Breastfeeding Baby Will Not Sleep.

Sometimes they do need to cry themselves to sleep even for naps. It may be that you need to get a sound machine that has the white noise or nature sounds for the room that your husband is sleeping in so the baby doesn't bother him. Sleep is so good and I hope your baby is on a better sleeping schedule soon!

I got this book at a garage sale I think for like $.25, Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems, By Richard Ferber, M.D. It helped with my daughter she was sleeping through the night at 4 weeks old. I recently let my friend borrow it and her son is almost 4 months old and he is now sleeping through the night. You might Try finding it. If you can't find it I could let you borrow it if you are local or I can maybe even ship it to you. I will need it back when your finished as I am pregnant with my second and due in April so you would have a few weeks with. Good luck and hope you sleep well soon.

M.

Get No-Cry Sleep SOlution by Elizabeth Pantley. It will rock your world :)

Meanwhile, don't make him cry it out. It creates a stress association around sleep.

L.

Hi Tiffany!
Looks like everyone may give you a different book suggestion. All babies and mamas are different, so the key is to find a style that seems to mesh with your personality.

We found the Babywise book to be very helpful for establishing a good eat/wake/sleep routine (NOT a strict schedule). Our baby has always taken very good naps (at 10 months he takes 2 1.5-2 hour naps) and slept through the night since about 8 weeks and now only wakes up at night if he is teething or sick. We have never really had to make him cry it out.

Maybe go to the library or a bookstore and compare the different book suggestions to see which one "sounds" more like your style before investing in one. Hope you find what works for you!

S.

Try reading "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child" by Marc Weissbluth. He goes into very helpful detail about the development of sleep habits in children from infancy on up. Basically, an infant sleeps when he's tired and as long as he wants to unless he's woken; it has nothing to do with hunger. After four months of age, a child develops bad sleep habits because parents encourage night waking and don't respect a child's need to nap during the day. Weissbluth gives tips for recognizing when your child is sleepy but not overtired so you can start soothing to sleep then. He also recommends putting a child to bed earlier than we think they're tired, because the more sleep they get, the more sleep they get!! Putting a child to bed earlier will result in longer sleeping, not earlier waking. I highly recommend this book - we used it with our first and he's been remarkably easy-going and cheerful and a very good sleeper. Our new baby is 5 weeks old and colicky, but symptoms have been somewhat relieved by a renewed emphasis on protecting his sleep needs. He needs a lot of soothing and attention to fall asleep and stay asleep, but he does scream and cry less the more sleep he gets, so it's worth it. :)

My son is 9 months old too. On top of nursing I have figured out that if his belly is not full he will wake up a lot. I feed my son a lot of grits/oatmeal/pureed fruit/rice.

here's a few suggestions:
*Maybe it's time to start weaning, he may not be full from nursing anymore and he also maybe depending on you to be his comfort while he sleeps
*try a nap time/bed time routine. Make sure he has a full belly, take him for a stroll and/ or read him a book or play some soft music to unwind, make sure he has a clean diaper, body massages with lotion may help,lay him down with a pacifer(if he takes one)
*sleep when he sleeps when you can
Is he possibly having teething or gas pains?
*may be it's to quite in the room (leave the t.v. on or soft music)
*Warm baths along with the other suggestions right before bed maybe help
Before nap time make sure he is well stimulated with activites

He's at a very active age and let's face it, naps slow him down and he dosen't want to miss anything.

I hope I've helped some. It'll get better. Let me know how it goes.

Tiffany, I am also a mom to a non-sleeping son! Actually, make that a former non sleeper. At a year old, he STILL wasn't sleeping through the night. I knew in the beginning it was because of his reflux, but we had all that worked out, and we couldn't figure why he was waking and crying. We would have to pace the floors with him and pat him back to sleep, because he actually WOULDN'T CIO. I am not a fan of CIO either, but we tried it a few times- to no avail. Finally, one day I had a mental breakdown. My husband couldn't stay home one day to even let me get some sleep (he is military), and we are so far away from family, I didn't have anyone to help me out. I was exhausted after a year of this- screaming for hours, no sleep, no naps. I was ready to make my husband a vasectomy appointment! A fellow mom told me to do a "modified cio" method. When we put him to bed (he wouldn't go to sleep on his own, which I think was a major problem), we both hugged him, put him in bed with his blankey and Beebo (his bear), and said "mommy and daddy love you, and we are right next door in our bedroom. We'll be back to check on you in 5 mins", and then kissed him and left. He cried, but he didn't scream like he used to. In 5 mins, I went back in, repeated this (without picking him up, even though he was holding his arms up. I just patted his back, kissed his head kind of thing), and this time extended the time to 6 mins. And I always went back in as promised (earlier if he sounded like he really was nervous, but he did fine!). The first night he only cried maybe 20 mins and went to sleep. He woke up during the night, but I just patted his back, kissed him and told him I loved him and I was next door if he needed me. The next night, we did it all over again, and he cried about 10 mins, and didn't wake up once! I had to check on him at 5 am when I woke up, surprised he hadn't woken up. I was scared to death! But, after 3 nights of that routine, he started going to sleep on his own, and not waking during the night. He has only woken up a couple of times since then (2 months ago) and cried, and it's always because of his teeth. It is BLISS. I just couldn't stand the CIO method where you aren't supposed to touch them or check on them- which so many moms said worked for their children. Now, he naps between 2-3 hours daily (just one nap), and is sleeping 11-12 hours at night. It is pure heaven.

This is the only thing that worked for us, and we tried EVERYTHING the pediatrician recommended. I think with the digestive issues he had earlier in life that he just got used to waking up, and we didn't ever let him CIO because it made his reflux worse. So, I hope things get better for you, because I know it is wearing on your nerves and sanity!

OH- as an aside, we use a fan for white noise (a loud one), a nightlight that provides very dim light (but other than that his room is very dark), and he has the rainforest music maker in his crib that plays music for 20 mins. It's always enough to put him to sleep, and occasionally if he wakes up at night, I hear him turning it back on and he goes right back down.

He is a TOTALLY different baby now that he is sleeping well.