Ok, Micah is almost 4 mnths old and it literally takes me 1-2hours to get him to sleep at night. I usually don't get him to sleep until 1 or 2 am and it's just taking the stuffing out of me. I think I've tried everything. I've tried getting him to sleep on the breast, he just starts whining after about 30mins of me trying to pacify him on the breast and will not fall asleep on the breast. I've tried walking with him, I can only pace the floor for so long before my legs fall off. I've tried leaving him to see if he will fall asleep on his own but he just starts to get really angry. Any suggestions? I just feel rather stressed out with it and like I need to cry. We co-sleep which helps him sleep better thru the night but it doesn't really help with the issue of getting him to sleep. Please help if you can.

Eva, have you heard of the No Cry Sleep Solution? It's filled with excellent ideas for getting babies to fall asleep and stay asleep without crying it out.

First of all, how are Micah's naps? It sounds like he could be overtired if he's resisting sleep until 1 AM! Either that or maybe he's napping too late in the day, so he's not tired at bedtime.

The book I just mentioned also talks about the importance of a bedtime/naptime routine to follow with babies. For example: DD 16 months, daddy gives her a bath, we put her pjs on, pray and read with her, breastfeed, rub her back, and say goodnight. Do you have a bedtime and naptime routine that you follow with Micah? It certainly helps to prime their little minds that it's time to sleep. Also, lullaby music can help if you play the same CD every day at bedtime and naptime. That way they associate the music with bedtime/naptime. Also, it can help to introduce a "lovey" that way they associate that item with falling asleep. For example: "Hannah, it's time to go night-night, hug your bear-bear and go sleepy."

I hope that some of this helps. GL! :)

I don't really have any advice but I wanted to tell you that I feel so sorry for you... that's hard to deal with... I sure hope that he will start sleeping better for you soon!

Eva, have you heard of the No Cry Sleep Solution? It's filled with excellent ideas for getting babies to fall asleep and stay asleep without crying it out.

First of all, how are Micah's naps? It sounds like he could be overtired if he's resisting sleep until 1 AM! Either that or maybe he's napping too late in the day, so he's not tired at bedtime.

The book I just mentioned also talks about the importance of a bedtime/naptime routine to follow with babies. For example: DD 16 months, daddy gives her a bath, we put her pjs on, pray and read with her, breastfeed, rub her back, and say goodnight. Do you have a bedtime and naptime routine that you follow with Micah? It certainly helps to prime their little minds that it's time to sleep. Also, lullaby music can help if you play the same CD every day at bedtime and naptime. That way they associate the music with bedtime/naptime. Also, it can help to introduce a "lovey" that way they associate that item with falling asleep. For example: "Hannah, it's time to go night-night, hug your bear-bear and go sleepy."

I hope that some of this helps. GL! :)

I've never heard of that book before, I will look into it. It seems to me that he is overtired and that makes him hard to get to sleep. His naps are still all over the place at the moment, we are kinda still coming out of that newborn sleepy thing. And he is just as hard to get to sleep during the day that he is at night. He has this snowsuit that I call the "magic suit" bcuz when you put him in it and then rock him in the carseat he will fall asleep cuz the suit is all cosy. But that's not the ideal way of getting a baby to nap. He's still taking quite alot of naps during the day, he's fallen into this pattern of being awake for an hour and then sleeping for an hour.

We don't really have a bedtime routine as such at the moment. To be honest, by the time I get all my housework done (I do it once Abby is in bed cuz I don't get time while she is awake), I'm too tired to bath him every night. So he usually just gets bathed twice a week. Maybe I just need to get a little more umph and bath him every night and see if that helps. I did buy a little lamb comforter thingy that I slept with so that it would get my smell and hopefully get him to sleep better, but it's head rattles and kinda defeats the purpose of getting him to sleep. Maybe I should just keep trying with it, or buy one that doesn't have a rattling head...LOL. Anyway, thank you Ruth for your advice. I appreciate it and I will look into that book.

Lack of sleep is *SO* hard. Sorry.
I have never read The No Cry Sleep Solution., but I have also heard awesome things about it. I really liked some of what the Baby Whisperer had to say. Like all books you have to take some of it with a grain of salt.:-D I found it helpful though. She talks about the same thing. A routine so they know what to expect at bedtime. It does sound like he is over stimulated and over tired. I hope you find something that works soon...

Blessings!
Kathaleen

We had gotten a Classic Womb Pooh for ds before he was born and I would put that in the bed with him. It made the womb sound and he seemed to like it. Now he carries it around and sleeps with it everynight (without the womb mechanism) and he will be four in February.

That might help. We also had to put a heating pad in his bed and warm it up at night before putting him in.

I would carry him in and my husband would remove the pad and check the temp and I would lay him down.

Do you swaddle him? That can help a lot to make thm feel secure and cosy. A routine is great too. I would pass up the bath every night if he has sensitive skin but maybe just rub some baby lotion on him when you change his diaper to get him relaxed. Sometimes if they are really tired they just need to cry for a little while to get the "stress" out so don't worry if he cries. You aren't a bad mommy and he will learn to sooth himself to sleep. Try putting him down at the same time you put your daughter down if he will stay asleep when you get in bed, or maybe he would fall back to sleep more easily.

my son loved to be wrapped in whatevery shirt I wore that day. also when my kids were about 3 months or so, i would secure a unbreakable mirror to the side of the crib and when we put them down, fully awake,they could look at themselves. my youngest 2 have been listening to the same music for 4 1/2 years and 3 years. i really believe that it helps.

I'm sorry it's been so rough. It was the same way for me with mine until he was about 6 months & then it slowly started to get better. I second the No Cry Sleep Solution. She has some great tips in there!

Are you sitting up to nurse him then put him in bed before you come to bed at night? Or are you laying down together for the evening and trying to nurse him to sleep?

The latter has worked well around here. Mine often didn't do well with me nursing them in the chair then laying them down in bed ...not early on.

Sorry, that's all I have to offer.

Unless maybe you have a swing?

And ditto the evening bath and trying to keep him more awake/active during the day.

sounds pretty familiar, Ryan has had some of the same problems. He's finally starting to do a little better but i shouldn't say that too quick. [whatwacko] One thing that's really helped him is to let him sleep in his car seat, he likes to have something snuggled up against his face, so he just leans over to one side of the car seat. at first it really scared me and i tried and tried to get him to sleep some other way because of the sids risk, but that is how he wants to be and I've finally just let it go in the interest of my own sanity. what i do at night is get him changed and fed and then rock him and sing softly for about five minutes til he looks drowsy, then we go in his room and I put him in the seat, then I have a chair next to the crib(his seat is in his crib) and i sit there and hold his hand until he falls asleep. I hope to gradually wean him back to where he doesn't need me in the room to fall asleep, but I am just grateful for where he is now. i don't know if this will help at all, since every baby is different, but I just want to encourage you to keep trying until you find out what works for you! I know it is stressful and i'm sorry you're going through it!

It was the same thing with my daughter at about 4 months of age. Someone suggested giving her one of my shirts that I've worn to sleep with... I thought that was crazy at first but right when I put it in her crib, she turned over to it, grabbed it and pulled it up to her nose and fell asleep!

She's now 22 months and still sleeps with that same shirt. She uses it as her blankie. It's really cute. It doesn't smell anything like me anymore but it's just out of habit!

Just a suggestion...

Are you sitting up to nurse him then put him in bed before you come to bed at night? Or are you laying down together for the evening and trying to nurse him to sleep?

The latter has worked well around here. Mine often didn't do well with me nursing them in the chair then laying them down in bed ...not early on.

Sorry, that's all I have to offer.

Unless maybe you have a swing?

And ditto the evening bath and trying to keep him more awake/active during the day.

Mainly, I sit up in the bed and nurse him and then on the rare occasion that he actually falls asleep on the breast, I lay him down in the bed. I've tried nursing him while lying next to him, but for the most part he refuses the breast once he's had his fill. Except tonight, he actually used me to fall asleep which was great. But we still had issues tonight. Here's exactly what happened cuz I'm out of ideas....LOL:
I gave him his bath and had him in bed by 10:30pm (I know that sounds late, but for him that's early....LOL) and he was asleep. 20mins later he's screaming his head off, so I go and get him and put him back on the breast, he takes a little then refuses it, so I walk the room with him all the while he's screaming his head off, so I try him back on the breast and it pacifies him this time to which he falls asleep.....for another 10mins then he's screaming his head off again. DH trys walking with him this time and he just keeps on screaming, so back on the breast he goes and he pacifies himself and falls asleep.....for another 15mins and so on. This pattern went on for literally 2 hours. It's now almost 1am and I just got him to sleep 15mins ago, so far he's still sleeping. This is probably the worst night yet cuz his little cry sounded like he hurt his throat. Dh and I just prayed the whole time cuz we were at a loss at what to do. I've tried swaddling him, he doesn't like it, he just kicks free. I dunno, guess he's just grumpy. I guess I'll just have to keep praying that God helps him to fall asleep better. Thanks for all your advice ladies.:-D

Have you tried him in a swing, car seat or bouncey seat of some sort? That slight elevation might be all he needs. My Eldest liked sleeping in his car seat for a while. He didn't do so every.single.night and it wasn't for an extended period of time (there are reasons not to do so which I cannot cite at this moment but I can get back to you with that info should you desire it..but it being too much of an incline is one..baby's head fall forward and thus cut off air supply) But that *slight* incline seemed to really help him there for a while. I know someone already mentioned the use of the car seat earlier in this thread.
It does sound like you've tried everything else I could think of.

What about lying on your or dh's chest? Micah on his belly. Tried that? That worked at times with a few of mine...just depended on what their issue really was..which, we never did determine, just one of those 'worked this time...didn't work that time' deals.

Do you think he's in pain? Like reflux? Sounds like he's nursing a lot which initially helps him get to sleep then is awakened by something...or maybe gas? I would see if putting him in a swing/sling/upright position helps. If it does, then reflux may be an issue.

Our ds slept in a close-to-the-ground swing for several weeks. It was a sleep saver!

I would second the reflux question. One of my nieces was born with severe reflux and they about went crazy trying to figure out what was wrong. The doc. gave them a foam wedge to put under her when she slept that kept her elevated. She is now 6 and has outgrown it but I would look at that or possibly colic or something irritating his stomach.

I actually think he could be teething and that's why he woke up screaming several times last night. After I got him to sleep just before 1am, he stayed asleep and only woke up once during the night to feed. I think part of the problem is overtiredness and the other part could be teeth cuz he keeps chewing on his little hands. I think I might try the teething powders tonight. Not sure if it's reflux, I thought that reflux made them be sick after each feed cuz he's not really a sicky baby, do I have that wrong? Tara, yup tried the carseat, that's mainly what he sleeps in during the day but like you said I don't want to leave him in that for super long periods. We have a swing, but he only likes it for about 15-20 mins and then he's fed up. Dh has tried laying with him on his chest and even bare chested but he just cries. I think I need to just keep plodding on and eventually we will get the hang of this thing they call sleep. We'll see how we get on tonight.:-D

Gosh that's a tough one. With Emily she was a swing baby. She also would fall asleep drinking her bottle. But we would have to carefully carry her to the crib and lay her down. Sometimes we would have to do the pat/rub thing after we laid her down so she wouldn't wake up. She was a tough one to get to stay asleep.

Now with Allison she was breastfed and there came a point when she wouldn't fall asleep no matter what we did for her. She was about Micah's age and it was very frustrating. I can remember nights of laying her in her crib and she would just cry. She cried no matter what we did so I'd lay her down and go somewhere and regain myself. I would sit and journal and just write prayers out asking God for help. II remember waking up one night to her crying after she had nursed. Travis had put her back to bed after she nursed and couldn't find him. he was in her bedroom sitting against the wall crying.

I know a lot of moms don't believe in letting babies cry but that's about the only choice we had. It was either that or lose our minds. There were times we just had to lay her down and cry ourselves.

Eventually we did the Ferber method when she got older. She outgrew this crying stage that I was talking about above. But she still got to the point where we couldn't put her to sleep anyway at all. So I would say she was about 7 months old or so and we started putting her to bed by herself awake. We established a bedtime routine and just laid her down. It took a few nights of this before it worked. And it meant letting her cry too.

The Ferber method if you have never heard of it is leaving them alone for 5 minutes and then after 5 minutes u comfort them for only 30 seconds without picking them up. Each time you are away you increase it by 5 minutes. She always fell asleep during the 15 minute interval.

It wasn't fun doing that but it was the last resort and worth it in the end.
She learned to go to sleep on her own and was ready for bed about 7 pm every night.

I hope you figure out what works for Micah. And are able to get some much needed sleep!

We had a BREAKTHROUGH!!!!! Well, I'm hoping it was a breakthrough and not just a fluke...lol. Anyway, last night dh and I were at a meeting for church and we left about 10pm to which Micah fell asleep in the car. So I left him to sleep in his carseat til he woke up about midnight and then I took him out, changed his clothes, had a few smiles, then I fed him and he fell right to sleep without crying or waking up again. So hopefully that works again tonight. I think I might try the carseat thing again tonight at his first signs of being sleepy, and then when he wakes up for food I'll do exactly what I did last night. Praise the Lord for atleast one good night:mrgreen:

Glad you got some sleep!!!:-D

Another good night last night!!! I think we might be turning a corner on this sleep issue. He was so easy to get to sleep last night. He was asleep by 11pm!!! Woohoo!!! I'm praying this continues. Thank you ladies for your help and support.

That's awesome, Eva!! Maybe soon he'll bump his bedtime up even earlier. :)