8 Month Old Not Sleeping

It's not only seperation anxiety. When they're in the stages of learning something new like sitting up by themselves, or crawling, walking or pulling up, they will wake up at night because their brain is stimulated by these new actions. At that age, they're always teething too. It could be any number of "normal" things causing that. And when they're in that more stimulated mode, any little noise will rouse them. What worked for us is getting a sound machine and set it to the rain sound. You'll figure something out and she'll start sleeping again. Hang in there!

my daughter is now 19 months but i remember when she was around those ages she went through the same thing it was her teething that was keeping her up i started giving her those homieopathac teething pills at night she would still wake up but not as often

Unfortunatel, they go through these stages. I NEVER let my son cry it out at night. you do what you think its best, but if 1.5 hours doesn't stop her crying, I think it is cruel to continue. She is 8 months old and you are the mom, you need to be there for her. You can never possibly know exactly what is wrong, but something is, so don't ignore her. My son is a great sleeper, but would go through these phases of about two weeks where he would stop sleeping and it would be hard to get him back. Then, he would go back to normal. I too did the rocking thing, but there were times where he would only sleep with me holding him. He is now two and I havent' seen him in the middle of the night since Christmas! I disagree with people who say you are going to spoil or get her in a negative routine by doing what she needs at the time, it didn't happen with us! Besides rocking, I do like the sound machine idea. White noise can really help, we used a cool mist humidifier at times. Also, is it dark in the room? My son has always slept in the pitch dark because I didn't want to use night lights. Starting at this age, every now and then, I have to turn some kind of light on and it calmed him right down. I put a night light in the bathroom next to his room. I open the bathroom door to give him some light and he will usually let me leave and fall back asleep on his own. Maybe she is just waking more often in the middle of the night and being able to see something will assure her. My son went through another bad stage at around 15 months old where he had to be on my chest to calm down. I would take him to the recliner and try to get some sleep myself. This lasted about two weeks and then stopped. Good luck, we all know how draining this is!

sounds like seperation anxiety mom. i may be a meanie here but mine did the same thing, if she's not running a fever, or sick then leave her alone she will cry herself out. i'd first take her to the Dr to make sure there is nothing physically wrong as to why she is waking up every hour screaming then honestly i'd ignore her.

what time are you putting her to bed?? try pushing her bedtime back by half an hour and see if that helps...if not...try an hour. its entirely possible that she is just not tired yet.
also try establishing a good bedtime routine...start with bathing her, gettng her in her jammies, maybe some of that lotion, then some cuddling and a book, and bottle or cup or whatever. turn off everything else...no tv...keep the lights dim...just make it a nice relaxing time. she may just need to wind down a bit more before you put her to bed.

Hi M.,

I understand how hard it is! We had sleep regression around this time too. Personally I would let her sleep with you as much as possible, and try to adjust to keeping her consoled as best you can. After all, she has no way to know whether she's safe at this age if she's alone in a dark room, and frankly I think that's not something you can teach. She will learn safety & security after many months of experiencing it. BTW this is *not* the wimpy way out! It's the most challenging way IMHO but it shows baby you'll always be there for her.

If you are/were nursing, that is a big help overnight. I learned to side-lie & sleep through most nursings and still do. On teething nights, it's the only way we make it through. Many times she'll have begun teething again and her increased night nursing is what shows me it's started again. If we were letting her cry it out, then instead of increased nursing she'd have had a terrible night and I'd be frustrated wondering if she might be teething. Closer contact at night keeps me much better in tune with her. Hope this helps!