frequent waking during night crying?

Hi
my six month old son normally sleeps through the night, recently he has been waking up to five times during the night crying sometimes still in his sleep?
he seems to only be comforted by a breastfeed?
can anyone tell me how i can settle him without a feed??
is this a normal problem?

Hi Newmum
My 5 month old usually wakes twice for feeds during the night but will occasionally wake 5 times or more.
If your bub is still asleep when his crying you can either try ignoring him for a couple of minutes and see if he will go back to sleep..you have probably tried this and its not working...
If you roll him onto his side an pat his bum he might settle?
Other than that I dont have any tips as nothing but the breast works for my bub!

My son did this for a couple of nights at 4 1/2 months after sleeping through from when he was nine weeks old. I would breastfeed him and he would go to sleep after about 30 seconds which wasn't like him at all, as soon as I put him to bed the crying would start again. This was happening every 2 hours only at night - he was fine during the day. On the second night - I don't know why- I looked in his mouth and his bottom 2 teeth were making an appearence, I put some teething gel on and it worked a treat! Could he be teething? I know you get sick of everyone saying everytime they dribble, put hands in mouth or touch their ears - all normal baby behaviour - 'He's teething!!!', it happened to me all the time. But I just thought I'd share my experience as it may be of some help to you.

All the best.
Jasmine

Hi there
I have a 4 1/2 month old and know what your talking about. She wakes through out the night, so i feed her and she is asleep in seconds. At first I thought my supply wasn't enough and i know i think maybe it's her teeth. I'm also under presure from my partner and my mother to move her in to her own room which i think is going to be worse and more tiring if she contines to wake up.
I'm thinking of putting teething gel on her gums one night and see how she goes. I can't see any teeth but they could still be there.
It could also be something she has just fallen into the pattern of. I hope it's not a pattern that we have to break.
Good luck

wow! been there done that. You are soooo not alone. We had the same problem from 4-6mths of age. I got totally exhausted feeding all night long and then she wouldn't feed well during the day.
We found a book called "How to solve your child's sleep problems" by Dr Richard Furber. It was a god-send. Basically it was all about teaching your child to go to sleep themselves and why this was so important for their and your own well-being. Yes, it's basically controlled crying. We learnt a lot from this book and it changed our way of looking at the problem. I found some parents happy to tolerate this behaviour,but if you find it a problem then chances are it is.
If you feed, rock, cuddle, pat, give dummy to your baby to go to sleep, then they have associated that pattern with sleeping. As they go through their normal sleep cycles and stir (during a light sleep phase) they usually tend to wake and cry if the same "thing" isn't going on when they actually fell asleep. It's not complicated, but I really suggest to read the book if you have ANY sleep problems.

hi guys
thanks for the tips, things have slowly improved it seems that yes he was teething three teeth have since cut through im just glad im not the only one that has had this happen thanks.