ARGH!! I love my little boy, but he is really testing my patience at the moment.
Why oh why won't he sleep? This has been going on for 8 months now (since he was born), and I know it can't go on forever but it just seems like it will.
At night he's taking about an hour to go to sleep, with us going in every 5 mins to lie him down again and pat him. Once he is actually asleep he's waking up every two hours, sometimes every hour.
What's killing me most is his day sleeps. He is so frantic and overstimulated, that even in a warm quiet darkened room his breathing is fast, and his eyes are darting around the room while he scratches at the sheets, plays with his blankets, plays with his hands, rolls around, stands at the end of the cot. It's like I have an 8 week old again - I'm settling for an hour (or more!!!) to get him to sleep for 30 mins sometimes less twice a day.
So I started swaddling him again - in cot sheets - to keep him confined. Now he struggles against this, but when he's not swaddled I don't even get to the door and he's standing up at the cot side.
He has 2 teeth coming through, could this really all be about the teeth? He's happy as larry until I try to put him to bed. Even then he's not really crying like he's in pain, just being a busy pants - crawling around etc. He mostly starts to cry just when I come in kiss him and lay him down, or even just put him in the cot.
We've got a good bedtime and daily routine - what gives!!! We had some good weeks after he started crawling, but that's all stopped now. Yesterday I even resorted to going from room to room to get him to follow me so he would get tired.
I so don't know what to do any more!
Please someone tell me this is just a phase that will pass of it's own accord. I'm so utterly exhausted - my whole day just falls apart if his sleeps are out of whack and I can feel myself getting to that point again where i just want to scream "GO TO SLEEP!!!!!!". I know how ridiculous that sounds. I also today just let him stay awake (since 7.30 this morning he's had about 3/4 hour sleep) because after nearly 2 hours sitting beside his cot settling I just didn't have the energy to "argue" anymore.
I feel like I need a week "annual leave" and he's only 8 months old - I'm such a light weight
Does anyone have any tips on calming down an overstimulated boy? Or even immobilising him a bit so he'll calm down and go to sleep.
Sorry for the long rant.
Tish
xx