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suddenly, 3 days before she turned 6 months, it all changed. suddenly, she was waking up once or twice an hour
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!! That is so hard when that happens, I've heard! I've got lots of friends who have babies who went from sleeping well to waking at about 6 months... it's pretty common, unfortunately! It's almost always because of teething... I'd say you have a good sleeper who is experiencing some discomfort and pain due to new teeth that will come in soon, and it's so great that you are responding to her by using the No Cry Sleep Solution book... this (if it's teething) could be one of those cases where there is a reason for the wakefulness... and if it IS teething, then once the teething stops, sounds like you have a sleeper and she will hopefully go back to that if you keep up the routine and sleep ideas in the book so that a gentle routine is established... the teething is a time of routine upheaval and is weird and scary for a little one, so it's wonderful for them to have this soothing routine they can rely on... if they are left to wakefulness with teething without trying to gently establish a routine, they can totally lose the initial ability they had to sleep during those first 6 months... so it's great you've started to use the book! The teething time lasted for 5 months straight of us using the NCSS book and following sleep plans, so it can take a while to get through the teething, but it's worth it! Our older son is 5, so you can't use "cry it out" on him! He's not going to sit in his bed and cry until he falls asleep! He's going to get up and come downstairs and make himself some cereal! That is the true problem of cio - it doesn't teach a child a sleep routine... But - because we chose this gentle sleep plan, he has learned to love sleep time, and his bedtime routine, and so even when he says he's "not tired" the routine lulls him, subconsciously, into a state where he falls asleep with the bath, books, songs... heck - it even makes US tired when we go through these steps with him!
Yeah, just read your message again... I'd say the completely awake thing is totally teething, especially when combined with not wanting you to put her down... it's possible this hurts and is weird to her so she doesn't want you to leave.
By the way, our older son almost always completely falls asleep with either his daddy or me, so I guess we never got past phase one either
but we love the cuddle time, and know that soon he might not want this from us anymore... just the other day he showed me his first baby tooth is loose... I got tears in my eyes! Wow, this time went so fast and he's such a big boy now! I'm glad for any cuddle I can get... so I think I see that whole thing about not holding babies differently - and I'm glad I always have, because I cuddled him tons, and still do! I'm glad I did, too, because he's still a very cuddly little guy.
Napping is hard to get, too, especially with teething! Just make a mini bedtime routine with nap books and a song or two... I found this helps!