10 Month Old Waking up in Middle of Night

This happened to me too! What ended up being the case was that my son was getting two more teeth. I would try baby orajel (if you can get it in his mouth without too much fuss). That always seem to work for my son and he eventually settled back down and I was able to lay him back down in his crib without fuss. You can also try a little motrin or tylenol before bedtime, this might help him sleep through the pain. Either that or maybe he's having a little growth spurt.
Good luck.

T.,

I know how frustrating it can be, since i myself went through that. My son was 9 months when he started getting up, and he would not cry, he just didn't want to go to bed and of course for me being my first child i thought it was better to give him the attention he was asking for, but my husband didn't agree and suggested that we put him in bed and close the door and let him cry to sleep, so we did and despite my disagreement i have to tell you that it worked, i would check him 10 minutes after and he would be sleeping on the floor by the door, it took only days for him to get used to his room....good luck!

Like the other respondent said, but also, my Pediatrician said that at different age stages and levels of emotional development & growth... they also go through degrees of 'separation anxiety'... where even when they are sleeping, they will sometimes wake up and 'look' for you and want you close by etc. It can start at around 6+ months old. Again, this is a stage and it passes, and then off and on again it may rouse. And sometimes there is just no rhyme or reason as to why they may get up... who knows why. Sleep is not static and even we adults have trouble with it at times. But, it's a stage. It will calm down... and other phases may occur. Yes, it's tiring to have to get up all night.. but well, it will pass, and that's the way it is with a baby. SOMETIMES... the baby may just be truly hungry... and needs to feed. My baby is this way during his growth spurts.. I know that (according to his pattern) that if he can't go back to sleep on his own (which he usually can), then he is simply hungry. I will give him a bottle and he will totally guzzled it down in a few seconds, the entire bottle. Then, he goes back to sleep. At other times, he has gas. Then he goes back to sleep. For my baby... he has a 'transition object', a stuffed cow that he sleeps with, and it's his cuddle object.. and it really helps him to sleep.
Good luck!
~Susan
www.cafepress.com/littlegoogoo

You might want to consider that he might be teething. My 23-month-old got one of his lateral incisors a little before 10 months, but all babies are on their own schedule, and some teeth hurt more than others when coming in. Here are a few things you can try at bedtime:

Hyland teething tablets
Valerian Super Calm (by Herbs for Kids)
Tylenol (if you think he is in pain)

You can purchase lots of holistic stuff at www.iherbs.com. They have cheap and fast shipping. I use them all the time. Also, Mother's Market and Henry's have lots of things, too, but they are more expensive in most cases.

As far as the waking up...I know it is hard, but you may have to use the Ferber Method. Here are some links:

http://www.professorshouse.com/family/children/the-ferber...

http://www.babycenter.com/0_the-ferber-method-demystified...

I used this for all of my kids. However, I varied the time in between comforts to semi-random times b/c my kids learned to have an internal timeclock...instead of 5, 10, 15, 20 minutes I did 5, 8, 12, 20, etc.

The main problem you are looking at is that you are training your 10-month-old to wake up and get mommy's comfort in the middle of the night. It will be hard for the first week, but then you will be pleasantly surprised/shocked at the results of your consistency. The first night will be torture for you. It will get worse before it gets better. But I believe you are doing both you and your baby a favor in the long-run by helping both of you to get a good night's sleep. Best wishes!

Have you had is ears checked? I know that sounds funny, but my youngest son was the same way. When they lay down the pressure intensifies, hence the crying. When they are upright the ear canal in stabablized so it feels better. Might be something to look into, at least you'd know otherwise.
Best of luck. I know it's no fun to have sleepless nights:)

I went thru the same thing. Still not sure if it was the teething. It passed, and it will for you too. I actually have been going through it with my 17 month old just recently again. She screams and cries after being down for an hour or two, and sometimes I even have to take her out of her room to calm her, which is very unsual for her. She wants to be held and rocked, and I lay her down, and she cries again. Normally she goes right down and sleeps thru the night. Some nights I think it's the "night terrors", and some nights I think there's no real reason, other than restlessness on her part. I wish I had an answer, but I don't think there is one. I never let my baby cry more than 10-15 minutes - I can't. Again.... this too shall pass.
K.
Kellyis.stayinhomeandlovinit.com

Hi T.,
I am a new mom to a two month old so I hope this might help. My daughter was having the same problem with crying and when picked up she would stop. It got to the point where I would have to hold her for hours just so I could get some peace. She was diagnosed with GERD (reflux) She doesn't like to be flat on her back and when it is acting up she wants to be held as you mentioned that your child seems to like. If you want to know any more signs that my daughter had/has with her GERD, let me know. Until then, I hope you are getting some rest!

well, it is true it could be that your child is teething or it could be something else. If you want, you can talk to your peds doctor to see what he or she say. But one thing you may have to do is either give your child shorter naps to see if that works or when your child wakes up take them into bed with you. Some people may say don't do that while others say they did. I have two children and my first born I did not have to do that while my second one I had no choice. I feel it depends on the child. Each child is different and some things may work for one child while others may not. So these are some things you may want to think about and just see which one works for the both of you! good luck

We're experiencing sleep problems with our 5 month old and just got the Sleepy Planet CD yesterday.

Even if you don't implement their method, I think it would be worthwhile for the information. What you describe sounds like what they call separation anxiety.

They have a website too.

Well this is very normal behavior for infants. It is exhausting but there isn't much you can do other than what you have already been doing. It is very natural for infants sleeping patterns to change and there really is nothing you can do to prevent it. One day soon your little one will sleep soundly through the night, but until then you will have to continually adjust to your little mans schedule. It is very trying but it will all be worth it once he has adjusted. If you cannot continue to get up in the night with him consider having him sleep with you (unless you & your spouse move a lot). It sounds like your son just wakes up and wants to be close to you, again very normal. Also remain calm during when trying to put him back to sleep, if your tense he will be too which doesn't make putting him back to sleep any easier. Good luck sleepy mommy.

Hi,

Sometimes for no reason kids will get scared of their bedrooms, I had the same situation with my grandkids.
Does your son have a night light in his room, sometimes a
little light shines away the bad, if not you might try one.
Also sit with him and pray and tell him Jesus is watching over
him and won't let anything ever happen to him. You'd be surprised how much prayer works even on a little guy. Mostly if he feels that he can always depend on you
he will eventually stop it, but as for right now it may take
some changing things a bit, maybe a gloworm he can hug that way it will light up, basically you will have to try several things to see what will work best.It sounds like he got scared in the room and now is afraid of the room, maybe a loud noise. Good luck with it.

I had the same situation with my older son. I read Dr. Ferber's "Solving Your Child's Sleep Problems". The basic premise is that the child needs to learn how to fall asleep on his own, or rather, fall back to sleep. Many people refer to this method as the "crying it out" method and deem it barbaric, but I don't think they've read the book. It is very systematic, and very nurturing towards the child. It will be hard, no doubt because he will cry, as did ours, but there are intervals of time that you go back in there to reassure him that you're still there, etc. It will be a tough two or three days, but then you'll be so glad as you get to sleep through the night. i was getting up four or so times with my son. I would simply lay him back down and he'd go right back to sleep, but i, like you, was exhausted in the morning and then through the day. We had great success with this book, passed it along to a friend, and it worked for them as well. So, give it a try, or at least read the method in it's entirety, and you'll see there is nothing mean about it.

I hope this helps!

how long are his naps during the day??? try putting him down for shorter naps or stop nap time totally... you can also try putting him to bed a little bit later in the evening... my second daughter has never been much of a sleeper... even when i was pregnant, she was extremely active and kept me awake at night... she stopped taking naps when she was about 6 months old, shes 9 1/2 now and only sleeps 6-7 hrs at night... your son might have outgrown naptime already...

I got tired of getting up and down constantly too when my baby was that age. I found that we both slept better together. I researched about co-sleeping and found Dr. Sears and never went back!
http://www.askdrsears.com/html/7/T071000.asp

T.,

my baby did that when she was about 10 months. What I did was instead of going in there as soon as I heard her crying, i would let her cry for a bit.. she started putting herself back to sleep. If the cry got bad or if it was about 10 minutes, I would go in there and give her lovin or whatever she needed but now she sleeps through the night. The other thing is I don't usually put her down on her back. I never could get her to sleep that way, she would always wake right up as soon as i would put her down. I started putting her down on her side and that worked for me that way if she did start to wake up i could just pat her on her butt for a little bit and rock her back to sleep.

Hope this helps.
~J.

Same thing happened to me with my son! I figured out that he was having a growth spurt and was requiring a bottle at night...don't worry, he only woke up for three nights or so and then was sleeping thru again. Anyhoo, worked for me, you might try it!
p.s. This is still happening (even though he is over a year old) every four or five weeks during a growth spurt, he needs a bootle at night for a few nights.
H.

Might he be teething?