My 15-month-old refused to sleep – until I took drastic action

I’d been in and out of his room 10 times that night. Had tried feeding, changing, burping, rocking him. Nothing was working. He just wouldn’t settle. 

For 15 months, Joey had slept perfectly. But now, my husband and I were lucky to get one hour of uninterrupted kip – and I couldn’t understand why.

I was frustrated, desperate. And exhausted.

I hadn’t experienced a lack of sleep like this since Joey was first born. 

There had been some complications with delivery – he got stuck, basically – and while he was in the neo-natal unit, I was moved to a ward in the middle of the night for recovery. 

I was a vulnerable new mum, still awaiting feeling to return to my legs after a spinal epidural, and that disruption to my sleep had a huge knock-on effect. 

‘I feel worse than when my dad died,’ I sobbed to my husband. 

I’d heard that sleep deprivation is used as a form of torture and I now understood why. You’ll say or do anything when you’re that tired. 

A week later, we were back home, in our happy little bubble. We hadn’t given much thought to getting Joey into a routine but luckily, we stumbled into our own rhythm. 

Things were so smooth that, when people asked about my baby’s sleep, I didn’t get what all the fuss was about. 

This wave of luck lasted until Christmas, when a friend from overseas came to stay. For whatever reason, this upset Joey, then 15 months old, and our once settled and happy baby suddenly became needy for additional comfort and support. 

He started waking early every morning, couldn’t settle during the day for a nap and became reliant on the pacifier that had previously been for bedtime only.

By this point, I was pregnant again and, as the weeks went by, the need for Joey’s sleep to be back on track was growing more urgent. 

I tried routines from books or things my friends suggested, like the EASY routine by Tracy Hogg. This is where you feed the baby (E is for eat) then give them some Activity time (A) before settling them to Sleep (S) and then have some You time (Y). 

It all seemed to make sense and it worked for my friend… But not for us. Joey was too curious to calm down that quickly. 

In fact, nothing seemed to work. 

When Joey was 21 months, his baby sister was born. 

So while she would wake during the night for feeds, we were also contending with a toddler who didn’t sleep through. 

Sleep became one big lottery. Sometimes it felt like they were a tag team at waking us up! 

The effect sleep deprivation has on your mental well-being alone is something I wouldn’t wish upon anyone. I had low energy, felt irritable, couldn’t face exercising or making the right food choices.  

I was like I was constantly in fog, stumbling through the days. It’s something you can’t truly appreciate without experiencing it.  

A few months in, I was utterly exhausted and knew I needed to get them both into good sleep habits – for all our sakes. 

Turning to an expert was not a decision I made lightly – I worried she’d tell me things I’d already read and researched myself. 

Nonetheless, I called a sleep consultant who came to the house armed with a written plan. 

For Joey, she advised we needed to get his daytime nap back on track, get rid of his dummy and allow him time to settle himself to sleep, going in every 10 minutes to reassure him.  

None of this was easy but within just three days, his night sleep improved massively. 

As for my new baby, she simply told me to pick her up, soothe her and put her back down. It seemed simple but from three months, Sienna was sleeping through from 10pm until 6am. Bliss. 

One thing she told me really stuck – each baby is unique. 

I had understood this at a surface level, of course, but I’d never truly appreciated how much the personality of the child impacts the approach to parenting.  

It explained why something that worked for my friend’s son – a laid-back character – never worked on my own super-alert child. I needed to respond to his needs and do what worked best for him. 

The best part of having a sleep consultant, however, was the accountability and reassurance that, without, leaves new parents second-guessing themselves and giving up too soon.   

I’d become obsessed over sleep, but now I had someone telling me that, at some stage, all parents feel like this. 

As a serial entrepreneur, my business head started whizzing. Surely if everyone felt like this, then a service should exist to help them, like this consultant had helped me.