My husbands few on the situation..please read....

Ladies, hubbie and I have been chatting tonight about Hollie's situation.  He is much more better at vocalising his thoughts than me, I tend to get confused and muddled. so maybe this makes our situation clearer, and someone can suggest something.

If you where to sum it up, Hollie is, on an average day, inconsoable crying for 30 minutes three times a day. That could be morning/afternoon/ before bedtime.  Although not sleeping through the night, she tends to go down at 7pm, and she sleeps for 4/5 hours, take a feed of 100mls, and go down easily after 10/15minutes and sleep for another 2/3 hours and follows that pattern until she wakes up at 7am.  During the nightime, she never cries like she does during the day. Wakes first thing in the morning in a great mood. That for a start is making me doubt the reflux idea.  As she feeds more during the night, yet, cries much much more during the day.

She may be going through some teething, although, the patterns of when she cries are so regular, and again don't happen at night time, that i doubt teething is the sole problem.  she is on all the possible drugs we can give her,

She has cut her naps to 45 minutes, perhaps 2/3 times day. this morning for instance, she slept for 20mintues in a period of 6 hours, despite our efforts to put her over to sleep and clear signs she was tired.  the inconsable crying starts when she refuses to go over to sleep.

Is there any other medical cause that we are missing and could suggest? is it overstimulation??  Not much of a routine?  emotional needs not being met?

Many thanks for listening.

I honestly don't think the root cause is any of those things you mention latterly.

Overtiredness, for example, is awful to work through (S was hyper-alert baby), but is rarely the reason, after all something is causing the discomfort that prevents sleep and leads to ovetiredness.

Remember that with the reflux treatment it is supposed to mask the issues, so don't discount the meds just yet unless you think they are making it worse.

I'm guessing you've been considering colic, cranial osteopathy etc. Unfortunately none of us can diagnose her, but if you feel that your post does lay it all out more clearly, can you print it off and take it to the GP?

Also if this is becoming less manageable for you both, could you call up an org like http://www.cry-sis.org.uk/ (unfortunately their helpline is now closed till 9am tomorrow)

x

On reading your post the thing I thought of was over-tiredness.  George wakes at around 9am and goes to bed at about 8pm.  I'm lucky if I can get him to nap for 20 mins in the morning and the same in the afternoon.  Any more than that, all the better, but any less and it's a nightmare.  He can get overtired and that causes him to cry lots.  The overtiredness isn't a regular thing but is usually caused by over stimulation or just his nosiness and refusal to sleep.

I guess Madonna makes a point in that there could be something underlying causing her to be unable to sleep, but I've read that babies don't recognise when they are tired / that they need to sleep, and so they sometimes need help in that area, which is where sleep cues etc can help.

I don't know what the answer is but are you able to spot her tired cues so that you can help her to get to sleep before she gets overtired?  Is there anything you can do that helps her to sleep?  I'm thinking for example the fact that if George gets overtired, I generally can put him in his car seat and rock it and he'll go off.  You could try just for a day to get her to sleep more if this is the case, and see if that helps?

Sorry not much help I know but it's all I've got!!

Oh, only also to add that friends have had really good results with cranial osteopathy in helping with comfort / sleep, so could be worth a look?

Prob no help at all but B goes into meltdown very quickly when he is hungry and is inconsolable until fed. He is 18 weeks but still feeds usually every 2-3 hours during the day, although sometimes of an afternoon he goes 5 hours without a feed... If he's overtired it's more just fussiness and maybe some fussing-type crying. Do you try feeding her when she cries?

I would be tempted to treat it as overtiredness, over stimulation. My daughter suffered terribly with reflux but also with an inability to wind down if allowed to get overtired, which would then lead to a grumpy poor feeder and a vicious cycle for the rest of the day of too tired to feed, empty sore tummy, too hungry to sleep etc.

Do you wait for signs of tiredness before her naps? I found that by putting her down when she was still completely alert and happy, at a point that feels quite unnatural to be suggesting sleep she would settle far quicker than when she showed signs of being ready as that was usually too late. I don't  think she could comfortably stay awake for longer than 2-3 hours in the morning at that age without quite a major meltdown even though she was regularly sleeping through 10-11 hours at night by then.

Routine was very much up, feed, little play, feed and back to sleep with not a lot of time for anything else first thing.

I do hope things improve for you soon. I echo what others have said to push for any medical causes to be thouraghly investigated also by the doctors. Take care x

thanks all, we will consider all xxx

Oh Duck, I just wanted to give you a . You are doing a fantastic job - Hollie is so very lucky to have a mummy who is so concerned and loving. I hope you can find out what the issue is lovely.

My daugher was very like this, and aside from the fact she actually did have reflux (it was obvious now looking back as every picture we have of her as a baby she had a pool of possit next to her, but only during the day) we could never get her settled during the day.  About the refulx, my daughters pattern at night was identical to yours, feed, go to sleep, up in night for milk, no posset, then back to sleep again. It was only during the day that it was more obvious, no idea why.  She was swaddled at night so I am not sure if that in itself made a difference.

She just wanted to see what was going on. Even taking her for walks in the pram didnt make much difference.

I found a solution, well, for me getting an hours sleep, and it was to stick her in the car. There is a ramp onto the motorway about 3 minutes drive from here. When it got too bad I would put her in the carseat, and we would head to the motorway.  3/4 of the way up the ramp she would be sound asleep, and I would get some peace and quiet. I am lucking in that the coast is a 25 minute drive from here, so I would drive there, and stare at the sea to calm me down, and then drive home, which gave her a nap.  There is also an orbital road so I would drive round that, seeig people out about their business which made me feel as thugh I was part of the human race again.

It wasnt ideal, but I just accepted that it was something I had to do to avoid the meltdowns. When she woke from her naps she was in a good mood again, and the day was good from then on. 

I know its not ideal, but its how I dealt with it. 

How much milk is she taking in feeds during the day? 100mls doesn't sound like much for a feed during the night. Could she be hungry?

Sorry, I can't remember how old you said she was but I know the MW said when M was first born that she should be having at least 3oz at a feed. I know 3oz is less than 100mls but Hollie is quite a bit older, isn't she?

Overtiredness is a killer. Matilda used to go ALL day without sleeping; literally being awake for 15 hours. Oh the misery that comes with that is shocking. Will she co-sleep during the day so she can sleep for longer? Matilda will sleep for 20 mins in a cot during the day but a couple of hours if she is in my bed.

I do think it sounds like lack of sleep. I echo what the others said, try putting her down before she gets tired. Sammy wakes about 6 ish, bottle, breakfast about 8 and then I put him down about 8.30-9. He'll then go down after lunch again.

The tiredness thing is such a vicious circle, the only way to break it really is to put her down regularly to try and create a routine I think.

At 5 months S was probably having 5 bottles of 180ml (well, some were bfs but the equivalent of that). I started weaning him at 21 weeks which helped the reflux massively. Have you considered starting her on solids? Might help the reflux and fill her up.