6 Month Old Not Sleeping Well

Does your son have acid reflux? (Can be just crying after burping, crying when lying down or like my son, TONS of spitting up) This made my son wake up all night long for months. We tried a few different medications and they did help. It was the only way we got any sleep. His tummy improved around 11 1/2 months and we took him off the medicine. It was the same time that he started to walk, so he was more upright all day too!
Good luck, sleep deprivation is so tough!

We are going through this with our 6 month old son also. Then it dawned on me, this kid needs more food!!! LOL, he's a BBIIGG boy for 6 months, and I guess I had forgotten since our last boy that cereal at night is mom's best friend! If you're not giving him cereal before bed, try it. If you are giving him cereal at night and he's still waking, then here are some other suggestions...

We play a cd all night long for our son. Helps him fall back asleep without us when he does wake.

We have also been back and forth with formulas for our youngest. He started waking when we went to the Similac Alimentum (Similac's version of the Nutramigen). We went back to Isomil and he slept like a baby. The hypoallergenic seemed much more dense to me, and may have been upsetting his tummy (could also have been a complete coincidence). We are trying to determine if he has a milk or protein allergy (bouts of mild eczema), but still have not quite nailed the culprit.

Mylicon drops are great if he seems gassy also. These were a God-send with our now 3 year old.

He's probably also teething. If all else fails, try some orajel and tylenol before bed.

Hard to nail it down at this age. Could be a million things. I'll think about you when I'm up with our little guy next time :) but hopefully the cereal will continue to work for us (and maybe for you, too!). Good luck to you, let me know if you find a secret!

~ V.

My son does the same thing and he is 10 1/2 months old. He will sleep for about an hour during the day and then he goes to bed around 7 and gets up anywhere from once to three times a night and some mornings is up at 5 a.m. on. It gets frustrating because our almost 6-year-old has been a good sleeper from when he was little.

Not sure what the answer is. I wonder if the growth spurt thing is true that they are just hungry. Sometimes he falls back asleep right away and other times he is awake for 1 to 2 hours.

Lack of sleep is the absolute worst. I hope thing get better for you.

I thought maybe it was that he was cold, but last night made sure he was nice and warm and he still was up. I can't figure it out.

I have a seven month old baby boy, and whenever he does that kind of thing, he does it for one of three reasons. He is either overly tired, in which case, I need to put him down right before I think he should go to sleep. He is hungry, which means I should feed him more cereal closer to his bedtime. (are you feeding the baby solids yet?) or, my recent problem, which has been teething. He wants to nurse more when he teeths. I put the numbing stuff on his gums, and that seems to help him sleep. I have also heard that baby's this age can start to have nightmares that wake them up at night, so maybe if you let the baby cry, he will put himself back to sleep. I am sorry you are tired all the time! I really feel for you!
-H.

I know babies go through a huge growth spurt around 6 months, and want to eat around the clock. Plus, I know their sleep schedules are a mess during these spurts. I can totally relate though, because my son was an amazing sleeper until 4 months old. Then boom, he wakes 1 to 3x a night, and he's almost 20 lbs. Anyway, if it is a spurt, it shouldn't last very long. I really hope your little one gets some sleep, so you can as well.

Hi J., just a thought here. Is it possible that he could be teething? I have 4 children, the youngest is 7 months and we've had a few nights like that too. I suggest you give your baby some ibuphrophen before he goes to bed. If he sleeps better then you will know that was probably the problem. We sleep with our baby and I nurse him. At night when he's teething he will be very restless. You could also give your baby tylenol, but motrin last longer.

Good luck!

The first thing that comes to my mind is he is alergic to something in his environment or yours if you are breast feeding. Alergies can develop at any time, even to something that you weren't previously alergic to. If there are any homeopaths in your area they could pin point it out in 30 minutes or less. Or you could start eliminating things from his/her environment - just do one thing at a time and wait two weeks after each elimination to see if that was it :)

When my son was a baby & wouldn't sleep well at night, I was told not to let them take a nap after 5 p.m. I was also given the advice to get into a routine right before bedtime. Maybe a bath, or if you are a parent that believes in reading early to babies, you could try that. Whatever works for you. Hope this helps a little.

R.

I feel for you and I am so sorry. I have a one year old that still has those sleeping problems. We had to put him on low iron formula that helped a little. Also having 2 well timed naps during the day has helped, but yet I too am still sleepy, sometimes I guess, I hope these things will work out in time...

I suggest evualate his schedule. I have a 16 month old and he had slept very good through the night up until he was like 15 mos. I tried every thing. I fed him more before bedtime, tried giving him a cup for bed (bad mommy lol) I even tried just letting him pass out on his own every night. I did every thing i could think of. It wasn't til his dad was tellin oh he took a 3 hour nap today. I was like WHAT lol My son i found out can not take no longer then a hour nap during the day or else he is up all night long and i don't get no sleep for work. My girls were never like this but my little guy is tottally different. We started waking him at 9am and he goes down for a nap around noon. Sleeps for a hour then he has to be wokin back up. He then goes to bed at 9pm with all the other kids. so check out his schedule. I know he is only 6 mos but at that age they need a routine tooo.

How many naps is he taking through the day and how does he sleep at those? He should be taking two good naps a day with each one being at least and hour and a half. I would let him start crying it out at night and let him try to comfort himself. If you go in there everytime he cries, he knows that you will be coming. He is smart so he continue to cry until you come in. Just give it a few days of this and he should be a lot better. Good luck to you and stay strong! It will be over soon.

T.

Have you tried bathing him at night??? I didn't think that the johnson & johnson bedtime bath really worked, but it does and that really did help my son sleep well, even to this day. Just give it a try, there's nothing like a nice bath and a good warm bottle before going to bed for a baby. THAT'S WHEN YOU GET THE BEST SLEEP LOL

Hey!
I'm not big on giving little ones medicene, esp if it's just to get them to sleep better, that's not a good thing. Starting your kids on a drug induced sleep when they are so young is wrong.
There has to be another reason for him not sleeping. Even if he's just hungry or teething. It seems if you changed his diet, that it would most likely have somthing to do with the formula. Maybe he is allergic to something in it, or it just stimulates him in an over the top kind of way. It seems it would do you both some good to experiment with his formula some more.
Don't be afraid to stand in the store and read the labels on the formulas. Try to get one that is the closest to real milk as possible. Better yet, try fresh goat or cows milk direct from a dairy. Ones that haven't been processed.
When my older sister was a baby, fresh cow's milk was the only thing they could find that wouldn't make her sick. It was a trial for my parents.
The more natural for us the better!

Blessings!

Hi J.!

My suggestion would be to try AROMATHERAPY. (My mother-in-law teaches aromatherapy and I've learned a lot from her!) A nighttime massage with a lavender-chamomile blend (very good for children) would help calm him down and relax. Plus, it'll be soothing for you as well and a great bonding experiance!

There are multiple ways to apply essential oils (massage, baths, air diffusor) but the number one thing to focus on is finding a quality line of essential oils that are all natural, pure and free of "filler chemicals" which can sometimes aggravate sensitve people and possibly do more harm than good! (If you would like to know more about the line of essential oils my mother-in-law recommends to her massage therapy students, just send me an e-mail.)

Good luck with your little ones! :o)

E. T.
1000MomsClub.com

Hi J.~
Waking every hour is NOT a normal phase. But it could be something such as an ear infection or teething that you wouldn't know of if there were no other symptoms. I would have the ped. check him out and if all is well on that end, think about a growth spurt...maybe he is hungrier and you need to boost his daily intake a little. What is interesting is that you mentioned overstimulation. Way to know your baby!! :) Overtired babies do NOT sleep well...he may actually need more sleep during the day to be able to sleep well at night. Babies typically need to nap after 2 hours of waketime, more often during a growth spurt. I think if you regulate naptimes routinely during the day, maybe even adding a nap in the evening (if youre not already) you'll see a difference in nighttime sleep. Feel free to msg me and I'll give you the sleep advice I've researched. It has been a lifesaver (sanity, too) in our house!
Good luck!
~L.

Hello J.,

sometimes babies go through stages like the one you described, at times they don't seem to get enough sleep. Other times they don't seem to get enough to eat. It's normal for them. Unfortunately you have to go through it with them and it can be hard. But take heat. He is outgrowing one schedule to conform to another and you can help him with that. Soon you will be able to figure out what his new schedule is.

My oldest did the same thing. It was hard but we finally got him on a good schedule. I'd keep trying to lower his stimulation, feeding him baby food and less naps during the day. He could be just overtired and it creates a bad pattern of sleep. Consistancy is the best in all things.

Hi J..
When my daughter was an infant she woke CONSTANTLY throughout the night. I was not getting much sleep either. If I held her she could sleep for hours but when I laid her down (then back sleeping was recommended) within an hour she was awake. It was as though she had been startled awake. I mentioned it to the Ped. and we figured out that she had floppy airways. The muscles in her throat weren't strong enough to hold the airway open when she would get into the deeper REM sleep and she would startle awake because she couldn't breathe. I started put her down on a 45 degree incline and she slept all night! I continued with that until she was about 10 mos old. That gave her airway time to strengthen.
Let us know how it goes...
E.

I have a daughter who's almost 3 yrs old now. She has/had a hard time going to bed at night cause she just was always wired even though she didn't have junk food before sleep. I went to a herb shop and asked their oppion on what I can do. They suggested that I put her on liquid ceritonin and EFA Blend for children (this is in a vitamin E form). It has helped me tremendously. She now calms down and relaxes and will actually go to sleep before 1am. I hope this helps.

You said you put him back on the Nutramigan formula? Could that be the problem. I just recently put my son on the Nutramiagan and noticed at first for the first month or so that he wasn't sleeping well during the day. He would still sleep great at night (9-11 hours for a 2 month old) but I noticed that the change made it hard for him to sleep during the day. Why not try giving it a while and see what happens. It could be that the change has affected his sleep pattern. My little guy now sleeps well during the day and at night again. The other way that we got him to sleep so well at night was we started with giving him a smaller bottle (4oz at his age) then we would do a bath with the Johnson's Bedtime bath moisturizing body wash and then I would lotion him with the Bedtime lotion real good. Then we gave him another bottle (4oz again). Another idea that just came to me is when is he eating supper? Try giving him a small snack before bed. Might keep his tummy fuller and he would then sleep longer. The bottles only stay with them for so long but solids stay with them longer. Just a few ideas to think about. Keep us posted as to how it goes.

My 6 month old just started waking up, too, but it's because he rolls himself over and wakes himself up. Does he roll over and that's what wakes him up? Sometimes my little guy just needs to readjust and kind of cries, but he's not actually awake. I usually give him about 5-10 minutes and then go check on him if he's still crying. Stick to a routine and maybe he needs shorter nap time during the day and that will help him sleep at night. Good luck and keep trying things!