Talk about the 9-month sleep regression

I had a request to put up a post where you guys could talk about how you're dealing with or not dealing well with the 9-month sleep regression.

To recap, this is the period encompassing the developmental leap at week 37 and the one at week 46. Very very often there's also some teething mixed in there, and learning to crawl and/or pull up and/or cruise and/or walk.

Which means you've got a brain working on developmental stuff that won't let the kid sleep, a brain and body working on movement that won't let the kid sleep, and maybe some random shooting or throbbing gum and jaw pain in there, too.

In other words, you're going to have to accept that the kid just can't sleep straight through until some of this is over with.

(We haven't even mentioned how this sleep regression can affect other stuff, too, like naps and mood and clinginess and what they'll eat and won't eat. Some kids who keep sleeping at night just wig out during the day--that's their particular reaction to the developmental spurts.)

Which means your plan shifts from Get Kid To Stay Asleep to Maximize Sleep For Everyone Else. This is not the time to pretend you know what's going on or that you have it all under control. This is not the time to say "your job is this and mine is that." It's the time to divide up the schedule so everyone gets 5 hours at a stretch if possible. If one of you has to go to sleep at 8 pm and take the 8-1 shift so the other has the 1-6 shift, do it.

Here are the important things to remember: Lots of us have been through it. You will get through it. There is nothing inherently wrong with your child--this is normal. Hideous and demoralizing, but normal. You're doing a good job.

Now, commiserators?

Comments

[rocie]

Hi there Sharon! I came across to your page because I am looking for someone with same experience as mine. To my knowledge I am always and have been a good friend. But never in my 30-year existence that a friend invited me to be one of her or his bridesmaids even my relatives never bothered to include me on their lists. Honestly, it hurts because while I consider these friends to be my super friends it ended up they've preferred others than me. Or probably I am just too ugly and short to be one of the bridesmaids. Or perhaps I am too intellectual for that show off ceremony. Bitter! HUh! LOL.

[ania]

My son never slept all night, he was waking p every 2-3 hours until 8.5 months then I got a 2 blissful nights when he would sleep and now we are back to 2-3 times a night every 4 hours or so. Tonight I had to spend with him 30 min each time so he could settle down. I'm so tired :( Naps became a nightmare few weeks ago and they were only good for maybe a month total, meaning 30 min in the morning and 1:10 min afternoon. Believe me everyone I've done and tried everything I read all these great books that only made me feel like I'm a bad mother. I was consistent with things and changes but they just don't work for him, so I'm sticking with nursing him in the middle of the night and then waiting by his crib for him to fall asleep. I like this article....it just makes everything seem normal and that's what I need....I finally wants to stop feeling like a bad parent

[Kayleigh]

I'd say it was 9 month sleep regression but LO has always waoken up every 2-3 hours since birth so he has no excuses! He's done a 5 hour twice and 6 hour stint once.

Me and fiance have just given up on him every sleeping through so I get up with him two mornings in a row then fiance does so the other can get some sleep.

Sick of people saying let him cry. If you've ever heard my baby cry you'd know that isn't an option! Besides it's cruel.

Gotta say though co-sleeping from around 1am has been a lifesaver he just has an all night milk bar!

[Tina]

I'm going crazy with this 9 month regression. Well it's been since DS was 3 months for us. The only time I was able to sleep well was at 6 months when we tried CIO, which worked for only 1 week until he was waking up at 4am everyday with a soiled diaper. Then he was back in our bed, which is now my bed and his bed because DH had to sleep in the other room. DS was moving/crawling/rolling so much in our KING size bed. He still is moving a lot and would crawl in his sleep until his head would hit the headboard or something else, which would wake him up and then he'd start crying. The only thing that would make him stop crying is if I nurse and that can go on for HOURS. Last night he woke up crying about 10 times! At one point I was up to just watch him.
Because I don't sleep enough, I'm such in a bad mood during the day and I hate being like that. DS constantly need me and have no rest during the day.
I am so tired, haven't had a break or 'me' time since his birth. He's also a very high need baby, had reflux and used to vomit a lot for the first 6 months. He's also constipated and is teething. During the day he crawls everywhere and puts everything in his mouth. He won't even let DH hold him or put him to sleep.
I just don't know what to do anymore.

[Micky]

@abcd, Carrie, and sleepy but getting by--my 9 month old is still only sleeping a max of 4-5 hours and nurising/singing back to sleep. It is extremely comforting to know that there are other parents going through this. There is a lot of pressure to get your kid to "sleep through" or else think that you are a bad parent. I firmly believe that if you keep giving your kiddo an opportunity to comfort themselves (i.e. don't rush immediately to the crib), they eventually will when they're ready. I don't know any teenagers that still need a night nurse or a song to fall back asleep. It all happens when they're ready.

Also, what I hear from a lot of nursing moms is that their babies are still needing a night feeding or so. I think that the "norm" of sleeping through the night at this age might be correlated to the norm of bottle feeding (only 17% of 6 month olds are breastfed). I simply cannot produce enough milk at 8:00pm to keep him full all night, and I can't sleep through the night myself without getting too full to be comfortable.

[Lee]

This post is a great reminder for this very sleepy mama that there is nothing to "fix" and that this too shall pass! We went through this with our older girl, so you'd think I'd have the perspective... anyway, thanks Moxie and all the other commenting mamas!

[Rafael Robyns]

I found this page quite helpful when my 10-mo old son (our second child) suddenly started waking up repeatedly during the night, having made steady progress on sleep up until that time. I don't know what brought on the change--could have been an ear infection or a more clock-like internal change--and I'm not sure what brought him out of it. Something did, and I can at least tell you what we tried.

We were getting him back to sleep each time he awoke (6-8 times per night?) by picking him up and walking/bouncing him just so. My wife decided to try a policy of never picking up, only trying to comfort in the crib even if he was crying. We did not leave him crying. We never tried Ferber with our daughter and she came to sleep peacefully and securely despite the same problems as our son.

Within a couple of days of the new policy he was sleeping through the night. And within a couple of days he was back to waking up repeatedly. But we stayed with the policy, and I think it was the right decision in the long run as it got easier for both of us to get him back to sleep without pickup. But still, he would wake up several times at night.

At a little over 11 months we returned from a 2-week trip and, suddenly, he began to sleep through the night, or to wake up with a whimper and small cry and then somehow get himself back to sleep. We also managed, at a late stage in the process of trying to get him out of the sleep regression, to slip in a stuffed animal instead of our arms when he wanted to clutch onto something in the crib.

My best guess is that developmentally he advanced to getting himself through those sleep-cycle transitions, perhaps (but only perhaps) aided by our having conditioned him to stay in his crib.

So, my advice for parents of 9-10-mo old children going through this sleep regression, which seems real, is (1) stop picking up your child from the crib, though physical comforting in the crib might be a good idea, (2) eventually work in a comforting object instead of your hand, (3) give your child a moment to settle before going in, and go in only if the cries are escalating, and (4) do not give up hope that this stage will pass. On to the next sleep regression!

[J&T]

Our budgie we think is starting the regression, almost 9 months old.

He was sleeping from 6pm to about 5am every day until a week ago. Now is having trouble getting to sleep at night, and refusing his bottle. If we check on him before bed, the slightest noise may wake him up and he won't get to sleep for hours.

Thanks for this post, gives us hope!!!

[Sacha]

Wow... I thought I was alone! I'm so tired of comments from family members blaming it on the fact that I'm breastfeeding or that I "spoil" my daughter too much! She is 9.5 months old and has never really been a good sleeper due to chronic middle ear infections. Now that she's got a second set of tubes in her ears... I've been at a loss for how to retrain her to sleep better at night. She goes down between 7 and 8 and sleeps for 2 to 3 hours. After that first waking, she is up every hour for the rest of the night! I am totally worn out and disheartened :( My hubby is not much of a helper when it comes to nighttime parenting so I pretty much have to go it alone. I also have a 3.5 year old son so I can't really nap during the day as he SELDOM naps at the same time as his sister. This post however does give me some hope that maybe she is normal and this behavior is not somehow my fault! LOL

[samantha]

Thank you to all the mom's for sharing your stories about your babies and their sleep regression. At 3:00a.m. I needed some reassurance that my babies bahavior is normal. He is nine months old today and no longer sleeps well in the night. Thanks again! I will survive!

[MJ]

Thanks, moms, for making me feel like I'm not insane. I have a 8.5-month old who was a great sleeper until about 3.5 months, and since then it's been awful. She's my second, and I had high hopes she'd be a better sleeper than her brother, but amazingly, now I can say she's worse. He was very inconsistent but did eventually sleep through the night. She never has.

My girl is very active, crawling, cruising, thinking about walking, loves feeding herself...and just an awful nighttime sleeper. She goes to sleep fine, but is up anywhere between 2-8 times a night. I've tried everything. And on top of it, she's had chronic ear infections since she was 5 months. We finally got an ENT referral but have to wait three more weeks for the appointment.

The eternal optimist in me says that maybe if she gets tubes, she'll sleep. And, it won't be like this forever, but it's hard to remember that at 3am when you're exhausted. Everything just seems worse at night. I'm cranky and my husband is cranky and we always end up fighting, which also doesn't help.

So, to any frustrated and exhausted moms reading this in the future, you're not alone. :)

[Reshma]

These bones are seeds. They germinate. They turn into urodrgneund veins of potential. What you're ignoring can blossom at the back of your mind and you'll never know it. Is it possible nothing gets wasted? Moxie may have just put the groundwork to a new creature.I love it when i get what you're saying, it makes me feel like the knowns are more detailed now that they've been spoken in a different timbre.

[Marcelo]

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[Ricky]

Saikhan lekts baina. Bayarlalaa.Iimerhuu gargalgaa saaiti yum garch baival hen hunii bodol sanaa telexed tus bolno gesen bas neg ashig tus baigaa yum. Olon hun oilgoj medej baival erxbish tustai biz. Bi huvdaa ashigt maltmal, erdes baylagaas orj irj buy mongo mongolchuudiig delkhiin tuvsind baihuuts medlegtei bolgohod zartsuulagdaasai gem boddog. Medleg bolosroltoi Bol toorch budilah ersdel bagasna gej naidaj bna.

[Sheamus]

Rub a drop of whiskey on her gums where the tooth is conimg through. It works like a charm and is MUCH BETTER than ambesol since it asborbs in the gums rather than dissolves when she drools. Don't worry a drop is not enough to affect her besides relieving the pain. The boys pedatrian told me to do this and sleep is not interrupted by teething.

[Joedilson]

“Endurance is not just the ability to bear a hard thing, but to turn it into glory.” ~ William Barclay “We must ovceorme the notion that we must be regular it robs you of the chance to be extraordinary ~ Uta Hagen“Whatever you vividly imagine, ardently desire, sincerely believe, and enthusiastically act upon must inevitably come to pass.” ~ Paul J. MeyerWhat a way to head into 4th of July celebrations! Congratulations on completing your improbable journey guys! You have been such an incredible inspiration!