Advice Needed Re: Teething and Maintaining Schedule

First of all, a 5-month-old that sleeps from 9pm to 6am IS sleeping through the night. Good job! And it's great that he goes back to sleep after the 6am bottle.

If he is, indeed, teething, I'd give him the Tylenol just before bed time. Both of mine had (and still have!) these interruptions every few months for one reason or the other. Generally, we deal with whatever is causing it, it lasts for 3 or 4 days, then it takes another 2 or 3 days to re-establish our previous routine.

You might also note that symptoms for teething and for ear infections are almost identical: runny nose, grumpy, low fever, tugging at ears, not wanting a bottle (or just chewing the nipple when it's offered). With either problem, he might not be drinking a lot during the day, but will finally take a bottle in the middle of the night because he's hungry enough and tired enough to ignore the ear/teeth pain.

One thing I know Babywise says is that hunger is always a legitimate reason to feed, so I would simply offer a bottle when he wakes up and get him back to sleep. If it happens more than a few days, you might want to assess his day-time eating.
If you've started solids, he might not be getting enough milk/formula, so he's really hungry in the middle of the night.
Maybe a bed-time bottle will help. Both of mine did not initially have a bed-time bottle, but then got one around 5 or 6 months old, then dropped it again by their first birthdays. Just make sure he's not falling asleep while drinking the bottle, and you want to brush his teeth-gums so the formula doesn't sit on his teeth all night (shouldn't have to worry about it if you're using breastmilk). We would offer the bottle after bath time and story time, then brush teeth (this was simply letting the baby chew on a little baby/toddler toothbrush), which helped keep the bottle time separate from sleep time.

As a side note: establishing teeth-brushing at this age worked really well for us. We've never, ever had an issue with it with either child (now ages 2 and 4).

I wouldn't use Orajel it will actually make him more fussy.

Although I agree that it could be teething, he could also be going througha growht spurt and be genuinely hungry. Does he eat any solids yet? Maybe something before bed would help. I have never been a fan of crying it out myself, but if you have clearly given him everything he needs, then it would seem like you could still do that. Also, has he started sitting up, or even crawling, or doing any other physical activity that is causing him to burn more calories. That was about the age that my son would drink more than the normal bottle at night time. Sometimes even an extra 3-4 oz. so maybe you could try that too. Good luck, this is a frustrating time, but I have always had great sleepers, and if they do wake up for a week or two, it has never ruined their schedule in the end. ~A.~

In my experience with my now 14-month-old teething is certainly an ongoing problem. While it is just a phase, and will get better for short spurts inbetween teeth, it lasts a long time. She started at 4 months and now is getting 3 of her "one year" molars at once. I didn't have much luck with the teething tablets or oragel, but I did with Tylenol (and we switched to Motrin for everything but fever at 6 months). However, instead of giving him Tylenol when he wakes up, try to fix the problem before it starts and give him Tylenol at bedtime or even 30 minutes before so it can start working. This has really been a night-saver for us. And we just watch for signs of teething and administer the Tylenol when we feel the need. If he is genuinely hungry you might try an extra bottle, a later feeding of cereal or even cereal in the bottle. But I would suspect, that more than likely, its the teeth. Best of luck, sorry for the long reply!

Hi C.,

While I agree that teething is tough on little ones, it shouldn't lead to messed up schedule days for too long. I might wonder if he's up out of habit now. I personally would CIO - but not for hours or anything.

I also follow Babywise and love it. I found another book that helps me as well is Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child by Marc Weissbluth. You may have read it already. It does discuss teething and how it is not a catch-all for fussy behavior and sleep problems.

Good luck! C.