u/Hot_Access3264

Hi everyone,

Just looking for some advice or to hear what worked for others 😊

My son is 8 months old and used to sleep through 7–7 until the 4 month sleep regression hit. Since then, it’s been really up and down. He’s had the odd night where he’ll sleep 7–3 or 7–5, but most nights he’s waking every 2–3 hours.

The thing is, he’s not waking for hunger. When he wakes, he cries, but as soon as I pick him up he closes his eyes and goes back to sleep. Sometimes I can just pop his dummy back in and stroke his hair and he’ll settle, but then he’ll wake again an hour or two later.

His schedule is pretty consistent:
- Wake around 6am
- First wake window ~2 hours (he can’t manage longer in the morning)
- Then 2.5–3 hours
- Last wake window 3–3.5 hours before bed
- Daytime sleep totals about 2.5–3 hours over 3 naps
- Bedtime usually between 7–8pm

Day naps are a bit of a struggle, he sleeps really well if I contact nap, but if I transfer him to the cot he either wakes straight away or after about 20 minutes. I do want to move away from contact naps, but I’ve been continuing them for now just to make sure he’s getting enough daytime sleep while nights are so broken.

I’m also wondering if this could be another regression as he’s recently started crawling and babbling a lot more.

I know every baby is different and there’s no one size fits all, but I’d really love to hear what helped your babies sleep longer stretches at this age?

Also, his cot is still in my room — I’m not quite ready to move him into his own room yet, but planning to once naps are more consistent.

Any tips or experiences would be really appreciated!

Hi everyone, I’d really appreciate some insight or similar experiences! I’m UK based.

I had my first baby 8 months ago. I went into spontaneous labour at 40+5 after a completely uncomplicated pregnancy. The only thing noted towards the end was that baby was back to back.

My waters broke around 4:30am and contractions became very strong and frequent by 6am, so I went into hospital and I was 2cm. I had hoped for a water birth and to avoid an epidural, but due to how intense the pain was for me I had pethidine and then an epidural at 4cm. I just have so much regret not at least trying to get in the pool😞

Not long after, I was offered a top-up because I was feeling a lot of pressure. I agreed, but I wasn’t really aware that this would leave me unable to feel or move my lower body!! (I mean I knew this beforehand but with the pain and how out of it I felt, I was not thinking) I then fell asleep after this.

When I woke up, I was contracting 6:10 and baby’s heart rate had dropped. The midwife pressed the buzzer and quite a lot of doctors and surgeons entered the room. They asked if I could move on my side but couldn’t move much due to the epidural. Within minutes I was taken for a category 1 emergency C-section at around 5cm dilated.

My baby was born healthy, thankfully, but it was quite a traumatic experience. I also had a significant infection in my C-section scar afterwards and was in and out of hospital for about a month ( I don’t know if this would affect my chances at VBAC )

After the birth, I was told baby’s lactate levels were 9 (and that above 4 is considered high), so they felt the decision for a C-section was necessary and most likely saved his life.

I’ve never really had a clear explanation as to why his heart rate dropped, and I still think about it every day and I can’t help but wonder if having that unnecessary epidural top up caused it 😭

I’d really love to try for a VBAC in the future. Has anyone had a similar experience (especially with back to back baby or sudden heart rate drops)? And does this sound like a situation where VBAC might be a good option?

Thank you so much 🤍