Little one is 9 months and her sleep has been such a mess in the last few weeks, waking up multiple times in the night (roughly every 2 hours), needing feeds to sleep and only sleeping if held. I am back to work and finding it hard with a consultant schedule. Any advice to a FTM from parents who went through this? Did anyone use a sleep consultant? Or any other hacks? Thank you

Probably a regression. It will pass with time, just keep the usual schedule

Just know there is nothing you’re doing wrong. You can try to adjust naps, timing, etc but sometimes you just have to ride it out. Maybe not what you want to hear but don’t necessarily tie yourself in knots trying a bunch of different things. Consistency is important and I promise this will pass!

No advice, just solidarity. Going through the same thing right now with my 8 month old.

Could be teething: "Yes, 9-month-olds are usually teething, often getting their upper front teeth (central incisors) or the ones next to them (lateral incisors) around this time, following the bottom front teeth that typically emerge between 6-10 months. While every baby is different, most have their first teeth by 12 months and a full set by age 3, with symptoms like drooling, fussiness, and gum chewing being common."

Adjust nap? I made every move to prioritize night sleep, so nap schedule was built around getting the 7-7.

Thank you! Manager 1, what did you do more specifically?

Try baby Tylenol and see if it helps.

Babies are tired and need sleep. We usually tried: one or minute or so to cry before we went to them, to help them learn to self soothe. If still crying, go with a cuddle. If they won’t settle with a cuddle, check if they’re wet. Check if they feel feverish. If still upset, we gave Tylenol. If they still cried with Tylenol, we would offer some water. We really prioritized eating during the day and no bottles at night, so I think only once or twice ever did we offer a bottle at night when absolutely nothing seemed to help. I recall one time baby sucked down the bottle and then slept, but many times the bottle also was refused and it was illness or something else.

It’s really frustrating and hard, I know it is. But really these things are sometimes just growth phases you have to get through and they’ll resolve themselves. But do not feel bad at all for whatever you need to do to get through it!

At that age I stopped night feeds entirely and sent my husband in to handle wake ups to make it clear that milk was off the table. They also start really ramping up solids and go through a growth spurt so try increasing calories and quantity of meals during the day. Also drop to two naps if you haven’t already done so. I remember hitting a rough sleep patch then so it’s normal.

Hey sleepy baby on IG is brilliant and has affordable guides. It’s so hard, but being responsive is effective.

How many naps is she taking? And how long? It’s possible she is getting too much daytime sleep. I’d do no more than 3/3.5 hours of daytime sleep at this point, split between 2 naps. One nap should be short (30ish mins) and one longer.

We were dumb FTP who really did not understand babies and sleep so we got a sleep consultant and man! It was the best money we invested. It was hard initially because we did gentle crying to sleep or whatever that version is called where we were in the room with our hand on our sons back but we refused to pick him up from his crib. My advice: use sleep consultant only if you are clueless as parents. Many and most are able to manage babies sleep schedule themselves but we were just not able to understand the basics of naps, feed, good sleep hygiene. It's a lot of money so use it if you are really struggling or nothing else has worked or if you are like us who has no clue about parenting babies

I worked with a sleep consultant and it was the best money I ever spent, so instead of it being trial and error for me, I felt like I had someone in my corner guiding me to success.