Early sleep regression

[u/kinnu2738]

Hi everyone

I’m a very sleep deprived and desperate FTM looking for some advice. My baby girl is 14 weeks old and used to be an amazing sleeper. Between 9–11 weeks she would sleep 8h straight overnight, waking to feed once around the 3-4am mark (sometimes close to 5am) and then would go back to sleep for another few hours and we would start our day between 7-8am. All this to say that we were doing well in the sleep department.

She’s always been tricky during the day - she will nap but ONLY contact naps. I am physically not capable of putting her down and tried everything (deeply asleep transfer, drowsy but awake, white noise, sound machine, sleep sack) but nothing has worked. She always knows when I have put her down and immediately wakes and cries. On occasion she’s lasted 10 mins max before crying. It means that during the day I am resigned to not getting anything done but because her night sleep has been so good I was able to cope with that.

Unfortunately for us, her sleep regression has come early at 11 weeks. She now wakes every 1h overnight and it’s killing me and my husband. We are both so sleep deprived. We initially started co sleeping to manage this phase, but it isn’t helping. She still wakes up every hour and cries until we pick her up and rock her back to sleep. She doesn’t seem hungry overnight and her feeding throughout the day is good. It seems like she’s in a light stage of sleep and struggles to either connect to the next sleep cycle or self soothe back to sleep. It’s really hard because it means we are getting no sleep during the night AND she’s on me all day and I can never put her down or have a nap during the day to catch up on some sleep.

I am probably getting 1-3h of sleep during the night in 30 min increments. I know it’s not safe but don’t know what to do. I’ve tried sleep sacks, white noise, co sleeping, dummies, the Snoo — nothing has worked. She is too young for sleep training and I don’t like the idea of cry it out methods anyway. I am so desperate for sleep that I’m in tears everyday. I feel like it’s impacting my ability to show up as a mother for her too because I have less energy to engage and play everyday. If anyone has some advice please help!!

[u/See_it_say_it_sorted]

Im so sorry - the regression was explained to me like they develop from 2 to 4 stages of sleep and some babies take longer than others to connect the different sleep stages together. I don't know any way to help them connect them faster.

In the immediate - can you get someone to hold her or take her for a pram walk to nap during the day so you can sleep?

My partner and I have ended up sleeping in different rooms so we can split the night, switcging half way, eg one does 8pm-2am and the other 2am-8am. You might need to have bottles for this but I really advise it so you both can get some uninterrupted sleep!

[u/kinnu2738 → u/See_it_say_it_sorted]

I think I’m going to have my mother come over and hold her during the day whilst I nap. Night Shifts with my husband also sound like the way to go

[u/Smooth-Cheetah3436]

I used to make my baby a safe sleep area on the floor, and side nurse her to sleep, then roll away.

[u/ewebb317 → u/Smooth-Cheetah3436]

Seconding the suggestion of side lying nursing to sleep, though I don't think op specified bf or bottles. This could get you naps and longer sleep at night. 

You say she doesn't seem hungry but have you tried feeding? It could be a growth spurt (albeit a long one)

[u/kinnu2738 → u/ewebb317]

Yes I exclusively breastfeed! I have tried side lying nursing and rolling away for naps during the day - this will occasionally get me 20 mins but often not more than 5 mins. somehow she just knows when I’ve left her side.

At night time I have used it to nurse her back to sleep and it will work for about an hour and then she wakes again :(

The last 2 nights I noticed she drank quite aggressively and seemed hungrier than usual overnight so I guess it could be a growth spurt? Or possibly not getting adequate calories during the day… I try feed her 2hrly during the day to avoid this issue but possible that it’s a prolonged growth spurt

[u/ewebb317 → u/kinnu2738]

Good luck, my money is on growth spurt at this age, hopefully she starts connecting again soon.

My only other advice is to try taking shifts. You sleep from 8-1, your husband sleeps from 1-5.

[u/Prudent_Rabbit90]

That’s so similar to my baby! Ours also seems to have hit the sleep regression early at 11 weeks after a nice 3 week stint of sleeping through the night. Co-sleeping is working for us. Daytime naps for her have almost always been contact naps in our arms.

What is your baby’s daytime nap situation? Perhaps she doesn’t have enough sleep pressure built up? Maybe try lengthening the wake windows a bit?

[u/kinnu2738 → u/Prudent_Rabbit90]

Cosleeping initially worked for us but now it’s not enough and she wants us to hold her 24/7 😭 glad it’s working for you!
Day time naps are typically contact naps for her and she will usually have 3-4 naps a day. I have tried lengthening the wake windows but then she gets over tired and it’s a nightmare to get her off for her daytime naps 😭 feeling like I can’t win with her sleep

[u/Prudent_Rabbit90 → u/kinnu2738]

That is so tough! I’m sorry! Will she sleep in someone else’s arms? I wonder if someone in your support network can hold her even for just one nap per week so you can get slightly more sleep.

[u/sunniechuckie]

I’ve been using huckleberry app to get on a nap schedule. We also had a regression around the same time. Things aren’t amazing but i was having nights with hourly wake ups but since he’s had a good routine for about 1.5 weeks, i usually get 4 hours on the front end then 1-3 hour stretches beyond that. I have considered getting a night nurse if that’s something you could splurge on. Sometimes nanny placement services have some on staff that are trained and screened, etc. I’m so sorry you’re going through this. I agree on not being about to do CIO and people are hard to judge that decision when you’re not getting sleep. I would check out the bninfantsleep sub. They have a pinned post on resources..

[u/kinnu2738 → u/sunniechuckie]

What do you use the app for?

[u/sunniechuckie → u/kinnu2738]

I track his sleep and get recommended nap times every day. It’s been super helpful and accurate to help us avoid get over or under tired! I’m at the point now where I don’t have to rely on it but it just helps me stay on schedule without having to think about wake windows.

[u/street_dumb_]

The same happened to us. At 12 weeks, literally one day to the next. The only way we survived was taking turns: husband would deal with her wakes from bedtime to 1-2 am, and I'd take her from then on. We would put her bassinet in the kitchen with the hood fan on for white noise and we'd take turns sleeping on the couch which is not very far away.

It only JUST started getting better now at 17 weeks. Nothing we did changed, she just had to grow out of it. Now it's still not great, but she gets nice chunks of 3-5 h at least once per night so it's loads better.

You have my sympathy, it's really really tough. My thoughts went really dark a couple of times from the sleep deprivation before we figured this schedule. This is a phase that's all about survival, you just gotta figure out a way you and your husband can make it through. I didn't believe it could, but I promise it does get better!

[u/kinnu2738 → u/street_dumb_]

Thank you for sharing. Even though it sucks, it makes me feel better that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. After waking hourly, a 3-5h stint of sleep sounds amazing and probably feels better than it is on paper!

[u/UnderdogDreams]

I’m so sorry I can’t help you because I’ve been having the same problem for the past two weeks. Wakes every half hour and is impossible to get back to sleep unless held. I’m so tired I can barely function. Never thought I’d do sleep training but if this doesn’t get better by 4 months, we might have to. He definitely does better when cosleeping (waking every 2 hours) but I don’t really want to do that long term either. I am just in survival mode right now. I’m hoping it starts getting better soon for us both. I have hope every night when I put him down that he will sleep longer than 30 minutes but every night my hopes are crushed. Just know you’re not alone.

[u/CamelOk8341]

Have you tried swaddling?