My Baby Wakes up a Million Times in the Night!!

My daughter did this when she had an ear infection. Sometimes this was the only symptom. She still does the same thing at 2 1/2. Has she been sick lately?

There is nothing wrong with letting her climb into bed with you. That's the only way some of us maintain our sanity. I can tell you from experience that co-sleeping really is temporary. Our kids begin every night in their own bed (unless they're sick). They both used to come to our bed most nights (when they were 2 and under) but really don't come into our bed anymore. Seriously though, we found everyone in our house slept better if we just let them in our bed.

The best place for baby to sleep is wherever baby will sleep. That's the only way the rest of the family gets sleep!

Read How to solve your child's sleep problems by Richard Ferber. Establish a nightime routine (bath, bottle, book, bed is ours), and follow the pattern of increasing intervals of letting her cry, checking on her, letting her cry, etc. Do this for 2 weeks straight. BE CONSISTENT every night, and during every wake up at night.
We sleep trained both kids following this method, and had success. We've had to re-sleep train a few times following an illness or teething or following a growth spurt, but the same concepts still apply and work.

Number 1) When you put her to bed for the night (the first time), do not nurse her to sleep.

Number 2) See number 1.

It's time to teach her to self-sooth. I like the baby whisperer. Check a book out of the library.

My children have never been good sleepers. My 17 month old still does not sleep through the night. He wakes up usually two times. We co sleep. Sometimes he'll need a quick nurse to go back to sleep sometimes I can just pat him a little and he'll go back to sleep. I don't have a lot of advice. If you are still nursing maybe something in your diet isn't agreeing with her. Maybe caffeine? Maybe she is eating a new food that could be upsetting get stomach. It might be a good idea to discuss with your pediatrician. Or it could be that she just wants to cuddle when she sleeps. If so it make take some time to wean her off that.

For me, having my husband go in did the trick. The baby won't expect to be nursed so she might go back to sleep more easily. You also need to stop bringing her into your bed, no matter how tired you are. She's getting used to it and likes it and will probably keep crying until she gets it.

I don't mean this in a bad way, but the reason nothing consistently works is because you aren't doing anything consistently. By changing everything up, she doesn't know what to expect and doesn't have a way to soothe herself back to sleep. Choose one method - are you going to sing to her? let her cry it out? send your husband in? give her water? Pick one and do it every single time. She will learn what to expect and be able to get herself back to sleep.

I would advise doing something not too invasive so she doesn't depend on you (don't sing, because she obviously can't sing herself back to sleep).

Also, you might want to consider a noise machine. Maybe having white noise will keep her asleep more.

My 8 month old does the same thing ... I gave in and we co-sleep. Only way for me to get any sleep. Sorry, not much of a helpful suggestion but I did the same thing with my now 3 year old and although it is exhausting (insofar as not getting much time to yourself), there are no words to describe the beauty of watching your child sleep peacefully next to you.

I gave up and took the side off the crib, then attached it to the side of our bed. My ds (14 months) still wakes up constantly to nurse, by now I dont have to get up, and I dont have to fight him to get him back in bed. He was ending up in bed with us anyway when I passed out nursing him.

It is normal. All babies wake up every 50 minutes or so all night long. That is the sleep cycle of a baby. Most of the time they will go back to sleep on their own, but some babies won't because they have not learned how. Look into the Ferber method. It does work but it will not work if you are not consistent. If baby gets fed or picked up when she cries at night you have trained her that if she cries she will be picked up and fed, but at 11 months baby does not need to eat at night and does need to learn to get a good sleep. If you have a baby monitor you might want to turn it off so you aren't waking up to get her at every little whimper. Then do Ferber, but be consistent.

Thanks so much for posting this. I'm going through the exact same thing with my 6 month old.. all night long. I just started reading a book I found that doesn't grate against my intuition like the other sleep books do. It's called "The No-Cry Sleep Solution" by Elizabeth Pantley. There's a forward in it from Dr. Sears. I no longer feel like a big failure, or "one big sleep crutch". One thing I realized is that I think my baby is getting the majority of his calories all night long, so I might need to swing the scale back more towards the daytime and get him to eat much more throughout the day so that he'll get the majority of his calories in the daytime instead of through the night. She also said that "sleeping through the night" actually means midnight to 5 a.m. Anyhow, I recommend getting this book!

My daughter is 5 months and does the same thing. Her doctor said she has acid reflux and that it causes her pain so she does not eat enough to stay asleep long and wakes up often because she is uncomfortable and hungry. You should talk to your doctor because at 4 months she said normal babies will sleep through the night. (And I just spoke with her today) So there is probably something medically that is causing her to wake up.

Is she eating enough at night? Mine is twice that age, so I don't remember exactly what was going on at 11 months, but he has a hard time going to sleep and staying asleep now if he doesn't get enough to eat. This is the case at night and during the day at nap time. He also nurses at sleepytime. If you give her milk or formula, add cereal to it. Give her oatmeal or potato to keep her full, the kind of stuff that won't run through her.