Six months old and waking more frequently at night

Our twins are almost six months old and for the past week or so have been sleeping terribly at night. Adira went from waking up once or twice a night to waking up 4-5 times per night. She nurses and goes back to sleep but I wonder if giving her formula would help her sleep longer. Lilah has a good reason not to be sleeping well - she had surgery a couple of weeks ago and has needed some extra comforting since we came home from the hospital. However, she used to sleep pretty well and is now waking up frequently (sometimes every hour in the first part of the night). We've had to put her in the swing downstairs to keep her asleep for longer periods of time, but my husband is now sleeping on the couch next to her.

Could this be an extended growth spurt? They have been consistently going to bed earlier and earlier - these days they are usually asleep by 7:30pm, sometimes by 7. Last night I woke Lilah and gave her a bottle at 10 before I went to bed and she still woke up 1.5 hrs later.

Two nights ago we had a night nurse come over and feed them and they only woke up twice each for her. Does this indicate that they just want to nurse for comfort? I much prefer nursing at night to giving bottles, but we are exhausted and need our sleep.

Thanks for any suggestions!

Edit: We have not started solids yet (though intend to soon) and they have not had rice cereal or anything similar yet.

 

Mine get some formula during the day and before bed. They are also eating solids. It doesn't help them sleep longer (although I do nurse them overnight).

Mine have also been crummy sleepers the past couples of week (they were 6 months last week) but DD seems to have turned the corner finally and had two good nights the past two nights. And that was after eating less than she normally does during the day and I have stopped bothering with the pre-bed bottles because we've been pressed for time this week. So I don't think it was a food issue in their case. In contrast, DS is way worse at night than he was and doesn't seem to showing signs of getting better just yet.

My main thought would be not to feed them at every wake up if they're getting up every 1-2 hours. IN that case, they won't get enough to sleep a longer stretch and they can become habituated to nursing to sleep at every wake up (my first was like this and I was always too lazy to break the habit but I've tried to avoid it with the twins unless I think they really are hungry). I do try to soothe mine back to sleep without nursing if they wake up within a couple of hours (which they have been doing a lot lately).

You can certainly try it. I'm too lazy to do bottles at night but we are talking about having DH do a bottle feeding so I can get some longer stretches of sleep. That worked with our first (he didn't sleep any better, but it just meant I didn't have to get out of bed). Of course, it's made more difficult with two...

Anyway, hugs for crummy sleep. I'm so tired... I need a night nurse...

 

I don't think one study has ever truly shown that giving a baby formula rather than breastmilk will help them sleep longer. Besides, even the anecdotal evidence suggests that solids or formula will only buy you 30 minutes or an hour between feedings. If your daughter is getting up four or five times a night, it's probably developmental, not hunger. Nursing back to sleep is comforting, but it's probably not the reason she's waking up. My girls both had periods of time when they woke more or woke less. It stinks. I say hang in there with the breastfeeding if you can and see if things get back to normal in a week or two.

 

Could they be cutting teeth? That always really messed with sleep for my kids, and they each got their first tooth right around that age.

 

We keep thinking that it could be teething, but haven't seen much other evidence for that (other than drooling, but they've been drooling for a month now). I've felt their gums recently but haven't felt any bumps and they don't indicate otherwise that their gums are sore. Who knows, though.

 

Night waking occurs normally in all children, and the real problem is not developing the ability to return to sleep unassisted after awakening. (Marc Weissbluth) It sounds like they got behind on sleep (maybe with one being in the hospital) and now they are having trouble falling back to sleep when they wake in the middle of the night. I especially think this is the case since their pattern of waking (every hour) is likely their normal sleep cycle. They wake up each time the enter the phase of light sleep.

Another thing to think about is, this is the age when they will start to be aware of cause and effect... 'hhmm, i call, she comes, snuggles with me, gives me milk....'
Sometimes responding slower to their calls will give them the chance to re-settle and go back to sleep on their own.
If you think they can't return to sleep without your assistance work toward putting them down to bed (the first time and for naps) sleepy but not asleep. In the middle of the night give them the least amount of attention needed to return to sleep.

My guess is this is not food related at all but a combination of being over tired, unable to settle themselves and new awareness (i call, she comes!).

Are they napping?

Good luck, keep working on it, it will get better!

 

Yep, they've always napped several times per day. Sometimes the naps are short (less than an hour), sometimes longer. I do think that we need to try to get them back to sleep without always nursing. Adira is a good-sized baby and cannot possibly be hungry every two hours at night! Maybe having my husband get her back to sleep will help her break the habit.

 

I don't use cry it out, but I if that's something people want to try then please check on your child first before leaving them to cry. I've seen many people people here say to not respond right away and sometimes to leave them for 15 minutes before checking on them when you hear them wake up. I think it's important to check on your baby first, then decide if you're going to leave them to cry or not. And this is why:

My son barfed the other night while lying face down in his crib. I always respond as quickly as I can (unless I have to stop to pee--LOL) since they are only 6 months old and he was busy rubbing the barf into his eyes which had become red and swollen because of it. I couldn't tell he'd barfed just by looking at the video monitor and I didn't know he was going to do this as he does not have reflux and never barfs randomly and I he was not sick when I put him to bed. I would've felt awful if I'd been "slow to respond" or left him for 15-20 minutes hoping he'd go back to sleep. He also wasn't crying any harder than he usually does when he wakes so the sounds of his cries alone weren't indicative that he'd thrown up and was in pain. But his face and eyes were swollen and red where he'd rubbed the barf into his skin and he also wears a helmet and had somehow managed to barf into the helmet which was probably really uncomfortable as well.

I just really think parents should check on babies first to make sure they really are ok (not sick, not stuck in the crib slats, etc) if they are planning to use cry it out methods. You just never know when your baby night come down with a fever at night or a vomiting illness (which is when all my kids seem to get fevers or develop initial illness symptoms) or get stuck in the crib slats (which happened to my daughter once before we installed the breathable bumped), etc.

It makes me anxious when I hear the advice to leave a baby alone without checking on them first (and a video monitor isn't going to tell you if they have a fever or other illness). Ok, end of my PSA--you all can ignore it if you want but I just really felt I had to write this since I've been seeing the advice from several people on many different threads to just leave young babies alone crying without checking on them first.

 

Sorry to hear you are having issues! My twins were doing pretty good - one to two night feeding up until about 4 months, then it seemed we had the 4 and 5 month sleep regression and they were waking up early in the night (previously hadn't) and some nights multiples times in the middle of the night. We chalk some of it up to getting both of them out of their rock n play into their crib and also getting DS out of his swaddle. And DS has started teething so it could be that.

DH and I have a rule that no one gets fed from bedtime (around 7) until after 1230 or so. Bless his heart DH takes the early shift while I sleep and will sooth any wakers back to sleep. DS finally quit waking early on but DD was doing it almost nightly. DH tried several things and only rocking her back to sleep worked. We got tired of that so now he is letting her cry it out (we had to separate the twins at night because her crying was waking DS) and she will cry for less than 10 minutes then go back to sleep. I am hoping some of her wakings are her getting used to the crib. Shes been in it just under two weeks and it seems she kicks her legs up in her sleep and ends up waking herself up.

Yes it is exhausting!!!

 

I just re-read my post and realized it sounded really harsh towards cry it out and I'm really not opposed to people trying cry it out methods. We tried them with our first son and it was not the method for us or him (both my boys become hysterical when left to cry and never stop). And I would be lying if I said my twins never cried alone at night because, well, as you all know, there's two of them and often only one of me available to help them but I do check up on each one before handling the other. And, in fact, my daughter has recently become the baby who cries for a minute or two after being put down before falling off to sleep so I do leave her to do her thing.

So sorry if that sounded like a criticism of cry it out. I really just wanted to make the point to check on the baby before leaving them to cry. I think it sounds reasonable when a book says to not respond to them for a certain amount of time and see if they settle themselves but I just really feel that, on the rare chance something is wrong, any mom or dad would feel awful if they left a baby even 15 minutes who had a high fever or who had been sick in the night. Crying is the only way babies communicate and my kids' cries really don't sound different when sick versus tired and just woke up.

 

I agree with PP that delaying your response when they wake will certainly give them the opportunity to return to sleep without assistance. We did this with our bubs at 4 months and they started sleeping through. I don't see this as CIO because generally they were only fussing when they woke and not crying. I'm glad we gave them this opportunity to learn how to go back to sleep on their own.. It set a healthy sleep habit.. My babies' cries are different in that I am able to tell whether they are wanting my attention to whether they really are upset and I think that most mothers over time can differentiate what their baby's cries are for. (This is an observation, not a criticism to PP).

At 6 months we had some regular night waking which I put down to development, learning to sit, stand and then crawl... Often these didn't show until weeks or days after the night wakes. Our night wakes were different though, they didn't cry, they had crib parties where they giggled and played for sometimes 3 hours!. After the first couple of nights of this, I closed my bedroom door so that I stooped being kept awake by their parties but I could still hear them if they cried, which they never did. This still occurs now and then and over time I've noticed that when they are not napping very well, they have more frequent night wakes and this becomes a pattern. Sleep begets sleep so it is a catch 22 of frequent night wakes making napping difficult too.

My suggestion to you would be to move their bedtime even earlier, as early as 6pm (maybe even 5-5.30 if you can) for up to a week, even a little longer,to help them catch up on some sleep. Well rested babies, without a doubt sleep better than over tired ones.. As someone else said, it is quite possible that disruptions to their routine with surgery etc, has made them both a little over tired and it's now accumulated sleep debt from which they now need to recover. For us, this has always been moving bedtime to earlier and with consistency, it has always worked (but it will take a week or even longer before you see results).

GL! And yes get hubby to attend at night so that they are not seeking a feed and please don't switch to formula yet, that's not your issue at all.

 

Could one of both of them be hitting a developmental milestone like crawling or something like that? My oldest always slept worse when she discovered something new she could do because she wanted to practice. And the two little ones have been going through a rough sleeping patch the last couple of weeks (that hopefully just ended *fingers crossed*) - in part because of teething and in part because of learning to roll over recently. Just one more thing to think about.

 

Actually, Adira is just about ready to start crawling, so maybe that explains some of it. She slept until midnight last night but woke with a 102 fever so didn't sleep very soundly the rest of the night. I think we will just have to keep Lilah in the swing for a while so we can all get some more sleep. Thanks to everyone for the suggestions - I will definitely wait longer before going in their room when they wake up so they can work on falling back asleep. I also ordered the No-Cry Sleep Solution book. While I am not opposed to CIO in principle (and Jan, I didn't think you sounded harsh, I think you have good advice), I'm not sure I could actually do it in reality.

Here's hoping we all start getting more sleep. As I've read here many times, it will get better

 

Jen: I wanted to come back and say that after 2 weeks of hellish nights, my babies started sleeping well again. And DD STTN the past 3 nights (for REAL not just 5 hours, which, honestly, I never expected one of my kids to do prior to about age 2!) . DS is back to waking twice but going back to sleep very easily (the past two weeks he's been crying and staying awake for hours).

Also, YAY for a better night! It sounds like maybe your babies were having a developmental leap as well, plus the disruption caused by the surgery. My DD has been army crawling for a couple of months but she has been working on real crawling and finally mastered that Sunday (and STTN for the first time ever that night) and DS just learned to roll but has suddenly been using it to move all over and has gotten really good at it this past week.

I think the best advice is consistency and books are only a guideline. Early bedtimes never worked for mine. Bedtime before 7-8 has meant we're all started our day at 4 a.m. For all three kids. Partially co-sleeping and nursing at night and to sleep hasn't prevent DD from finally STTN. DS1 was a horrible sleeper--up multiple times a night until he was 19 months old. Turns out he had a medical issue and once it was resolved at 19 months, he started STTN on his own. I co-slept with him, had a rough time night weaning him (yes, he was a boobaholic but we got through it), but, now he's about to turn 3, STTN every night since about 23 months old, likes his bedtime routine, and still takes a 2-hour nap each day without protest either. The only thing we did with DS was a consistent nap and bedtime routine and eventually night weaned him. Nothing magical was required other than patience and time (and my patience was pretty thin!). But his health reasons are why I'm so passionate about not leaving a baby to cry--fussing, true fussing, is one thing I agree with that leaving them for a bit can be helpful, but crying always gets attention.

It all passes eventually and sometimes it's hard work, but, ultimately, I think the main thing I've learned about baby sleep is that no matter what method one chooses, consistency and time are the most important aspects.

 

Hooray! We also had a good night last night. Lilah was in the swing all night but only woke up once, and Adira woke up twice. They nursed and went right back to sleep. I never thought that getting up three times a night would feel so luxurious. Here's hoping your good streak continues.