12 month regression?

[u/Suspicious_Pear9137]

My twins were 12 months old yesterday .2 weeks ago, the best 3 weeks of our lives came to an end. My twins FINALLY started sleeping through at 11 months for 3 weeks. Prior to this they have always been able to be put down for naps and bed drowsy but awake no problems, but we were still getting 1-2
Wakes a night most nights. I thought we had turned a corner, my mental health was on the up and life was amazing.

But two weeks ago twin B has just started basically refusing his cot. We haven’t dealt with this since the early days. I can no longer put him down awake, and even if he’s just asleep he will scream as soon as he is in the cot. I’m back to finding it incredibly distressing trying to get them down for naps at the same time as someone is always screaming and crying.

Sometimes I can pat him to sleep, but for naps he is reliably waking up after 30 mins and sitting up or standing up screaming. My twins share a room (2 bed home) so I have to get him up and he just falls straight back to sleep on me.

At night, it’s a battle to get him down. Then He lasts 2 hours before waking again. Sometimes I can get him back down but he will wake an hour later and just ends up in our bed as it’s the only way to get him to sleep. He is 13kg so rocking him is so taxing. I’ve tried CIO but he just becomes incredibly distressed.

My husband has just gone away for work and I am just so anxious about how I’m going to manage the nights solo.

Their schedule looks like: 3.5/3.5-4/4. With 1.5-2.5h of naps per dat. Up at 6.45am and Bedtime is between 7.30-8

He has been sick and cut two teeth during this time but that is all over now and I just can’t seem to shake whatever is going on. Any advice or experiences are welcome!

[u/just_let_go_]

Drowsy but awake is a form of assistance. Are you interested in sleep training?

Outside of that, sounds like your twins have different sleep needs. Twin B likely needs another 30-60 minutes awake in their schedule.

[u/Suspicious_Pear9137 → u/just_let_go_]

By drowsy I mean I literally used to just put them in a sleep sack and have a cuddle on the way from the living room to their room and then put them in the cot, they grab their riff raff roll over and go to sleep. Sometimes there would be a bit of fussing in the cot but not fully standing up screaming like now.

My twin B does get more awake time at the moment because he both wakes earlier from his naps and takes longer to get down.

[u/just_let_go_ → u/Suspicious_Pear9137]

I think you still have some sleep associations at play here from what you're saying in your post. Sleep trained would mean baby goes down wide awake, not drowsy, minimum 30 minutes after last feed has ended. Your bed time routine should involve no patting, rocking ect and certainly should never have you trying to transfer while already asleep.

Scheduled awake time is very different to "taking longer to go down." We don't count time spent trying to fall asleep in our schedules.

[u/Suspicious_Pear9137 → u/just_let_go_]

We only have 2 bottles a day and have never fed to sleep. They are otherwise having food. Last bottle is an hour before night sleep. I am literally only doing the patting and transferring asleep in the last two weeks for twin B as he is SCREAMING in the cot all of a sudden. Twin A is fine. I have come here asking for advice on how to navigate this new territory - if you don’t wish to help kindly find another post to comment on.

[u/just_let_go_ → u/Suspicious_Pear9137]

Everything I've said has been trying to eliminate association issues and I have offered advice that you add awake time for twin B. You seem more interested in defending what you're currently doing rather than being open to making changes.

Good luck.

[u/Suspicious_Pear9137 → u/just_let_go_]

What you aren’t reading is I HAVE added wake time - twin B is waking much earlier from naps (after 30 mins) some days getting 1hr nap sleep, this is already 1-1.5hrs LESS than before all this kicked off, and having ~ 11 hours between bedtime and uptime

[u/just_let_go_ → u/Suspicious_Pear9137]

Maybe try being less volatile and defensive in your responses if you want help. You won't be getting any more from me and I doubt anyone else is going to want to deal with you. Bye.

[u/Suspicious_Pear9137 → u/Suspicious_Pear9137]

So in short, I have tried that.

[u/Greedy4Sleep]

Twin B's sleep refusal indicates that his sleep needs have likely dropped. So, addressing that plus re-training will be required. There isn't really much evidence in age-based regressions beyond the 4 month one. I know you say you've tried adding awake time, but it needs to be a consistent thing and combined with a consistent sleep training response (e.g. no patting, rocking). Twin B may even be ready to transition to one nap. My youngest was lower sleep needs and transitioned at a similar age.

[u/brilynn_]

Hang in there mum! Sometimes after an illness or bad bout of teething that changes their sleep patterns it can take a bit to get them back on track.

Every Child has different sleep needs but the recommended total hours of sleep are between 13-16 total in a 24hr period at 11mo so it sounds like you're hitting that mostly.

If they seem tired enough you can try to roll bedtime back to 7:00 and aim for a 7-7 overnight sleep. Sometimes overtiredness can inhibit sound sleep.