10-month-old taking 20 min naps

[Ceri]

Hi

Zoe (10 months on 4 Jan) is not the best napper in the world but was sleeping up to 2 hours on a good day. Now I'm lucky if she sleeps an hour, split into 2 half hour naps or shorter. She is obviously tired when she wakes from these short naps. This seems to have started when she got a bad cold, but shows no signs of going away now that she's better.

The wind-down routine seems to work in getting her ready to go to sleep. Then I leave her alone to fall asleep which usually takes no more than 5 mins (it is now over 2 months since I tried to use PD to extend nap times since there was no noticeable improvement). However, she has recently taken longer than usual to go to sleep at nap times; this could be to do with teething pain which comes and goes. I wait for tired signs, but if I haven't noticed any I put her down for the latest time given.

Overall she sleeps well at night (between 10 and 11 hours). I gradually moved her bedtime to 7.30 by 15 min a day to try and shift the wake-up time but she seems to be fixed to 5.45 so I moved her bedtime back to its earlier slot a week ago.

Is this Zoe trying to go to one nap a day? Luckily she can now make it through the day on these short naps without it affecting her night-time sleeping but I still think she's tired.

Her day looks like this:

5.45 wakes
6.00 BF
7.45 breakfast
9.00-9.30 nap starts
10.00 or whenever she wakes BF
12.45 lunch
1.35-2.15 nap starts
2 or whenever she wakes BF
5.15 dinner
6.45 bed

Hope you can help.

Thanks

Ceri in Seattle

[tigris]

Hi Ceri,

I have a 10 months old too who have had some teething issues lately. At the same time, he started to take longer and longer to settle for his naps (especially the second) and often woke 20-30min later.  He also started to wake up earlier in the morning. I was uncertain what to do since he is only 10 months old, and theoretically still needs two naps, and I was not sure how much the teething was to blame. But when my DH suggested that maybe he can go to one nap per day we gave it a try.
It was a little tricky to keep him happy over lunch the first two days, but since then it is smooth sailing: he now naps for a solid 2.5 hours in the early afternoon!
Of course this may not be the solution for your Zoe, but maybe worth considering?

Kristina

[Daniel's mummy]

Have you tried putting Zoe down earlier for the first nap?  Could she be over tired by 9am?  My ds doesn't wake until about 7am and he is often ready to go back to bed by about 9 or 9.30 am.  That's only 2 or 2.5 hours of activity. 

I usually find Daniel's naps go to pieces when he is tired.  Getting him to bed sooner makes the difference.  Having said all that today I think I put him to bed too early each time, but it's a guessing game isn't it?

In case it helps here's our routine.

7am - wake and bottle
8am - breakfast
9.30am - nap 1
11am - wake
12pm - lunch
2pm - nap 2
3.30pm wake and bottle
5pm - dinner
6pm - bath
7pm - bed

Hope you find the answers you need.

[Fiona (Leah & Kians Mom)]

Hi There,
I was also thinking the morning nap may be too late, I usually put dd down 2 hours after original wake up time and let her nap for about 50 mins and no longer in the am. When she started to take longer to settle for her pm nap I started to cut the am nap back by about 5 mins every week or so, I think she started this at about 11.5 months and we were on one nap at 13. When she went to one nap I moved it earlier to 1pm.
Our schedule at 10 months looked like this.

8.00 Awake
10.00 Sleep 50 mins
13.30 ish Sleep for 2 hours
19.40 Sleep

[tigris]

Maybe I should add my Daniels routine too...by the wayHazel, how nice to see another little Daniel! 

8am - Up
9am - Breakfast
12noon - Lunch
1pm to 3-4pm Nap
4pm - Dinner
7pm - Bottle and bath
8pm - Bed

Kristina

[Daniel's mummy]

Kristina - Congratulations!  Dh and I keep talking about when we'll start TTC.  Maybe soon.  Wishing you a happy pregnancy.

[Ceri]

Hi

Thanks for your replies.

I'd pretty much ruled out being overtired as the reason for the short naps, because Zoe used to sleep an hour in the morning at that same time with the same early start but has recently taken to short naps. Can naps also become shorter because a baby is not tired enough, or out of habit? I'll try and put her down earlier tomorrow morning and see what happens.

Would you believe it, but after a 22 min nap this morning, this afternoon she's still sleeping, and has just passed the 2 hour mark?! Same thing happened with sleeping through the night. Just after I'd posted a desperate message here on the night sleep board, she slept through for the first time...

Thanks again for the advice.

Ceri