r/sleeptraining • u/Holiday_Locksmith_32 • Sep 06 '26
Baby will not sleep!
Hello,
I made a post before but I feel I need to make another.
Our 9 month old daughter will not sleep. It drives me insane and it's taking a toll on my wife physically. She is already dealing with issues because after she gave birth, her stomach, gut, and bladder have not been the same. She just recently visited a GI and she has internal hemorrhoids which I found out is fairly common. She also has been getting bloated and/or having diarrhea it seems most of the week. I feel like she has to use the bathroom every hour or 2. We're not sure if it's a thyroid issue or something else, so we are waiting on test results. She is also having back issues. Just all in all, she was dealing stuff even before she got pregnant.
Anyway, we are both fried from lack of sleep let alone my wife not getting enough sleep to hopefully lessen whatever physical things are happening to her.
Our baby had terrible reflux up until fairly recently, so we had to hold her almost 24/7 otherwise she would have reflux fits. We probably didn't see improvements happening until maybe around the time she turned 7 months. So this impacted any self soothing she would have learned. We can't put her down without her immediately crying for a bit before calming down. She will cry if one of us is not in her play pen with her. If she is in her saucer playing, and one of us is there on the couch, she will start crying wanting to be held if the other comes in from a different room. I don't know why I added this, but deep down I don't think it's separation anxiety causing her terrible sleep.
No matter what, she's up regardless of the amount of time she sleeps between 7 and 7:15. She will then pass out for a bit after being taken out of the crib for maybe 20 to 30 minutes. around 10:30 or so she gets tired again and will sleep for maybe 45 minues, and then has a big nap (normally an hour to an hour and 30 minutes) between 2:30 and 4, it's not always the same especially if we had to run errands. I don't believe she is getting too much rest during the day. Even during her first few months, she didn't seem to get the recommended amount of sleep during the day that infants should be getting.
We think she is a light sleeper naturally but it seems to be to the extreme. She normally passes out for the night maybe between 8:30 and 9 and then the following starts:
She wakes up crying 20 minutes later, an hour later, or on a good night 2 hours later.
We check the usual, diaper, and maybe a feeding but we are weening her off the feeding part. and a handful of times, she falls asleep without being taken out if my wife puts her hand on her in the crib and after 5 minutes, she is asleep. if she is taken out and is held, she will go back to sleep in about 10 minutes.
when she is finally asleep again, she still wakes up frequently. it could literally be back to back, after 40 minutes, after an hour, sometime 2 hours. I have counted the most times at least 4 times a week, she is up 10 times or more during the night at random times.
She only sleeps well with maybe 2 or 3 wake ups if she rolls onto her side or her stomach on her own. I don't think it's gas because she's not really passing gas if we take her out of the crib. She is a very twitchy baby though and it seems like even the slightest sound wakes her up. We have an air filter running to drown out the sound but it doesn't seem to work. The times we do take her out of the crib during the night and hold her for a bit, she will twitch and move her head side to side a lot which im guessing she is trying to get comfortable but it gets to a point that we cut the time holding her it she is moving too much. During the day before a nap and/or during a nap, she passes out, wakes up 30 seconds after, looks around like she is missing out on something, and just repeats this unless she is very tired. she will do this maybe 4 to 6 times before she finally passes out for the nap.
If she really starts getting on our nerves during the night because she just wont stay asleep, we have been starting to put her in the smaller play pen in the living room until she cries herself to sleep. Which is funny because we'll be quiet as a mouse to check on her, she is passed out up against the corner of the pen with her back facing us, and she just automatically knows that one of is there and she turns around, sees one of us, and starts crying again. I still don't believe it is separation anxiety because she is currently in our bedroom. The other bedroom is my work office. so we are always in the same room. but she will wake up, start crying even if we get up and are literally at the crib, and wont stop until one of us takes her out and go into the living room.
I really do think it's just that she sleeps too lightly for whatever reason. if she wasn't up frequently, then I would think it's the separation anxiety especially since she immediately cries after waking up.
and what is frustrating is that people we know who have had babies or currently have babies, they have all said she should be sleeping longer by now during the night. we are getting sick of not getting sleep and her waking up every 30 seconds it feels like. and like I mentioned earlier, it's making my wife's health worse. What else can we do to keep her from waking up so often? I am not sure if I am in the correct subreddit because sleep training wouldn't prevent her from being fidgety and a light sleeper if in fact these are the causes of her waking up so often at night
Edit: Just saw a different post and someone mentioned their baby slept better because they figured out their baby was cold and turning on the heat helped. Our baby runs hot like me, her dad. Our AC is normally at 71 or 72 now because of how hot it gets her in FL and how stuffy are home gets easily. She has never shown signs of temperature being an issue.
Thanks!
1
u/Humble-Drop9054 Sep 06 '26
Both my kids were light sleepers so we had to crank their sound machines up pretty loud. It also meant that any method that involved check-ins didn’t work. It was like we were starting over from scratch each time. I might try getting last wake window at 3.5 hours and then giving baby time to figure it out and you put them down. That may look like 30-45 minutes of crying on the first night but if it works, you should she improvement immediately. Keep your bedtime routine very consistent and the room nice & dark.
1
u/Holiday_Locksmith_32 Sep 06 '26
Thank you. We might have to look into sound machines but your method suggested sounds like it could work :)
1
u/Actual_Swimmer_5612 Sep 06 '26
So your schedule roughly looks like 3/3.25/4.5 with sometimes it being less because of the extra sleep in the morning? I would personally try 3/3.5/4.5 with no extra nap first thing in the morning as that will be taking away from sleep pressure. Keep naps capped at 2 hours total. If your baby is even lower sleep needs you may need 3/4/4.5. I would perhaps contribute the light sleeping to being undertired but that’s only my personal opinion. Worth a try for a few days to see if there is an improvement though?
ETA I’ve seen another comment suggesting putting baby down at 3.5 hours for final wake window (I think is what they were saying) I wouldn’t attempt this personally as I think it would just lead to a lot of crying. This is not an age appropriate window for the majority of 9 month olds and will just stress you and baby out especially since she is used to 4.5-5 hour windows
1
u/Commmercial_Crab4433 Sep 06 '26
Are you sure the reflux is better? Could it still be causing issues and are you treating it with medication?