Jenna had reflux when first born and has a dairy intolerance (we have had allergy tests done but they have come back negative, when she has had dairy she doesn’t immediately react but it affects her reflux). Her reflux is managed currently via food rather than medication anymore.
Has a dummy which we attach to her gro bag or pj’s
We play white noise
She goes to sleep in her room but when she wakes needs to co-sleep (more on this in history)
Has a bottle before bed (more on this in schedule)
This is a little tricky as we got back from Florida on the 10 January and so I am unsure if her sleeping is so horrendous and off balance on the basis that she has some form of Jet lag or if this is just the new horrific norm. I am giving you what is currently happening as well as historically what has happened so you can advise the best course of action:
Jenna is in nursery Monday – Friday 8am – 5.45pm
Awake: 7.30am (have to wake her up)
Breakfast: 8.00am – This is usually given to her at nursery and is 1 x Weetabix and offered some toast (all with oat milk)
Snack: 9.45-10.00am (I have attached her food diary from nursery so that you can see what food types the provide)
Lunch: 11.30am (see food diary)
Sleep: 12 – 2 (occasionally this is less and occasionally this is more, can range from 1.5 hours – 3 hours
Dinner: 3.30pm (see food diary)
Snack: 4.50/5pm (see food diary)
Snack: 5.45 pm (usually raisins or a little organix bar
Snack/light dinner: 6.15 – again maybe some bamba or bar or perhaps soup
Bath: 6.35pm (10 mins)
Teeth brush: 6.45pm
Dressed and play in room: 6.45-6.50
Bottle: 6.50-7.00pm
Waking patterns – settling:
Sleep: 7.00pm – 9.00pm
Awake: 9.00pm
Occasionally can be put back to sleep and if this happens then will sleep to midnight then awake
Last two nights has not been willing to go back to sleep and been awake till 12.30am (last night), 1.30am (night before), 2.45am (night before) – the fact that this has lessened by an hour each time is why I think maybe perhaps jet lag currently
When she is awake on this second occasion she will not be put back down in her cot and comes into the bed to co-sleep (jet lag or no jet lag)
To go to sleep we are in a nursing chair to give bottle, she stops taking milk when she is ready, puts her dummy in and gets comfortable to sleep, she goes to sleep on either me or my partner and we transfer her to the cot.
When she wakes up we don’t immediately go in but if she starts screaming or standing up we then go in. We try and put her down on her own but she gets up screaming more, holding her hands up to be picked up.
On the first wake up at 9.00pm she will go to sleep on her own in our arms and we can often put her back. On the second wake up prior to going away in December she would not go back down, she would point to the door to be taken out, when we sat on the nursing chair to try and calm her down and would scream and ‘buck’ and not calm down until she is out of her room. Prior to going away she would usually settle as soon as she was in the bed with us – straight to sleep.
When in Miami we were in the same room as her so we would give bottle on our bed, she would find a comfortable position on the bed and go to sleep herself (with us in the room). We would transfer her to the cot. As always she would be awake two hours later and we could not get her back to sleep to transfer. She would only co-sleep.
When we returned from Miami she now will not settle after her 9.00pm wake up, except this time she is much more agitated and vocal. Screaming at the top of her lungs, proper crying, flailing on the floor, kicking her legs, bucking and absolutely not settling until we take her downstairs. Here she is calm with the TV on, but will not sleep until the timings as noted in first paragraph
Prior to Miami the schedule was the same as above, except she wouldn’t usually be awake for so long (during 12 – 3am etc.) so she would wake at c6.30am as she would be asleep via co-sleeping with us.
We had a night nurse from the moment we got home for 2 months solidly, then 2 days per week for one month. The night nurse diagnosed her with reflux from day 2 of working (which was day 5 of being born). Night nurse was a nurse at the Portland. Moved from Aptimil Milk to
Aptimil Reflux and after one month had an appointment with paediatrician who recommended Nutramigin Milk with gaviscon. Reflux symptoms still present so was prescribed Ranitidine. The two medications caused Jenna to be slightly constipated and had horrific cramps/gas and would scream until she farted.
In terms of milk up until she was c 2 months old she would take no more than 30ml at any feed, this gradually did increase to 3 oz as a general, and occasionally 4oz, when we started weaning she did start taking 4oz as a general and occasionally 6oz at night.
Went to another paediatrician to get a second opinion at 8 weeks (day after her jabs), he prescribed Operazole. For two days straight she was horrific, screaming consistently, would not take food, would not settle –. We stopped all medication and booked to see an allergist and another paediatrician Dr Shah who advised she did have reflux, prescribed Ketofin and pro biotics and a dietician to manage her reflux with weaning.
From birth she hated the car, hated being in her buggy she was only not crying perhaps a few hours out of 24 hours and that was when we were ‘juzzing’ her or every so often in her baby swing. She would not sleep during the day for longer than 30 minute periods. The jabs made her reflux substantially worse, so each time she had one we had 3-4 days of horrific sleeping/eating/general wellbeing.
At six months we had a sleep consultant provide a plan in terms of weaning and sleep training. N.B. I do not and have never agreed with CIO.
We followed the weaning the dietician provided (this is part of the package with the last paediatrician) the timings the sleep consultant provided, and her reflux was substantially better with food integration but is bad (and still does get bad) when she came across something that affected her reflux: dairy, carrots, courgette, avocado, tomatoes (not any more).
The sleep consultant wanted us to try the timed method of crying it out. We still didn’t put her down awake, but when she woke up crying we would leave for one min and then go in, and then two min and then go in etc. Jenna was in a sleepyhead, inside a next to me cot in our front bedroom (not main bedroom or her bedroom). She did do pretty well and on day 2 we had a good day, but by day 3 onwards she no longer would go in that room without insistently screaming not just for sleeping, when we went in to feed she would scream, or change her nappy, etc. She had associated that room with unhappiness so we stopped with the timed crying.
At seven months we put her in her cot in her room and occasionally we would have a good night when she would sleep through, perhaps maybe 2 days out of the week. In December 2018 we went to Miami and her sleep was horrific, when we got back we had a night nurse come to help as we were just exhausted by this point. From January 2018 she was 6 months old and in nursery 2 days per week, a child minder 2 days per week and with my mother one day per week
N.B – the child minder has always been able to put her down for her naps awake and she has gone to sleep – her current nursery has been able to put her down awake from the moment she has gone there (August 2019) – with the exception of maybe twice over the past 20 months we have never been able to put her down awake, she has always kicked and screamed and flailed
The night nurse who came in January was with us for one week and during that time managed to get her to a point where she would self-settle, she would still wake up but would find her dummy and go back to sleep, at least 4 out of the 7 days. She used a method of putting a muzzy over the bars and when she would cry we would come up from behind the muzzy and she would realise that we were still there and not a problem (this likely stopped working at some point as she could stand up and see we weren’t there, also pull the muzzy down and also it sometimes became a game of a peek a boo to her.
This was fine until July 2019 when she had her MMR jabs and one year Jabs, and then of course her reflux kicked in for four days. She didn’t really get the usual symptoms though, she didn’t seem to show any issue with her legs or temp etc. it was mainly reflux which was screaming.
In August 2019 she moved nursery so this meant she had five days a week at the same place, one week before she started she got her first tooth hooray only 13 months old! – it was one of her back molars and everyone has said that those are the worst so thought perhaps that might be why she had been so bad.
Between August 2019 to date she has now got 10 teeth, four back molars, two top front, two bottom front and two either side of her top front two. She has not had one night where she has slept through and she is getting progressively worse.
I am literally at my wits end, I work five days a week and get a max of 4 hours sleep a night (broken) – I cannot take this much more but I really genuinely don’t believe in crying it out.
I am begging for some help – do you think at all is this possible> can we be helped?>
