the fake tan - or he'd been visciously tango'd.

Anyway - we then had a nice bath (those on Bookface will have seen how much he loves that) and got changed for bed.

We then came downstairs and I sat down to give him his bed time feed. He took the bottle and after a couple of sucks his eyes were going. I managed to get him to have about half the bottle before he was absolutely sound asleep in my arms.

I have to say that we commit the cardinal sin of putting him to bed asleep - but having tried for weeks to get him to sleep on his own we gave up I'm araid. Even the childminder said after trying to get him to sleep in the travel cot that he's quite happy to go in his cot, but it's not for sleeping.

So, we'll see how long he lasts tonight - any bets?

Needless to say we'll be having an early night ourselves.

[Nicos]

So, we'll see how long he lasts tonight - any bets?

3.20 am!!!

[Rabidbun]

My sympathy - ours was also an insomniac until recently (now sleeps through from around 9pm till 5.30am) and went gradually from feeding every 45 mins as a baby to waking (only!) a couple of times in the night by the time he was two to the present time of two and a half.

Couple of things that we worked out that were helpful, incase they work:

1. Ours won't go down to sleep unless he is exhausted (fights all the way to stay awake) - we worked out that there was a cut off point after which if he napped, it would hugely impact on the night's sleep. For us it was anything past 3pm. Cutting short each of his naps also was of help.
2. Dream feed - very helpful.
3. We also found that part of the issue was anxiety about being in his own room - though he did get disturbed less, he woke up and panicked rather a lot at being on his own, which in turn affected how he slept. From a year, we caved, and he slept for the next six months on a mattress next to ours. This helped tonnes, as not having to get up and lie next to his cot/bed to resettle him did wonders for the amount of sleep we had.

Hope you find something that works for you, lack of sleep is truly painful to cope with.

(And how these health visitors actually survive telling sleep deprived parents that their child "should be sleeping through" or "will sleep if you do x" I do Not know! )

Oh, and thought of one more thing that was a MAJOR help for us. We looked at his diet - to see if we could work out if he was particularly unsettled after a particular food. Windy foods didn't help, but the main thing for ours was banana - if he had as little as a couple of bites of one he was unsettled for up to three nights afterwards - presumably he was in pain. If there is a food that you think your wee one isn't tolerating, it could be worth cutting it out for a few days to see if it helps the sleep. If it does, depending on the food, could then be worth talking to a GP about whether it is practical to exclude that from the diet, depending on what it is of course.

[janeyo]

My Nan always swore by putting a little brandy or whisky in our milk - never did me any harm (hic!) honest!

My Dad would drive me round the block in the car to get me to go to sleep, but my Mum just had to turn the vacuum cleaner on near my sister to get her to sleep! Weird huh?

That would be 'white noise' similar to the whoosh they hear in the womb. Sadly this methos works less well on not so new borns!

[janeyo]

It is better to put him to bed sleepy but not overtired. If that means you not seeing him when you come home from work as it's too late then that might be a solution. Babies don't sleep when they are overtired!
Signals that he is tired are: yawning - get him to bed by the THIRD yawn or you might miss his window for sleep, and not wanting any eye contact, and rubbing eyes, ears and head.

X

ps I love the baby whisperer book! her cues for baby body language are brill!

[Comfreyfan]

Really hope last night was better HW. They're all different and you can only keep trying. My 3 ranged from number 1 son, who slept through the night from the day he was born to youngest daughter who didn't sleep through until she started school - and we tried everything possible (except the whisky!).

The one thing I do agree with is that it's really hard to get an overtired baby to sleep - restricting the day time sleeps is rarely the answer. I was a child minder for 20 years and parents would beg me not to let their children sleep after lunch/after 3 pm etc. More often than not they would fall asleep on the way home, be really crabby over supper time and bath time and then they wouldn't sleep. I'd usually persuade parents to let us try an afternoon sleep to see how they got on - nearly always much better. At the very worst if they were going to be up anyway at least they'd be in a better mood - but usually they'd be much nicer, happier household and asleep quicker.

[HeyWayne]

Well, anyone that bet he would wake at 21:11, then again at 21:38, 12:02, 03:20 and finally at 06:05 well done - you win.

However, we think we may have a solution, and once again it relates to size.

Bean sleeps on his side - legs out in front of him at 90 degrees to his body. Which is fine when you put him down, but when he rolls onto his other side his legs hit the bars on the opposite side of his cot and he seemingly can't get comortable. When he sleeps in with us he does roll about and will sleep happily for hours. Our theory is - if he can sleep on his front he may do better.

Both he and LW are asleep on the other couch - but having now had their breakfast. They look cute as a button but LadyWayne would kill me for taking a photo.

Thanks for all the ideas and understanding - quite cathartic to just type it out some times.

[RedThorn]

just a quick thought... is he teething?

[HeyWayne]

just a quick thought... is he teething?

He has been - but he's got four teeth now (all the front ones). It's difficult to tell nowadays though as he's constantly drooling. It's a definite possibility.

[RedThorn]

hmm that could be part of the problem, red cheeks, drooling, looser nappies etc and waking up more than normal, he could be teething