Reply To: Experiencing night wake-ups with difficulty settling

[JC]

Hi Emma,

Thanks for your help with our questions and suggestions.Our baby just turned 6 months old. Usually, he falls asleep around 8pm and sleeps until 3-4am without any problems. Sometimes, though, he wakes up earlier and gets upset, like the other night when he woke up at 10pm and cried. I think he just wants to go back to sleep quickly but finds it hard. This doesn’t happen often, though. Most nights, he sleeps until 3am, has a feed, and then goes back to sleep easily.

Our bedtime routine is simple: we feed him at 7:30pm, play with him for a bit, then at 8pm, we turn on the white noise machine, put him in his sleep sack, turn off the lights, sing a lullaby, and lay him down. He’s getting better at falling asleep on his own, although sometimes it takes a while. But usually, he falls asleep peacefully when we using your settling technique. We’re feeling more confident about his bedtime routine. The only tricky part is when he wakes up before his usual time and cries loudly for about 15-20 minutes.