16 Month Old sleep issues.

[Avia"s Mommy]

I have a beautiful 16 month old daughter. We get up every morning at the same time, 6:00. She is in daycare. She plays well. She takes her nap at 11, she always sleeps 2 hours. She gets up, eats and continues to play. I get her from daycare every afternoon at 5:30. She comes home plays for about an hour while I get dinner ready. We eat, then we take a bath. and settle down. She will lay with me for a little while and go on to sleep. She will not go to bed by herself. She has to have a bottle. I know, I know, Shame on me. She takes a sippy cup any other time. She doesn't take a pacifer. At times, I wish she would over the bottle.
We had to drop her bed down to the toddler bed. She figured out how to get out of her crib. Every night for the past 480 days, she gets up about 4 o'clock in the morning. We have tried leaving her in ther to cry it out. She gets so upset that she looses her voice. She will scream, as if someone was hurting her. Finally just get up and find us. I have tried to lay her back down in her bed, She screams. I gave her a stuffed froggy to lay with, she cuddles with him, but she freaks out when I try to leave. She has night lights. She can not be hungry. She wants to lay with us. If you just lay her in OUR bed, she will go on back to sleep. She is a rough sleeper, tosses and turns, kicks, whines. I don't want to have to do this until she turns 15. I know its hard on her, cause it's hell on me. I need relief. I need sleep. I need help.

[laughterkt]

I am right there with you! we have a wonderful 15 month old daughter....and I think she may have slept through the night twice in her entire life.
I, too, rock her to sleep and give her a bottle at night (bad mommy..)......
so I know she has a hard time "self soothing".....

She is waking 2-3 times a night. Screams like yours if we let her "cry it out"...I sit up crying in the middle of the night.

She'll go back to sleep if we rock her, but then wakes up (most times) when i put her back in her crib.

We have only let her sleep with us a coule of times, but that often doesn't even work.

i am beyond exhausted and don't know what to do.

just wanted you to know you are not alone

[Avia"s Mommy]

I'm with you on they crying with her part. I get so frustrated, I wind up crying.
And, If you let her "cry it out" NO ONE gets sleep.

I've tried the "cry it out routine" on the weekend where it wasn't a big deal if I missed some sleep. I would just nap with her in the afternoons.
But I work 50+ hours a week. I need my sleep.

I'm sorry you have the same issues, but it is good to know that I am not alone.
Thanks. :)

[aydenmommy]

I wish I could help. I have co-slept with my son since he came home and has slept through the night since. We decided on this because I know that for myself I can not sleep w/o my husband so why ask a little person to do the same. Can you try to put her mattress in your room? Not sure if that may help. Lots of luck!

[tlc011781]

so glad to read this post and know that I am not the only one! I have a 14 month old who routinely gets up at 4 am. I am desperate for sleep and dont know what we are doing wrong. Our schedule sounds the same as yours too. We have tried everything. I forbid to put her in our bed, I don't want to start that habit and have her still sleeping with us when she is 10. I feel that is mine and my husbands time. Normally giving her a bottle helps, but I want to avoid the whole getting up anyway! It is such an interuption of good sleep. I hope it gets better for you ladies too!!

[jiblett_gravy]

My son is also 16 months old, but it varies from day to day. Sometimes he sleeps in his crib with no problem, the other times he wont do it. He also figured out how to get out of his crib. One night I had to put him back in his bed 5 times. It was so funny I couldnt get mad. You'd hear little feet slapping the floor to look up and see a head shoot by the bedroom door. I do the cry it out method sometimes depending on the mood. But, here recently, we just put him in the bed in the spare room. No problems at all. I know its probably wrong, but I guess all the crying all nite over this last year has gotten to me. One thing I never did is allow my wife to put our son in the bed with us. Thats cutting into my playtime, and, you'll never get them out of the bed. So i didnt let that start. But I feel your pain and im with ya on it.

[Gracie's Mom]

My 16 month old daughter started sleeping all night when she was about 5 weeks old, right up until she was 6 months old. She wakes up anywhere between 1-4 times a night, at different times each night. At first, we thought she was waking because she was teething so we would give her some Infant Advil or Tempra, but she was never really in pain she just wanted her bottle. She use to have two naps per day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon at about 1.5 hours each, but now she only has one in the afternoon for about two hours. We also thought that she was afraid of her crib at night so we put a nightlight in the room, but that didn't work. So just a few weeks ago we got her a toodler bed, she loves it and is so proud of it because she can get in and out herself.. but still will NOT sleep all night. She usually wants to lie on my bed with me and after she drinks her bottle she falls to sleep but still wakes up a few hours later looking for another bottle, she won't go to sleep at night without it. Can anyone help? It's been almost a year since she's been waking at night, and I'm in need of a good nights sleep!!

[shanbuon@hotmail.com]

We have the same issue with our 16-month-old daughter, but I'm slowly realizing that night-waking is very common among toddlers. They wake because they're learning at rapid speed, as well as teething and illness. Lots of literature has led us to believe that all babies can sleep through the night. I don't believe it to be true.
I personally don't like cry-it-out methods for the same reason that "aydenmommy" says. I like to sleep with someone cuddling me - why wouldn't an underdeveloped, dependent little creature who loves mommy and daddy be the same?
I also work full-time and have days where I'm exhausted. But, the fact is this won't last forever. It's a brief period in time.
What has helped me is to try to relax about it. I hold on to the belief that she will sleep through the night soon. And, all this cuddly time (without tears) will pay off big time in the end.
Good luck, moms.

[KKarsten]

I can so relate to all of your posts here on this issue! I am so exhausted that it isn't even funny, and am now actively looking to return back to the workforce. How on earth I am going to do that is beyond me, when I have my little boy who just doesn't sleep well.
After doing everything BUT the "crying out" method (example:rocking, co-sleeping, singing..etc.) my husband and I finally decided it was time to give this "crying out" thing a shot again. We had tried it for only a few nights when my son was 6 months old, and he would cry for over two hours before we just would give in and rock him to sleep. Now that he is 11 months old, it takes about an hour for him to completely pass out. But still....this is sooo hard on us! The first few nights I just cried right along with him. He gets sooo worked up that he practically hyperventilates. It is just awful! And when he does finally pass out...we find him folded in half...he sits up and then just collapses between his legs! Of course we always lay him back on his back and he sleeps for about 4 hours before he is wide awake and I end up taking him to the guest room with me to sleep so my hubby gets enough sleep to function for work the next day. Otherwise we have to let him "cry it out" again!
The REAL problem I am facing now is that I can't be 5 feet away from him during the day without him busting into tears and rocking his body back and forth like he does when we put him down in his crib for naps and bed at night. This is just awful! I can't get anything done around here. When I get down on the floor and play with him...he is all smiles and happy, but the minute I start to get up....the tears and screams start up again. We are now afraid that he has associated my leaving him in his crib to "cry it out" with my leaving him anywhere in the house...even when I am in the same room with him! HELP....what do I do to break this? I can't even imagine trying to put him in daycare right now.

[aukizy]

I had the same problem my son will be almost 2. And he slept maybe a total of 10 nights since he was born. My doc reccomended. Melatonin 3mg. But I only give him half of that. Its safe you can find it with the vitamins. Your body produces it at night when you are ready for sleep. But please make sure to ask your doc. I started my son on it 2 weeks ago. And for 2 weeks he has slept all night long. A half an hour after I give it to him he is out.
And he don't have to take it everynight. I have finally have got some sleep too