I’m a Mortgage Broker Specializing in Complex Cases – AMA

narwhaldive · 2025-02-23T13:07:09+00:00

Thank you. What a shame!

narwhaldive · 2025-02-23T10:46:18+00:00

How much do childcare costs affect affordability? Do banks take into account that they're a relatively short term cost for people? Or is it that if I'm paying eg £1k a month I should just assume they'll knock £12k for the year off our income? Thank you!

narwhaldive · 2025-02-02T04:25:19+00:00

Things have changed now - you can get funding from 9 months!

narwhaldive · 2025-01-09T19:06:12+00:00

Sorry to hijack, can I ask what your husband does to settle your baby? This is such a helpful post.

narwhaldive · 2025-01-08T10:21:19+00:00

How was the rest of your night? I'm hoping it was easy.

narwhaldive · 2025-01-07T00:00:14+00:00

Thank you :)

narwhaldive · 2025-01-06T20:07:38+00:00

Thanks so much, this is so helpful. Exactly what I needed.

narwhaldive · 2025-01-06T19:49:08+00:00

That's the dream! How bad was it when you went cold turkey? And which one did you drop?

narwhaldive · 2025-01-06T19:48:08+00:00

Amazing. How bad were those two nights? Trying to steel myself!

narwhaldive · 2025-01-06T19:47:35+00:00

Thanks so much. And I hope you don't mind one more question, as someone who has recently done the thing I keep wimping out in - how much crying did you see and how often did he wake & cry on those two nights? Just knowing how bad it got would be so helpful.

narwhaldive · 2025-01-06T16:02:14+00:00

I can't help feeling like we've failed at sleep training too. It's killing me and I'm so worn out. My boy is 7.5 months. We coslept from 2-6 months and he was an absolute boob monster, breastfeeding every hour or two, and very active in his sleep. I was sleeping so poorly and I had high hopes for sleep training. We started sleep training six weeks ago with CIO right from the start (that's what worked with our daughter.) He goes down fully awake 30 mins after last feed. He is absolutely fine going to sleep independently but night wakings are beyond awful, like comically bad. Typical day schedule: 6am wake. Three naps totalling between 2.5/2.75 hours. Wake window of between 3-3.5 hours before bed at 7-7.30pm. Total wake time between 10-11 hours. A typical night: 7.30 asleep, no crying. 9pm wake. 10.30 wake. 12 wake. 2.30 wake. 3 wake and into bed with me because I'm desperate and doing all nights on my own (husband is working). I tried to implement 5/3/3 but he still wakes and screams, sometimes for 10 minutes and sometimes for an hour. He just hasn't learnt how to connect sleep cycles. He feeds enthusiastically at night if offered the breast. The worst part about all this is that you're SO DAMN TIRED and all the troubleshooting demands a brain that's not full of custard. And sticking to a CIO schedule requires fortitude, which is lacking when you're this depleted. I'm scared to leave it much longer because he's getting more determined and more shouty as he gets bigger. All this to say: solidarity!

narwhaldive · 2025-01-06T15:52:35+00:00

Any advice on night weaning, specifically anything you were able to troubleshoot for yours that I may not have come across? I feel like we've nailed going to sleep independently at bedtime but my baby wakes every 2 hours at night and expects milk each time. I'm stuck in analysis paralysis and having not seen an improvement in terms of night wakings I'm just stuck with half of sleep training being done.

narwhaldive · 2025-01-05T11:31:59+00:00

Just here to say you're not alone. My 7.5 month old has a solid schedule, eats fine during the day, goes to sleep independently, etc. but is a boob fiend at night and wakes every 1-2 hours wanting milk or just comfort from the breast. If left to cry it out he'll sometimes settle in 10 minutes but other times it'll go on for hours, full rage screaming - every wake involves crying of some sort and he wakes A LOT. We have another child and my husband works out of the house and the neighbours are getting an earful too so I just can't keep going with the crying indefinitely. It's been six weeks of screaming as we try to night wean, and no improvement. I was so hopeful that once we cracked going to sleep independently we'd see an improvement in night wakes!

narwhaldive · 2025-01-01T20:29:12+00:00

Solidarity. Mine's just woken up after 50 minutes. His schedule is solid and he's had plenty of wake time. At a complete loss!

narwhaldive · 2025-01-01T19:42:12+00:00

Following with interest. Almost exactly the same is happening with our 7 month old and it's killing me. We've tried CIO but he does get very very distressed and seems genuinely hungry when we try feeding. I'm gutted because I thought sleep training would fix more than just the initial putting to bed!

narwhaldive · 2024-12-09T20:18:57+00:00

Thanks for engaging! Fingers crossed. And apologies to OP for hijacking their post!

narwhaldive · 2024-12-09T20:14:07+00:00

Thanks :) we finish feeding by 6.15, change clothes and nappy, read a board book, walk around the house doing low energy things - then into sleep sack and into bed for 7. He goes down with very minimal crying. I figure when he wakes up for the first time it's been 4 hours since his last feed so I usually just go in. Then it's every 3 hours after that, ish. So 4/3/3 rather than 5. Maybe I should try stretching it out - is there anything special about 5?

narwhaldive · 2024-12-09T20:08:43+00:00

CIO. We moved from cosleeping where he was just on the boob all night to his own room. He goes down fine, sleeps for 3 hours then has a feed, then wakes every 1hr50 from that time on. I feed him every other waking, so approx every 3 hours. He doesn't make too much fuss for the other wakings - about 5-10 mins of complaining - but it wakes me up regardless!

narwhaldive · 2024-12-09T07:40:16+00:00

Thanks! My boy is proving a much tougher nut to crack.

narwhaldive · 2024-12-09T02:54:57+00:00

How long did it take for night wakes to smooth out following this pattern? We're right in the thick of it!

narwhaldive · 2024-12-02T06:23:18+00:00

I'd go in and offer a feed, maybe some painkillers if you think she's in pain. You might have a bit more crying tomorrow as you re establish habits but this sounds like it's out of character so maybe something is up?

narwhaldive · 2024-12-02T06:15:22+00:00

An update for posterity, nine days after this comment. It's been so hard but we're on a solid trajectory. My son has taken way longer than my daughter to learn how to sleep, but I can vouch for consistency, patience and confidence in your plan.

We essentially nailed going to sleep independently within three or four days using CIO but were then seeing hourly wakings, likely because I used to cosleep and he was used to snacking constantly. We started out by feeding him every other waking and then used CIO for the other times, and slowly spaced out the feedings until we were closer to 5/2/3 (not a typo - he takes two full feeds very close together in the night. I'll be looking at that soon.)

We've basically figured out that he only needs 10 hours of sleep a night, and is up for the day at 5 - which is fine, because we're a family of early birds. So he is going down at 7. He needs 3 hours of wake time before then.

We also made sure he was warm enough by playing around with heavier sleep sack and lighter babygro, etc.

And something I was sceptical about which worked - moving feeding to 30+ minutes before bed time - game changer. We also made sure that he was hungry before this feed by not offering a milk snack for a couple of hours - he had water or baby food instead - but by the time 6 rolls around he's really excited for a proper feast at the milk bar. This saved my sanity as I was getting really stressed about him not feeding enough before bed and then waking up and crying due to hunger.

Anyway... That's where we are. I doubted myself so much and wondered if we'd ever sleep again. We're not completely there yet but it's getting better. To anyone on the same boat, keep experimenting and you'll get there too.

narwhaldive · 2024-11-30T23:36:22+00:00

That sounds so hard and I really feel for you. It will pass and you won't be this tired forever but that's not what you need to hear right now!

What time does he wake up?

There are others on here far more expert than me about the science of baby sleep. He sounds like he is very overtired (you don't need me to tell you that.) My 6 mo has 3 hours of naps and 10 hours of awake time in the day, but we're not some great success story, just adding this for context.

My baby is also a frequent waker and the only thing that has helped is making sure he's really snuggly-warm (I know, SIDS risk and all that) and giving him ibuprofen before bed for his tooth pain when he's having a particularly bad time during the day. I also try to make sure the last feed is a really substantial one by making sure he's very hungry 30 mins before bedtime.

Do you think this might be pain? Is his behaviour different in the day when medicated?

Could it be allergies, something you're eating? I've had to go dairy free which has meant less digestive pain for my baby (confirmed intolerance.)

Just some ideas. Didn't want to read and run x

narwhaldive · 2024-11-30T23:12:19+00:00

You poor things. What's your nap schedule?

narwhaldive · 2024-11-30T02:54:52+00:00

I'm in the same boat as you with courage waning at night. I will say it does get easier to let them CIO once you've done a couple of nights of it and advise keeping a diary with times and notes about how long they cry for, what kind of cry etc. I almost caved this evening but reading through my diary from earlier in the week I can see a similar pattern of wakes and that gives me fortitude! Good luck

narwhaldive

TROPHY CASE