There is a lot of debate about babies and sleep. We seem to think we have to “sleep-train” them. I was recently talking to a woman who was practically in tears saying she was trying to sleep-train her child (ie the child was screaming herself to the point of vomiting every night) because family and friends told her she had to, it was time baby learnt. In fairness to this argument, sleeping is not something babies are born knowing how to do. Or at least, they aren’t born knowing how to get themselves to sleep. You’ll see a lot of babies feed with eyes wide open until the veerrry last second and then BAM, asleep – well they don’t know it’s easier if you close your eyes…
Babies are also not born with the requisite hormones required to get to sleep (unless you count what they get in breast-milk..), nor are their sleep-cycles remotely similar to an adult. So getting to sleep is a big issue and it’s really not helped by the fact that it’s the FIRST question anyone asks you – like it’s the defining feature for how you’re going as a parent.. (no pressure or anything).
Well, I’m not going to tell you I have all the answers, but I can tell you that there is hope. I have 2 kids and I fed them both to sleep (tsk tsk) and when I say fed, I mean every couple of hours AT LEAST. What I can tell you is that they do learn to go to sleep without a boob in their mouths, when they are ready. And they do learn to sleep longer than 2 hrs without a feed, when they are ready. And they do learn to sleep through the night, even if you do all the above and don’t leave them to cry. The question is how long does it take and can you survive it?
My kids, the first was pretty text book I’d say – longer sleep was first sleep of the night, then feeding every 2-3 hrs and learnt to sleep through the night by about 22months. (That’s not to say that I too didn’t fall into the trap of thinking I had to try EVERYTHING to teach her to sleep…just fyi, nothing I tried changed a damn thing). The second wasn’t quite so “easy” (i didn’t think the first so easy at the time, but it was definitely normal and i learnt from the second that they can be soooo much worse). The second fed every 1-2hrs until nearly 22months, then it became the occasional 3-4hrs or even a 7hr stretch (once). He’s still a work in progress, but I can tell you after 4 years of broken sleep I am seeing the end of the tunnel (hooray!). Has it been easy? Hell no! But is it perfectly normal and ok to ignore people who think you should be “training” the baby? Absolutely.
I’m not trying to say what path you should follow, I’m just letting you know that if you do the hard yards IT WON’T BE FOREVER! I promise. My eldest is now awesome, has been since 2yo and given that 25% of 4yos don’t sleep through the night, I’m pretty happy.
BTW -sleeping “through” is actually defined as a stretch of more than 5hrs straight (or thereabouts) so seriously, it’s not just ok to have a baby that doesn’t sleep 13hrs straight, it is normal and fine and some people may need to adjust their expectations to fit the reality of what “sleeping through” means.
So i totally appreciate the aching exhaustion that you’re totally over, really i do. But my advice is, if you can possibly stand it, hang in there just a bit longer. Trying to “fix” it will just exhaust and frustrate you even more. There really is an end point, and hard as my second was, accepting it, setting the expectation of 2 years in my mind, cosleeping and just going with it made the second time so much easier and more enjoyable than the first. Baby needs you, and that’s ok. Enjoy the closeness while it lasts and know there is a light at the end of this bloody long tunnel.