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We went through something similar at around 6 months. He used to go down easy with rocking and stay down until morning. At around 6 months, it started taking longer to put him down and he would wake up at 2, 3, or 4am. When it got to the point where I had been rocking him for 2 hours and he was still screaming his head off and waking after only 45 minutes once he fell asleep, we decided that to let him cry it out. We figured that whether he cried in our arms or in his crib wouldn't make too much difference. He ended up crying for about an hour before falling asleep by himself. It took a few days but now he goes down really easy by himself and no more night wakings.

For my son, I think it was an issue of object permanence. He was waking up because he was being rocked to sleep and was freaking out when he would wake up in bed by himself.

I don't know if cry it out would be right for you but that was out experience. Hope you get some sleep soon. I know how much it sucks. *hugs*

He could be showing signs of separation anxiety a little early. I talked to our ped about it Tuesday because LO is also 6 months but has recently started showing some signs of separation/stranger anxiety. She said that it usually doesn't happen until 9 months or so, but it's not uncommon for it to start at this age. She said that most of the time it manifests itself at night with multiple wakings (and not really hungry). We haven't gotten to that point yet, but I expect it to happen.

@winniebee: now that you mention it, that's how it started for us too. DS would go down fine and wake up at around 10-11pm. I thought maybe he was going through a growth spurt and fed him. But then it started to get worse and worse until we resorted to CIO.

Does your DS fall asleep by himself?

How is he napping during the day? Our daytime naps are awful but he's still sleeping through the night so I just move up his bed time because he's not napping.

Absolutely!!! Not as bad as our 4 month but there def was.lasted about 2-3 weeks for us. It's (knock on wood) finally starting to get better and she's 6 months 3 weeks.

@winniebee: I've read that babies process napping and night sleep in inferential parts of their brain your LO may be able to put himself down for naps but may need help for night sleep.

I used to rock DS until drowsy. When I put him in the crib he would wake briefly but fall back asleep. However once 6 months hit, all that went out the window.

Since you get your DS drowsy before bedtime, maybe he's experiencing the same thing as my DS and is needing help getting back to the drowsy state when he gets to the light sleep cycles.