in October 2024 Babies 🇬🇧

My baby won’t sleep

Last night he went to bed at 8 PM, woke up at midnight, and then continued waking up every 2 hours until morning. The night before, he woke up at 2 AM and didn’t fall back asleep until 4 AM. Today, it’s almost 9 PM and he still hasn’t slept. When I talk to people about this, they immediately say, “You need to create a routine.” I am trying—doing the best I can. But it’s like they don’t realize I’m basically a single mum caring for a baby 24/7. They ask things like, “Do you give him a bath before bed?” He hates baths. And bathing a baby in a tub is physically exhausting—my whole body aches. I already feel inadequate because I can’t manage to bathe him every night before sleep. It makes me feel like I’m doing everything wrong. I say he wakes up the moment I put him down in bed, and they say, “Well, he should be sleeping in his crib.” I know that. I know he should be in the crib—but he doesn’t sleep in the crib. Everyone tells me what I should do, but no one tells me how to actually do it. I’m so tired. I don’t have the strength to put him in the crib and wait for hours while he cries, hoping he’ll fall asleep on his own. I used to rock him to sleep in my arms because those were the only moments I could get any rest. But even that’s not working anymore—he won’t sleep in my arms now either. My arms hurt, I can’t keep going like this. I lay him down in bed and just break down. I’m so exhausted. And on top of it all, I feel like I’m not enough—that I have no idea what I’m doing.

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I really think it’s the sleep regression - I do a quick bath each night and she will fall asleep in the next to me but still on 2 hourly wake ups! So I don’t think it’s necessarily anything you’re doing / not doing - a lot of babies seem to be having bad sleep at the moment and my baby has since birth so I know how tough the lack of sleep is! You’re doing amazing it’s not a reflection on you at all 💕

Some nights I skip the bath for one of many reasons and she doesn’t sleep any worse because of it!

Thank you very much x

I'm sure it's a sleep regression my 6.5 mth old is day 9 of waking up every hr when before she use to sleep through I've read that alot of people are going through it atm to

Don’t stress girl my boy is same, I am solo parent and it was stressing. I don’t bath my little one every night cuz the night I bath him he gets more active. You don’t need a rigid routine, just make sure he his enough tired. Mine is 6 minutes and wakesup 3 times a night. I don’t want him to sleep through the night as well. But His schedule is as follows, he wakes up at 7am, goes down for first nap at 9:15/30 and sleeps 30* minutes I don’t stress this nap to be long and don’t try to put him down again. If crib transfer fails I put him on bed. Second nap is around 12:30/1 and this is 90 minutes nap. If I have to sleep with him for him to sleep 90 minutes I don’t mind. 3rd nap is around 4:50/5 and cut this at 30 minutes at max. I put him down at 8:30 he wakeup at 9:15/20/30 I feed him back to sleep amd he wakes up at 11:30 tha. 2:30 or 4am. After 4am I bring him to my bed till 7am. This is what works for me. I kinda have a routine but he made it I just follow him. Don’t stress

Sounds like sleep regression, I don't think it's anything you are doing. My boy wakes every 1-2hrs and we have a pretty strict bedtime routine, which done since about 10 weeks!! So I don't think that makes a difference (sadly). A 4hr stretch at the start of the night sounds great to me, so give yourself a at on the back! Just keep doing what your doing I'm sure he will get there. They are still little and learning to connect sleep cycles and sometimes just need our help - personally I do whatever I think he needs to help him, sometimes that's feeding, sometimes rocking, sometimes just singing a lullaby.

Get in touch with Sleep well with Hannah on instagram. She’ll help you. Her approach makes so much sense!

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