9 Month Old Waking Twice a Night

Unfortunately, I don't have any advice for you. But I did want to let you know that I've been going through the same exact thing with my 10 month old. We've been going through this battle for a few months now. It got a lot better for about 3 weeks and now it's going back down hill again. I'm eagerly waiting to read the responses you get because I'm out of ideas. I'm guessing most of it has to do with teething, but that's not really a comfort to us sleep-deprived moms, is it? Hang in there and hopefully you'll find some answers (for the both of us!).

My now 2 year old was the same way--so I understand where you are at right now. I think our bodies and minds can only take so much sleep deprivation before we are not able to function at our best emotionally and physically as parents, which can be so frustrating. What helped us was the book, "The Sleep Easy Solution" It is towards the "crying it out" persuasion, but gives advice about ways that sometimes we send the wrong message when letting them cry it out, and offers helpful advice about how to be consistent and teach them to soothe themselves to sleep while slowly weaning them off the nighttime feedings. Our son was sleeping better in only a week.

It was so helpful to us that I recommend it to everyone that I hear is having sleep problems with their babies. An added bonus is that because he learned to put himself to sleep at 9 months, it made the transition from crib to bed a lot easier than it was with our first child. I would highly recommend at least checking the book out of the library.

Most moms probably think I'm too easy on my son when it comes to sleeping, but here is my advice anyway. Dr. Sears says some babies still need nourishment during the night even into their first year, so I don't necessarily think yours doesn't need food, especially if he is small for his age. Dr. Sears also believes that a parent's job doesn't end at night, so we should be willing to comfort a child at night as well. It hasn't been my experience that my son "gets used to" waking at a certain time each night, because he will get back to long sleep stretches after his issue (whatever it was) has resolved itself. You might want to google "sleep regressions" if you want some explanation as to why this might be happening.

Try giving him a bottle of water. If you feed him the same everynight he will have it set in his eating routine. If he is getting enough calories during the day then just give him water to drink throughout the night. After a few nights he probably won't wake up for the water if he realizes that is all he is going to get. He may be thirsty or just wanting to suck on his bottle when he wakes up. It worked for my kids and only took a few nights. All 3 of them slept through the night by 2 months.

I would even put a bottle of water in their crib after they went to sleep so when they woke up they could find it on their own.

M.,

Please know you're not the only one who suffers with this. What I did was this: Keep giving him plenty to eat at suppertime. After he goes to bed, let it be so! When he wakes, tell him what you expect of him. Yes, he's young, but he understands more than you think. Then each and every time he wakes after that, don't comfort him, don't talk to him, just put him back to bed, cover him up and leave. I know this sounds harsh, but make it as boring as possible so he won't want to get up. Also I think he's a bit spoiled with the bottle thing. He's nine months old. Plenty old enough to get through the night. Yes he may cry, but this too shall pass. You'll see that letting him cry for a while is not going to hurt him. Good luck!! ls

I know this isn't advice, but I feel for you. My daughter is 10 months old and started waking up during the night (sometimes just once, sometimes twice) each night at about 7 or 8 months. We tried everything and finally were resigned to the fact that she may just do this for a while so I started going to bed earlier.

Well, I don't want to jinx it, but for the past week she's been sleeping better (through the night 4 out of 5 nights) and it turns out that she had an ear infection that we just started treating her for. I don't think she had it the entire time, but I'm not certain of that. She's had a few colds this winter.

Anyway, long story short, hang in there. Try to get rest when you can so you're not exhausted and you might check and make certain that he doesn't have anything wrong with his ears. Good luck!

I am not sure if he was previously sleeping through the night. If not, there is a book called "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child" and it is excellent. In any case, if he was not already sleeping, he may need to learn how to soothe himself back to sleep.

If he was already sleeping and knew how to self-soothe, a few things come to mind: teething, which has already been mentioned; a growth spurt, which makes sense why he would be hungry when he wakes up (we always kept bananas on hand for that); and/or he's learning how to stand up, and he gets too interested in standing/cruising to go back to sleep, but he's still tired, so he gets confused. If teething, Motrin lasts 6-8 hours and Tylenol lasts about 4. If a growth spurt, it will pass. If standing/cruising, he will grow less interested as the weeks pass, but it's a waiting game.

Good luck!

In his last bottle of the night, put a little bit of rice cereal in the bottle to make it "mushy"? looking. You may have to cut the nipple so it is just a little bit bigger. I did this for my son at 2 weeks old and he slept all night since. He is now 19 and doing well.

Good luck and God Bless :)

Could he be having a tooth coming in? I know my son has gone through stages of not sleeping through the night very well. I think it's just a phase but I know it's hard getting your sleep broken up...and frustrating...good luck! :)

We had the same problem and went to a sleep specialist at St. Lukes. She told us that our daughter was waking and eating out of habit, not out of necessity. The sucking and the full belly feeling is what she need to go back to sleep. We couldn't bare the whole cry it out thing, so we did it slowly. Each night we gave less and less... 4ounces, then 3, then 2, then started watering it down until it was almost all water. In exactly 2 weeks she slept through the night! No crying, no misery.

We did have to let her cry a bit to fall asleep when we first put her down in the evening. She was so tired that it just took her a few minutes.

Good Luck!

I'm also in the same boat. I have two kids and have had opposite experiences. My son, now 3, was sleeping 12 hours at night and taking two 2-hour naps everyday by the time he was 8 weeks old. My daughter, 9mos old, refused bottles, pacifiers, has never had an uninterrupted night of sleep since the day she was born. She still wakes 1-2 times a night (used to be more). She goes to bed around 7:30 every night wakes up between 1-3 AM and again at 4-5ish AM. I've tried altering her bedtime (sooner & later), adding a 3rd nap, cereal before bed (when she finally started really eating food around 7mos.), extra/less stimulation before bed, staying home all day/every day and/or going back to a typical schedule where I do things "out" in the mornings and get home for afternoon naps, etc...
My one crutch is that she LOVES her bouncy seat with vibration, so I use it a lot for naps because she will roll around and cry/whine in her crib for more than an hour if I don't. If I force the cry it out approach at naptime in the crib, she gets extremely over-tired and it works against me at bedtime. If I try to comfort her and put her in the crib or nurse her to sleep at naptime she wakes the minute I lay her down, so it's easier to put her in the bouncy (AWAKE w/ the vibration OFF). I've been eliminating one piece of the puzzle at a time... first it was putting her to sleep in the bouncy awake with vibration(nap), then awake without vibration(nap), then to bed at night without nursing to sleep, then to bed at night without music, then to bed at night awake. Then once I could see she was in a pattern - I could start to deal with night wakings a little differently. She always wakes at least once because she is super wet and needs a diaper change, so I used that as my guide. Around 1-3 is when she needs that change, so I respond almost immediately, so she doesn't wake up completely, change her diaper in the dark and nurse sitting on the floor in front of her crib (staying in the sleep zone). I eliminated the diaper change from all other night wakings. Then, one by one, I minimized the nursings (I would break the latch and pull up my sleep bra so she couldn't get to the nipple - usually she would fuss for a second, but fall back alseep). The I started "ignoring" her other wakings if they were within and hour of her last waking... she would usually cry some/fuss some, but resettle herself (I knew she was tired too, so usually exhaustion would get the better of her). If she ever started really escalating, I would go back to the last step of shushing and nursing for a couple minutes, if necessary. Now I'm down to her getting up the one time a night for a change and 3 minute comfort snack and at 5ish AM I just pick her up and put her in the bouncy (she usually sleeps until 7-7:30 or so). Eventually, I will eliminate the 5 AM waking and will work on naps in the crib unassisted, but I'm confident the 1AM diaper change will remain for a while, since she's such a heavy wetter. She's beginning to not drink as much before bedtime, so maybe the wet diaper will be less of a concern and I can cut the 1AM waking out of the equation. Baby steps... she just started drinking breast milk from a cup about 2 1/2 weeks ago, so I'm not pushing my luck. I would rather get up once a night if it means I can finally go out on a date with my husband without children (it's been more than 9 months!!!). If you're really at your breaking point - make an appointment with Nancy B. @ St. Lukes Sleep Center. I was referred by my pediatrician and Parents As Teachers. I met with her and got a recommended approach to dealing with it, but haven't implemented her suggestions because my husband hasn't been available to help (which is critical in her approach). Also, she suggested that I tackle the NAPS first and then work on the NIGHT issues, but like I said earlier when I would try to force her going to sleep unassisted at naptime, she would just end up exhausted, over-tired and then she would wake up MORE at night (some nights it was every hour to 2 hours) and I just turned into a zombie. Good luck – I know how all-consuming it is. You just keep telling yourself that something has got to give, but if you don’t have a game plan you’re probably not going to get any resolution any time soon.

My son turns 9 months today, and he still wakes too. Sometimes it's from wetting through his diaper, and depending how much food he's had in the day he needs to eat. He has a very high metabolism and is only 10% on the weight scale for his age, and his doctor said if he's downing 6-8 ounces he probably is genuinely hungry and should eat. On good days, I can give a bottle right before bed and he'll go 8 hours before needing to eat again. I've heard once they start table foods more they can get through the night better too. My little guy just hasn't figured out what to do with real food or how to get it to his mouth well.

I don't know how long this has been going on - but my 9 month old son begins to wake during the night everytime he is teething. It takes a bottle to get him to go back to bed (I know they say not to) but I think the pain wakes him up enough that he realizes he is hungry. Sometimes we also have to do some medicine for the pain - but we try not to. After the teeth break through he always goes back to his normal sleep patterns. Best wishes.

J.