I’ve sleep trained my almost 8 month old. She falls asleep for both naps and bedtime independently but is still waking up every 2-3 hours. Sometimes a 4 hours stretch. She only randomly gave me two nights over 4 hours. She’s EBF so I’m wondering if she’s just waking up hungry every time? It seems like she’s trying to settle, but wakes up again and eventually just turns into screaming if I don’t feed her.

My first never really had this issue but she took the bottle way more and I knew for sure she couldn’t be hungry anyway because I knew for sure how much she was taking. My second hasn’t taken to a bottle yet so she’s been purely on the boob.

Do they ever just start sleeping on their own ? Or do I have to go cold turkey with no feedings overnight ? I’m just so afraid she’s genuinely hungry. I also have a toddler and am afraid to let baby cry too long overnight and wake the toddler up.

Any experiences or tips with EBF babies welcomed ! I just long for a night some consistent longer stretches I’m so tired 😩

I’m so upset. I just completely embarrassed myself by tearing up at daycare while they were telling me my son isn’t doing well. The issue:

Daycare is apparently on a very strict nap schedule, and my son isn’t following it. After being there for 2 months he still hasn’t gotten the hang of it, and is apparently waking the other babies up.

They would like him on the following schedule:

Nap 1: 9:15 - 10am Nap 2: 12/12:30pm - 2:30pm

He’s allowed a short nap around 4:30 if he’s showing he’s really tired.

From what I can see in the app they use, he’s struggling with the second nap and doing more like 12:45-2pm. And then he falls asleep at like 4:50 and they wake him up at 5:15 when I go to pick him up.

I think the issue is that his body wants to do a shorter nap midday (like 60-90 min instead of 120+) and then a nap around 4.

They’ve said he “is almost 8 months old and should have the hang of it by now” and are asking what I’m doing at home. I told them at home we put him in his crib and leave the room. He typically cries for a few min and then goes to sleep.

Anyway, I’m just looking for some advice. I’m not sure what to do. How do I lengthen his midday nap? Or at least make it so he doesn’t cry when he wakes up early and just sits quietly? They basically made it sound like maybe group care just isn’t for him right now.

Sharing this here because I tried everything except for now this one very obvious thing... she was just COLD!

Our LO is 6.5 months old. Never been the best sleeper. Just went from 3 naps to 2. Not sleeping through the night. Waking once anytime between 10:30pm and 2:30am to feed. And then would consistently wake up ready to start the day between 4am and 5am. Never hungry at this time. Did not want her bottle. Binky didn't work to soothe her. Bouncing, rocking, contact/rescue napping would be a hit or miss. Sometimes could get her back to sleep after 30-60 minutes of rocking...sometimes not.

I tried everything. She sleeps in her own room in crib, blackout curtains, blackout shade on doorway too. No lights on any electronics. White noise. Etc. We tried an earlier bedtime as early as 6pm. We tried stretching her to 8pm.

None of this worked.

Previously she was sleeping in footie pajamas and a woolino. The temperature in her room at night was always 69°F.

A few nights ago when she woke up to feed, we had one of her fleece sweaters next to the crib and out of desperation I put it on her over her pajamas under her sleep sack.... she slept until 6:30am. Next morning we put her to sleep with the extra layer she slept until 6:15am. Same with the next day.

Check if your babies are cold!

I am at my ******* wits end.

Baby is 6.5 months

I have been sleep training since FEBRUARY #%*ing 26TH and my baby still cries EVERY SINGLE NIGHT. I need some serious help. Been doing CIO and last night he cried for an hour before passing out and right now he’s crying hysterically again.

Note that if I try to go in and soothe he just cries more so I don’t think another method is suitable. Happy to be proved wrong.

Total nap time - 2.75 hours
Total awake time - been experimenting from 10-11 hours
I know he’s a low sleep needs baby but holy shit I cannot figure him out and I’m becoming angry and resentful.

Typical schedule:

1. Wake ups can vary but lately he’s getting up around 6

2. Window 1 - 2.25 hours

3. Nap 1 - 1.25 hours

4. Window 2 - 2.5 hours

5. Nap 2 - 1.25 hours

6. Window 3 - 2.5 hours

7. Cat nap - 15-20 mins

8. Window 4 - 3 hours

Total sleep - 2hr45 mins on avg
Total awake time - 10.25 on avg

I’ve been trying to tweak by extending or shortening wake wjndows but still he cries EVERY SINGLE NIGHT. My first was so easy to sleep training so I am getting pissed off that this is not working the second time around.

help please.

Edit: based on Huckleberry the avg time asleep over the past 90 days is 12.5 hours.

So should I be budgeting 11.5 hours of awake time?

I truly do not get it. I can’t get my baby to sleep through the night. We have done literally everything. So many things I’m not going to list all of them. Every single thing someone has recommended we’ve done. Everything. Everything. Everything. I would bet hundreds of dollars there isn’t anything we haven’t tried. She won’t sleep through the night. She will literally cry over sleeping. We’re on night 7 of CIO which we’ve done as a last resort. I can’t anymore. I haven’t gotten more than 4 maybe 5 hours of sleep in a row her entire life and then I’ll be up for 30min-2hrs getting her to sleep again and we’ll do this on rotation. She will scream bloody fucking murder before she puts the energy into falling asleep (WHICH SHE CAN DO ON HER OWN).

I truly don’t know what to do anymore. I’m NEVER having another kid. The thought of risking doing this again brings back all my bad thoughts.

I don’t even know what I want from this post. What on gods green fucking earth am I doing wrong? Why WONT SHE SLEEP???!!!!! (She’s currently going an entire hour of crying, varying from bloody murder to little whining, with gaps of silence. I’ll literally HAVE to go calm her down at some point here bc I can’t let her keep writhing around the crib like she’s trying to escape a murder attempt)

More regularly we do 2.5/3/3.5 but we’ve done 3/3/3.5, 3/3.25/3.5, 2.5/3/4, 3/3/4. YOU NAME IT WE’VE DONE THE COMBO.

Edit: thank you to everyone. It took about 2 days for me to get through all the comments and reply. Mostly everyone said to increase awake time during the day so I did that for the last 2 days. Day one she was awake for 10.5hrs with 2.5hrs of total naps and she slept 8:45-1:20 (cried/fussed for 20/25min before falling back asleep on her own), woke up again at 4:05 to which I started getting up to go feed her but she fell back asleep in 3 or 4 minutes, then woke up for the day at 6:35. Day 2: she had 11 hours of awake time and 3 hours of total naps. She slept from 8:50-12:20. Woke up crying but we left her. After 20min my husband went in to put the pacifier in and give back pats and she absolutely lost her mind so he walked out. She went back and forth from crying to calm before escalating and escalating to where she screams had almost no sound. And had happened in the past the second she’d lifted from the crib she stops crying. He’ll transfer her back momentarily. I guess I’ll finish this update in the morning but I’m trying to stay hopeful since it’s only been 2 days of adjusted times but 😅

Edit 2: after a week I noticed 2.5hrs of nap time and a 3/3.25/3.5 adjusted wake window was perfect. She slept for 9hrs 2 nights in a row. It basically slowly got better, hit a peak, and is now getting worse again. Just now she woke up twice in 2 hours, I had to go in and help at the 2 hours in mark. I actually think I’m just going to give up trying anything else anymore

I don’t want advice from moms who have not gone through this. I want the moms whose babies went feral when they did not get the boob to go to sleep/between sleep cycles. I want the moms whose babies have tempers when they are not nursed to sleep. The moms whose babies get angry at bottles.

Please.. do they naturally grow out of this? He has slept through the night twice in 8 months. I put him down completely awake but when I decide to do a nighttime bottle over boob.. he’s angry all night long.

Thank you.

Does anybody else get their baby to sleep and then feel anxious the remainder of the night because you’re just waiting on baby to wake up or start crying? My body immediately tenses up at every little sound he makes thinking he’s fixing to start crying. It’s like I constantly anticipate the night going terrible even while he’s asleep. I feel like it’s starting to impact my sleep and mental health.

Essentially I am wondering whether it is possible to sleep train while keeping night feeds. It seems like every sleep consultant and everyone I speaks to advises to wean night feeds so the baby isn’t confused what to expect during night wakings, which I fully understand however I refuse to believe that it isn’t possible to keep feeding at night while getting decent sleep. I don’t believe that everyone who sleep trains weaned off all feeds… can you please share your experiences?

I want to sleep train my 8 month old but definitely keep 1-2 feeds but everyone makes me believe that this isn’t possible.

Ok hear me out - my life and mental health completely changed for the better once we decided to sleep train our then 8.5 month old (she's now 12mo) and I just wanted to share my experience in case it helps a mama/dad about to lose their minds like my husband and I were.

[Jump to the last 3 paragraphs below if you're not interested in the backstory and just want to know what we did lol]

Our LO was the best sleeper, hitting 12-13hrs//night with little to no assistance, until she turned 8.5 months and all of that went out the window. We've always had a really good routine, followed wake windows etc but simply nothing would get her to sleep on her own or not require us to stay with her for HOURS on end by the crib in her room. She'd cry, play, jump, chew on the railing, throw pacis out of the crib - EVERYTHING but sleep. And after 10 weeks of that we couldn't handle it anymore.

Both my husband and I have really demanding jobs and having to sit in meetings and think critically for 8 hours after 1-2 hours max of sleep each night was about to break us. We tried everything. This sub became my bible, ChatGPT became my sleep consultant and we tried everything that didn't require "letting her cry all night". Spoiler alert: nothing worked.

So we finally decided to hop on the sleep training bus and hired a sleep consultant that took the time to carefully walk us through the science behind babies' sleep, how their brains work and gave us very specific instructions on how to give our daughter the resources she needed to be able to self soothe and not depend on us every single time she wakes up. Her method was a gentle Ferber where you go in every 5 continuous minutes of crying (resetting the timer every 10s without crying) on the first night and slowly increasing that window each night (with 15min being the max). She told us it would take 5 nights for our baby to learn and while I didn't believe her at first, we had already tried everything under the sun that didn't require full blown CIO.

First 2 nights were an absolute nightmare. I'd cry by her door with her, she wouldn't lie down and would fall asleep from exhaustion while SITTING - even with the regular check ins (it would break my heart to watch the camera). But then on night 3 things started to get better and by night 5 SHE WAS GOING TO SLEEP ON HER OWN with a smile on her face and literally ZERO tears.

It's now been 4+ weeks since we started and we have not had to check in on her for at least 3 weeks. We've completed the training for night time AND nap time (which is a whole different ballgame when it comes to babies resisting) and I'm still shocked that this is the same baby.

So if you've been against sleep training with some level of crying like I was, but feel lost and tired, maybe consider hiring someone that believes in gentler methods and that can walk you through science backed facts that will help the fear/anxiety of causing distress in your little one. Or maybe just trust some of the posts on this sub in case you don't want to spend the $$!

There's light at the end of the tunnel. I promise!

EDIT to include sleep consultant’s website:

www.catchingbabyzzz.com

we did CIO at 6 months old but she was up at 5 am. At that time i accepted it because I was just thankful she slept through the night, no wake ups. now shes 10 months old and will not sleep past 530 am. it’s clock work, no matter what time she goes to bed, it’s the same time. Im at my wits end because im just so tired.

we do 3/3.5/4 and we dont cap naps. I’ve played around with her schedule 3/3/3, 3/3/3.5, and now this. But before you ask, her day time sleep never exceeds 2.5/3 hours. also, i never start the day at 530am. i leave her in the crib until MINIMUM 6 am depending on how she’s acting. sometimes 615 am/630 if she’s not freaking out.

its absolutely pitch black in there, I even turned the hatch clock off bc i thought that bright light was keeping her awake in the early morning hours. It’s 70/71 degrees, she’s dressed appropriately.

a sleep consultant offered some of her services for free bc she felt bad for me and still, nothing lol.

I honestly can’t tell anymore if my LO is waking from hunger, habit, or being low sleep needs. He’s 7.5 months and already on 3/4/4 sometimes 3.5/4/4, naps are 2 hours total sometimes 2 hrs 15 mins. He’s waking up 1-3x a night. Before I add even more awake time, maybe I just need to accept that he’s in his waking up phase, and it will eventually go away with age? I read about babies who “slept through the night at 9,10,11 months”… so, what did you do? What was it that got them there?

I find early morning waking to be THE most difficult problem in baby sleep because 1) it's tricky; 2) it's ubiquitous; and 3) there's a lot of misinformation out there.

I'm by no means a pro at this. This is just a post summarizing some of my observations and an approach that may or may not work for you. As usual I take most of my info from Baby Sleep Science and Ferber's book. A notable omission from Ferber's book (which I really love, don't get me wrong) is the fact that chronic sleep deprivation can cause early morning waking through cortisol elevation. Baby Sleep Science alludes to this fact in the bedtime post (https://www.babysleepscience.com/single-post/2014/04/08/early-vs-late-bedtime-which-is-right-how-to-use-early-and-late-bedtimes-to-solve-common-s) but it is missing from their early morning waking post (https://www.babysleepscience.com/single-post/2014/05/22/how-do-i-fix-my-baby-s-early-waking). So I tried pulling the info together and creating the following approach.

NOTE: I assume that baby is fully sleep trained, going to bed independently, and self-settles for all MOTN wakings. If not, work on those first.

​

1) Is baby younger than 6-7 months?

If yes: The morning stretch of sleep doesn't really mature and consolidate until 6-7 months, so early morning wakings may not be really avoidable. The best way to approach it is to assist to sleep (snooze feeding is an excellent approach) and move on.

If no: Go to question #2.

​

2) How long is baby's night sleep with the early morning waking?

If ~11 hours (fully night weaned) or 12 (not fully night weaned), this is probably enough night sleep for the baby. If the wake up time is unacceptably early (say 4:30a), you need to shift the entire schedule back. Here's a guide on how to do that: https://www.babysleepscience.com/single-post/a-step-by-step-guide-to-avoid-early-waking-after-the-fall-back-daylight-saving-time-transition

If not, and your desired wake time is reasonable given your bedtime (say 8p bedtime and wanting a 7a wake up time, which is reasonable), go to question #3.

​

3) Is baby getting ANY light exposure before your desired wake time?

This can mean one of two things (or both): 1) you are starting the day before your desired wake time; 2) the sleep environment isn't optimal and there's light sneaking in. ANY light in the early morning hours will shift your baby's circadian rhythm toward an earlier waking. So if the answer is yes, address it (by not starting the day or by fixing the sleep environment) and recognize that it will take days for the circadian rhythm to shift wake time back.

Also, some babies are really sensitive to ANY light. We're having to tape around the sides of doors because light leaking in from there is becoming a problem. The room really needs to be CAVE BLACK in the early morning (doesn't matter as much for naps).

If not, go to question #4.

​

4) Is your baby waking up from something?

The "something" can be:

-hunger, if baby is night weaned -> if baby is waking up for a snooze feed but is hard to settle after, he/she may be outgrowing the snooze feed so go ahead and night wean completely; offer an additional feeding or solids in the last wake period to help him/her transition

-diaper leak -> we struggled with this for weeks and found Pampers to work way better than Huggins FWIW; there are also inserts on Amazon that can work okay with day diapers

-habit: if you're bringing baby into bed with you or rocking baby back to sleep consistently, baby may start waking up expecting that; you can continue doing it if you're okay with it, or apply sleep training methods

If not, go to question #5.

​

5) Is there a mild chronic sleep debt?

This IMO is almost ALWAYS the case with early morning wakings after the above have been addressed, because:

1) baby is losing a good chunk of sleep by waking up early

2) most parents try to keep time of first nap somewhat consistent, which will increase the first wake window -> increase total wake time -> increase sleep debt.

This is where it's really challenging. Baby can catch up on the lost sleep in one of two ways: 1) napping more during the day or 2) early bedtime. Early bedtimes too often (like 3 days in a row) can backfire and lock in that early waking (see Question #2 for a discussion why), but is necessary to catch up on substantial sleep debt. When the sleep debt isn't as substantial, I find napping more during the day to be necessary to fill the sleep tank back up while preserving a bedtime that is conducive to maintaining the desired wake time.

To nap more during the day, the baby needs to be an independent napper and capable of connecting daytime cycles, OR the parent has to be willing and able to assist baby to nap longer. Slightly longer wake windows before the naps can help with building the sleep pressure for the naps. The last wake window can often be shortened a bit to reduce total wake time. If baby is an independent napper and wakes up early from a nap OR from a nap crying, sleep pressure is probably still there so leave for 10-20 minutes to let him/her fall back asleep.

FWIW: I use actual wake time to calculate first wake window. I find the fixing the timing of first nap rule to backfire more often than not, because 1) that first nap may just crap out, leaving us having to stretch subsequent wake windows to make it to bedtime (-> worsening sleep debt) OR having to do an early bedtime and risking false start or locking in the early waking; 2) it's a de facto long first wake window (because from a physiology perspective sleep pressure starts building when baby wakes up), so it adds to his total wake time.

Also: When baby is waking up waaaaay early and struggling with falling asleep before desired wake time, we have gone in to rock baby back to sleep. We don't do it too often to avoid building a habit (1-2 times a month), but I do find it helpful in preventing our day from being completely derailed.

We’ve been trying to tweak our daughter’s schedule to get her waking past 6am. A lot of people here have suggested adjusting bedtime, so I wanted to see what schedules have worked for others.

For context, she typically maxes out at about 10.5 hours of night sleep. We recently switched her to a two-nap schedule, which has actually been going really well overall, but she’s consistently waking around 5am. Her current wake windows are 3 / 3.5 / 3.5–3.75.

My LO is 9 months. I would love to know the schedule that makes your baby sleep through the night!

Thanks xxx

I’m really desperate right now and don’t know what to do. I was reticent to sleep train — now my baby is 10 months and I can’t live like this any longer, but I’m afraid I’ve waited too long and now it’s too late.

My baby has been an extremely, extremely poor sleeper since day 1. I have always been highly responsive to his cries and tried cosleeping for awhile, which seemed to help until it didn’t anymore. At 10 months old he still wakes no fewer than 5 times per night every night, cannot be settled with anything other than a bottle, and can’t fall asleep independently at the beginning of the night. He also fights naps during the day.

He is eating 3 solid meals a day + snacks + 4-5 bottles of formula at 6-8oz each. I’m not concerned that he is not getting enough to eat during the daytime. He seems to have formed a strong association with bottle feeding to sleep. His wake windows are roughly 3.5/4/4.5 and his wake up times and bedtimes can vary by an hour or two give or take, depending on how horribly the night went. I would love to wake up before him and have my coffee, shower and then wake the baby up at the same time each morning, but I’m fighting for my life over here. I’m so exhausted and desperately trying to grasp at any sleep I can.

Tonight was the first night we attempted anything resembling sleep training. Basically with each night waking, I just gradually increased the time I let him cry before coming in the nursery to soothe him. First 3 minutes, then 5 minutes, then 7 then 10. Just patting his back and offering a pacifier or saying soothing words does absolutely nothing at all, he will not stop crying until he gets his bottle. After the fourth wake (where I waited 10 minutes) he was standing in his crib screaming hysterically like I’ve never heard him scream before. After I came in the room he continued screaming and thrashing violently in my arms for an hour and a half. Nothing would soothe him and I was freaking out so eventually I just put him down in his crib still crying and had to walk away. He did not settle after another 20 minutes of this and the screaming only intensified so his dad got frustrated and gave him yet another gd bottle, and then he did fall back asleep.

I’m really at my wits end and I don’t know if we’re capable of this. I tried to tell his dad that we need to stay consistent with whatever method we use but he just wants the baby to stop crying as soon as possible because he wants to go back to sleep, and shoving a bottle in his mouth is the fastest way to do that. I’ve been reluctant to sleep train because I also have to emotionally regulate my baby’s dad, which is a whole other massive problem I have to deal with.

Has anyone successfully sleep trained past 10 months? Especially if your baby was NOT able to fall asleep independently AT ALL? What method did you use? Thank you so much

I posted a few days ago (“4th week of sleep training”) about my baby still occasionally crying for 20+ minutes when being put down for naps and bed.

Veterans were quick to point out she was on a 3 nap schedule when she would be on 2, and that her wake windows were too short. I was vaguely aware she should’ve dropped a nap but kiddo seemed SO sleepy at 2.5 hours I couldn’t fathom keeping her up for 3.5.

I took the advice on good faith and aimed for 3/3.5/3.5 low behold, she did stretch to 3.5 hours the first day and then made it no problem each day after.

It’s day 4 of 3/3.5/3.5 and she went down without a single whine or complaint every. Single. Time. Today. My mind is blown, my husband thinks I’m a magician and my in-laws are flabbergasted.

Thank you for your help, I truly appreciate it.

It really is the wake windows, I see why the veterans of this sub are quick to fire of short comments on what to fix. This stuff should be common knowledge for anyone who goes the sleep training route but I couldn’t find it easily accessible anywhere.

This note which pops up in this sub is helpful, I wonder if more lurkers will see it if I screenshot it and post it here?

I hope this is helpful to someone.

For parents who say their babies “sleep through the night”, do you check the baby monitor to confirm this? Am curious how many hours babies actually sleep through from beginning to end of sleep duration. Do babies really not wake up at all the entire time? So for example when a parent says their baby slept 11 hours, does your baby actually sleep that full 11 hours and if you check your baby monitor baby does not wake up at all?

Edit to add schedule: Wake windows 2/3/3.5 If he seems really tired and fussy we will put him down earlier if needed

Check ins include gently laying him down, putting kipacifier in, talking and shushing for about a minute. Then leave. Once we walk out we only set a 2 minute timer if he's crying. If he's not crying we start the timer once he starts crying. If he stops crying and settles himself for at least a minute I reset the timer. If I have to go in next timer is 4 minutes, 6 minutes, then 8 minutes. But we havent needed the 8 minute timer yet.

My son is 6.5 months old and has never been a good sleeper. He would be up every 2 to 3 hours and on bad nights up every hour. He was also wanting to feed multiple times a night. We ended up co-sleeping which eventually made his naps even worse and he was only napping for 30 minutes if it wasn't a contact nap.

Finally we decided we had to do something and decided to try sleep training. We decided on the timed checks method after trying the chair method and us being there but not picking him up seemed to upset him even more.

First night of timed checks he was asleep in 20 minutes with 3 check ins. He had a lot of wake ups in the middle of the night but only needed 1 or 2 check ins to put pacifier back in. I did feed him once around 4am.

After the first night we did the same thing for naps. And every nap he fell asleep with only 1 or 2 check ins. And naps were 2 hours, 1 hour, and 30 minutes.

Second night he fell asleep with 2 check ins and 1 of those I only went in because he stood up then fell and hit his head on the bars of the crib. He slept for 9 hours straight, woke up at 4am paci got put in and he was back to sleep, 6 am he got fed and back to sleep. So 2 total wake ups.

Today I put him down for his first nap and he fell asleep in 15 minutes with no check ins. He fussed for a second but put his pacifier back in. He was just rolling around, spitting his pacifier out and putting it back in (his favorite game), and playing with the tag on his sleep sack. Eventually, he just laid down and fell asleep. He is still on his first nap as I write this.

I never wanted to sleep train because it felt cruel and hearing him cry makes me physically hurt. But something needed to change. What we were doing wasn't working for us or for him. He wasn't getting the rest he needed and neither were we. Seeing how quickly he took to this breaks my heart in thinking that this is what he needed and I was holding him back. He needed some independence in learning how to sleep and I wasn't giving him that before. Hopefully, he continues on this positive trend!

So I’m still breastfeeding my one year old. He wakes up in the middle of the night several times and:

If he gets the boob he goes back to sleep fine

If I hold him and don’t offer the boob, no chance, he’s awake until I give in and breastfeed

If dad holds him he falls asleep but then wakes up after 1 or 2 hours again

He is on solids and eats quite well so I doubt it’s hunger

At this point I’m just thinking if it’s the boob and he’ll sleep through the night only when I fully wean him

Literally as the title says. I was in such a low place. Both me and my baby were miserable. I started having panic attacks which I never had in my life because of how stressful life was and the lack of sleep. We contact slept ALL naps. She would sleep in her crib at the start of the night and 3 hours later would wake up and wont go back to sleep unless I put her on my chest. Not to mention, it would take me about half an hour to an hour to settle her ON ME. She hated every settling method, I was helplesss. She would scream and cry most of the settling part. I started having hearing problems. I had no life. No time for myself. I couldn't do any basic human things. Couldnt cook or clean or even go to the washroom unless I put her in a bouncer infront of the wasroom door where I can see her.

I always postponed sleep training her as the idea of leaving her to cry would freak me out. She also hystrically cries most of the time, so I couldnt imagine myself hearing her cry this hard for hours.. until I had enough. My baby didnt get the attention she desrves because her mommy was so tired physically and mentally. She was tired too, not just me, she also barely slept. Have you seen a 6 month old with dark circles before?

My baby also suffers from CMPI. I blamed her colicy behaviour and sleep issues on her tummy issues. I thought she was so gassy and in pain that sleep training wont help her as she would wake up anyway from sleep because of pain (another reason why I postponed sleep training, what if she is in pain and needs me?).

To make things short, we put her on an amino acid formula for two weeks, saw some improvement in her fussiness level, I felt some level of ease to put her on a sleeping routine.I started following the "LittleOnes" sleeping routine - so following all wake windows and not having her overtired. We were still contact napping, I just wanted to put her into rythym. Then one night she cried for 40 min as I was rocking her and doing everything. I said to myself, she is crying either way, let me put her in her crib, time 20 min and see what happens... She cried for 10 min and fell asleep ON HER OWN. She then slept through the night, woke up once to feed and she put her self back to sleep until 8 am... The next day, I wanted to go cold Turkey and do day naps too. Took her just 6 freaking minutes... and the rest of the naps took her betwen 6- 10 min. It was crazy. I used to spend half an hour rocking, singing, jumping EVERY damn thing to make her sleep and she wouldnt. And if she did, she would wake up half an hour later to sleep on me. Guys. My. Life. Has. Changed. The poor baby couldnt connect sleep cycles on her own.

It has been 15 days since we started sleep training. She still cries for about 5 min somtimes. But she is a different baby now. Much happier.

If you are hestiant to sleep train and in such a bad place, dont be. Your baby will be much happier too when sleeping well. But you know your baby best at the end, and the type of cries they have.

if you want this, first put your baby on a sleeping routine following correct wake windows, number of naps and for how long they sleep, good night sleeping routine and choose a training method that fits you. Check out this sub's highlights: reaources on baby sleep. It taught me what to do and how to start. Most important thing, stay consistent. I will forver be grateful for this sub.

Split nights have probably been our hardest sleep challenge yet. My LO just turned 9 months old on the 17th and we’ve been dealing with split nights for about a week and a half. Not every night, two nights ago she slept through the night, then last night she had a split night where she was up for roughly 2 hours.

She’s on 2 naps, wake windows are 3/3.5/4.5. Naps are usually capped at 2 hours. When she’s had a bad night I’ve capped her naps to 1 hour each and it didn’t seem to help, so the last few days I’ve tested out letting her nap more during the day to try and rule out overtiredness. Same thing would happen, one night she’d sleep okay, the next we’d have a split night.

I have logged everything in the Huckleberry app and would be very open at this point to have someone look over her schedule the last two weeks & see if I’m missing something. She seems tired most of the time, so I hesitate to up her awake time even more, but I always hear that split nights are from being undertired? When she wakes during the night, she’s not ‘happy’, but while we’re bouncing her or rocking her she just kind of sucks on her pacifier and tries to play with it or touch our faces or chests, so she seems undertired to me?

She was sleep trained at roughly 5 months to go down independently and slept amazing for about a month, but then she started getting teeth back to back, sickness, separation anxiety, and we live in an apartment so when she wouldn’t settle after 10 minutes or so we’d go in and rock her. She self weaned (BF) herself around 5 months. I’ve tried to feed her when she wakes and she doesn’t seem all that hungry, but solids have been a huge challenge for us, so I’m also wondering if she’s hungrier?

My plan right now is to stick to a set schedule of 3/3.75/4.25 (maybe 4.5 is too long?) capping naps 2 hours max for a few days and see where that gets us. Please send me your thoughts or private message me if you’d like to take a look at her sleep logs!

I’m going insane. My husband‘s going insane. My PPD has gotten scary. I think it’s all due to sleep deprivation.

My six month old daughter isn’t really on a schedule per se. We usually follow awake windows during the day. Currently on a 2/2.5/2.5/2.5 and during the day she’s typically a good napper. Yesterday, for example she took a two hour nap in the morning and then two 30 minute naps. She usually wakes up around 8 AM and her bedtime is usually around 9 PM.

Since about three months old, she is waking up pretty much every two hours on the dot. She’s not just waking up, she wakes up screaming at the top of her lungs. I usually have to make a bottle and then she’s happy and goes back to sleep for two more hours… ALL NIGHT LONG. When we put her to bed, we’re trying the FERBER method. She usually only cries for 5 to 10 minutes before putting herself to sleep.

For a little bit of background, she has silent reflux and GERD that is being managed (or so I think) by a PPI

My son was also a terrible sleeper, so it’s clearly something I’m doing wrong.

How do I break this horrible habit that I started? 😭 I think I’m actually losing my mind.

Our LO is 8 months old and like the title says, goes to sleep independently every night but will wake up 7-8 times a night. My husband will go in and settle her and I will feed her at about 3am and 5:30am. She’s just had her first cold where during these night wakings we resorted to co sleeping after about 11pm and would swap over at about 3am when she needs a feed. When she sleeps next to us, she does not wake up as much.
I don’t understand what’s happening here. She falls asleep independently at the beginning of the night, only to wake up crying and need resettling.
This is a baby that had weaned herself of night feeds by 3 months old and was sleeping through the night.
Wake windows are 2.5/3.5/4. Wake up at 7am and bed time at 7pm everyday.
Please help. I’m going insane.

I was talking to my mom about baby’s sleep, and after a while she said, why do you worry so much? I didn’t worry about wake windows or how much you guys slept when you were babies. When you were tired you slept, when you weren’t you didn’t.

Now, it’s very possible that my mom just doesn’t remember what it was like to have a 0 year old, but it made me wonder…

Are there parents out there who just don’t worry about it even if their kid sleeps less than 12 hours total in 24 hours?

Not looking for criticism, just to hear everyone’s experiences.

EDIT: Thanks for all the comments! It’s so nice to see there is a good mix of those who track and don’t track baby’s sleep. Also feels great to read success stories and see support for each other in the challenges 💚

I am a FTM and I so desperately want to do right by my baby, but I feel like I'm spinning my wheels about sleep training, and any time I decide to do it, I get a scare post on my Instagram feed about how I'm going to damage my baby's attachment etc.

Baby is 8 months old and I kind of did sleep training months ago when we were room sharing (PUPD) and it was easy to put him down awake because I was right there next to him. Things were manageable, never great and I was still waking up several times a night for him. But at each of those night wakes I could put him back in the crib fully awake after giving him whatever comfort he needed, so it wasn't such a big deal.

Since sleeping in my own room starting at 7 months, I've slipped into nursing him at the end of the bedtime routine, then rocking/singing him to sleep. He notices when I leave the room, and I'm needing to get him more and more sleepy to transfer him, or he loses his mind. He often wakes, frantic, several minutes after I put him down when he realizes I'm not there.

Also he's waking 1-3+ times a night, sometimes to nurse, sometimes not, and again he loses it when I put him back down and usually cries hard for a few minutes before falling back asleep, or just escalates and I have to go back in several times to calm him (so basically it's like middle of the night sleep training without start of the night training).

I read a comment recently, something like "it's not fair to put your baby to sleep at the start of the night one way, and then not do the same thing when they wake in the middle of the night". I don't have the energy to rock and sing my baby back to sleep at all hours of the night, and I'm wondering if what I'm doing now is worse than just properly sleep training him. Also I am tired, and worn out, and I'm sure he feels my frustration when I tend to him at night.

I am working with a sleep consultant and she's made me program which is basically repackaged Ferber, but I'm having so much guilt about actually doing it, and about once a week ge sleeps through the night on his own, and then I lose my nerve.

Please help me stop flip flopping!

Details if relevant:

All sleep is in crib

WWs 2.75/3.5/3.75

Two naps capped at 2.5h total