How do i make my 11 month old sleep through the night?

Question

My 11 month old wakes up for every 2 hrs in the night, I have set up a schedule for him and usually put him to bed by about 9.30 p.m. I feed him solids by about 7.00 p.m give him a bottle of water and some formula. I then bathe him so that he gets good sleep through the night but he wakes up every two hours for his feed. I have been trying to increase the interval between two feeds tried to put him back to sleep by patting him & rocking him but that doesn't seem to work. He stays awake till the time i feed him must be even for 3 to 4 hrs. I also tried adding some cereal to his feed just to make him feel full but he refuses to take the feed if diluted or modified and stays up all the while till the time he is fed. I
discussed this with his paediatrician but he doesn't seem to take it that seriously and just tells me that he can't say why he wakes up every two hours.Is there anything more that i can try so that he sleeps through the night awaiting for your valuable suggestions

Answer 1

Close his door and let him stay away. You sleep. Feed him and put him to bed. I bet if you give him a couple hrs each night of crying time, I bet he will quit waking up. He had you trained, now you need to train him.

Answer 2

I am with Jenn with the whole pediatrician-thing. Him not taking you serious is not good. I would find another pediatrician if I were you. Mine blew me off when I had concerns about my son's tongue, and I ended up forcing him to really check him over. Turns out, my son needed a frenulectemy. So yeah, having said that, if there's nothing medically wrong with your son, you may need to change his eating habits for the entire day and increase bedtime. Give him more helpings of solids for all his meals and a snack with formula before he goes to bed. And this may not be true for your son, but with mine, the later I put him to bed, the more he wakes up during the night or earlier he wakes up in the morning. If I put him to bed around 8-8:30, he sleeps better. Also, your son may realize that he's got you where he wants you. You may need to ignore his cries in the middle of the night. Let him cry himself to sleep. Go in every 10-15 minutes to comfort him, but do not pick him up. He'll begin to understand that he isn't going to get what he wants and will eventually give up. It'll take a lot of patience on your part. But at his age, he shouldn't be waking up like that. I wish you the best of luck.

Answer 3

Babies' needs change. You cannot expect them to become fixed and stick to your 'schedule'. All kinds of things can trigger waking--teething (molars especially), fears, ear ache, growth spurt, bad stuff happening at home, etc. And to push the whole schedule thing means that the schedule becomes more important than the baby's needs. Check out Dr. Sears about nighttime parenting. We can't expect our children to only need us during the day--they have needs at night as well. "Crying it out" is cruel and only reinforces bedtime as something to fear. It also teaches the child that Mom/Dad won't respond to their needs, which only creates further insecurity and anxiety.

To say an 11 month old "shouldn't be waking up every 2 hours" (as some people have replied) one respondant did makes no sense and totally disregards the baby and his needs. It's not easy for Mom, I know, but it will pass, and the best lesson you can give your baby is that his needs will always be met, that you are always there with warmth and comfort and you are willing to figure out what his needs are--and the fears, discomfort, anxieties, whatever, will soon pass. And you thereby affirm the world is a kind place, not a place where parents are told not to hold their babies when they cry.

My first baby woke up a lot at night, especially when his molars were coming in (imagine the dull ache they must feel), and I just had to ride it out. My second baby is waking a lot right now because his first teeth are coming through. It's a bit rough, but I have to help him, rather than force him to go it alone and in pain. Letting your baby snuggle up with you in bed just might be the thing he needs right now! It works for my kids.

I'm sure you're doing you're best--just hang in there. It will pass. Good luck!

Answer 4

Make sure he is eating plenty during the day so that he doesn't need the food. Then try taking him to the store to buy a couple of special "nightime" tippy cups. Fill one of them with nice cold water at bedtime after toothbrushing. When he wakes, ignore him for awhile and see if he takes a drink and goes back to bed. My son would always wake up and I realized that I usually got thirsty once or twice at night so maybe he was too. I gave him some water and he never woke me again.
Give him lots of extra cuddles during the day so that the food is not just a ploy for cuddles. You can try just cuddling him without any food at night to see if that is what he wanted, then you can break the food habit and work on the cuddle habit slowly.

Answer 5

Maybe you should be feeding him more solids during the day. Are you only feeding him cereal. He should be eating more than that at 11 months. Give him mashed potatoes, mac -n- cheese, or anything that's soft and muhsy. Also are you keeping him up during the day. At 11 months, my son was up all day except for a nap around 11 or 12 noon. He would sleep for two hours and be up till around 8:00. My didn't sleep all night till he was 12 months but we wasn't up every 2 hours.

Answer 6

The old tale that cereal will help them sleep through the night is often untrue. Talking to your pediatrician and him not taking you seriously even though your son is 11 months old should be a red flag. He obviously is not the one you need. He could be suffering from acid reflux, or take him to a ear nose and throat specialist, and look information up online to see if he is suffering from a breathing disorder. Something like sleep apnea wakes up people with it several times a night. He may have fluid in his ears, which causes sleep to be uncomfortable for little ones. I took my eight month old to the Ped and he blew me off, but I took him to his ENT Dr and he had tonsillitis really bad and ear fluid so bad that he went on and put buttons in his ears, he had several ear infections already. After the buttons and a mild decongestant that was prescribed he started sleep better and now sleeps most nights through. Never give up on an opinion from one Dr when you "feel" something is not right. You are his mother and can pick up on things. If nothing else seeking this help may open the doors that will lead you into the answer.

Answer 7

This will be a process, but try this:

Ensure that he gets alot to eat before bed. Give him ceral by spoon if he won't take it in his bottle. Then, slowly dilute his bottle in the night until eventually he is getting only water. Once he is getting only water in the night, he may eventually begin to not wake up. If he is still waking up, you will have to start ignoring his cries. Make sure he is okay (Doesn't have a diaper rash, isn't sick, etc), but leave him be.... you may cry harder then he is, but you will start sleeping through the night!

Answer 8

thats hard to say, I have two lil girls back to back so sleeping is a word of the past for me. lol. but with both girls i had to do something different. with my oldest daughter (2) when she was yonger i would wrap her in a blanket and rock her to sleep and as she got older i made play time longer and feedings bigger and added new things.with my youngest its a very long play time and a nice warm bath right before bed. all that play and a warm bath would complete any day she's had. she's the same age as ur son. make play time longer if u can. playtime is the best time to lose engery for bedtime. but what works for one child may not work for your son. hope that helps.

Answer 9

My son is 11 months old also. He doesn't sleep all night, but he's quiet. He goes to bed at 10 and usually wakes up around 12 or 1 and plays in his crib and goes back to sleep. Then wakes up again around 4 and plays and goes back to sleep. I only know this because I was sick for while and couldn't sleep. He never makes any noise though. We forced him to be that way... not bother anyone at night. When he first started showing he could go all night, about 4 months old, we would wait about 30 minutes after we first heard him before going to him. Sometimes he would stop crying and just play. Sometimes he would actually be hungry. We gave him cereal in his bottle too, at first he refused it, but we wouldn't allow him to have anything until he ate some of that. Finally he caught on. When he would wake up at night and continued crying we'd go in there, make sure he wasn't hungry or wet or dirty. If he wasn't any of those we'd hold him for a few minutes and lay him back down. At first he cried a LOT, almost an hours worth of screaming. He just wanted someone to stay awake with him. He didn't want to be by himself. We'd just leave him to cry. I know it sounds horrible, but it worked. He only cries for a couple minutes now, he knows that we're not just going to stand in there and hold him for hours. That's what our pediatritian told us to do, if we wanted him to stay quiet all night... just show him that if there's nothing really wrong with him, to not expect anyone to come to him. All I can guess is that your son knows you'll come to him. You're a comfort. Another thing we did is made him wait for his night time feedings. From about 2 months we'd do this weekly. From the time he would wake up and cry we'd make him wait about 5 minutes before he would get to eat. After about a week of that he'd do the 5 minutes by himself (he'd wait about 5 minutes before he cried). Then the next week we'd make him wait about 10. By the end of the week he'd be doing it by himself. We just continued that until he didn't cry and scream at all, unless something was really bothering him. We also leave a few toys in his bed for him to play with when he wakes up at night.

Answer 10

Around 11 pm I would give my son some warm cereal. He would usually sleep through the night.