A time!

[mary12]

Helllo

My baby is a wake the last weeks at 6 o clock, i leave her in her room en she stays til 7, she is not sleeping.
 At 7, I give her her feed, she sleep then in my bed 40 minutes. We go out of bed at 7.45. Sometimes she does not sleep after her bottle.

 I did make her a wake time longer, before i put her to put every 2 hours, this because she only sleeps 3x 40 minutes a day.
But now she only sleeps 2x 40 minutes. I need to put her at the end of the day again in bed otherwise she only gets 80 minutes a sleep a day.
So what can i do. I dont know what i am doing wrong can somebody help me.

schedule...

A wake at six en the ik give her bottle a 7 en she sleeps for 40 minutes. sometimes she stays a wake

10 am sleeps for 40 minutes of less!

then i wait 3 hours or 2,30 en put her again in bed. Again she sleep 40 minutes, if i make here wake time even longer it means she has not sleep at all, and we have no time to put her in bed. How do people have a long a wake time in the morning en stil have time for a second nap, espacialy if your baby sleep long then 40 minutes.  i dont understand this.

So at 13.00 again 40 minutes, she canīt last til 7, that is here   bedtime. So i put her again at 16.00 in bed en she sleep 40 or less again.

What am i doing wrong and why is she so early awake, before she slept til 7,45 en then she had the slept also 3 time 40 minutes.

She is now almost 9 months why is she not sleeping longer, i dont understand. And if i give her longer a wake times this means she is awake en will not sleep longer en at the end of the day we have no time for 3 nap en she will get so overtired. Because 80 minutes or less is not much sleep for not even 9 month baby. Help help help

[Kellyjs]

Hi Mary,

I think your A time is very short for a 9mo, that's probably why you're getting the short naps. I was in your exact same position when my DD was 8mo!

The average awake time for a 9mo is between 3-4hrs. Keep this link handy as it explains more. Average A times- BOOKMARK ME!

I think that first bottle then sleep might be messing up your day a little. She's obviously UT for that first nap, then the rest of the day follows the same pattern.

Most lo's are on 2 naps at 9 months old. I would try and get at least one decent nap out of her for now as sleep can go wonky for other reasons soon. I'll edit this post in a minute and add in a link to some example routines so you can have a look at what others do. For some reason my ipad loses the post if I go to another page.

Ok, so you'll need to look at extending the first A initially. You may not want to start your day at 6, but you may have to for now to sort out the naps then we can look at shifting the day later if you want.

If she wakes as 6, and you can't resettle using ssh/pat in her cot (or however you usually resettle her), get her up and give her her bottle as usual (not in bed though). You'd be looking to extend this activity time to around 3.5hrs I would think looking at what you do currently. She may give you sleepy cues when she's used to going down, but try some low-key stuff like reading or carrying her around for a little while.

What do you think to that? Have a look at the routine examples too it's good to see what others are doing.

chronological EASY samples, 7-9 months

[mary12]

Thank you for your advice.

She doesnt sleep all days after her bottle. If i do what you says i have to start the day at six, iam afraid that if i do that she will wake up earlier.
So maybe then i have tot start at 5,3o and so and so further.

But the  days she is not sleeping her 2 time is over 3 hours and she still sleeps short.  Today she slept til 7.45 was a wake at 5 i give her a pecifier and she slept til six, then she was til 7 awake,  slept til 7,45.

Put her at 10.30 a sleep, that is 2,45 minutes later,  I have to short the a time in the morning otherwise, if she sleeps good no time for second nap)which she never does'.
Then i put her to sleep at 13.00 because she is verry tired, didnīt sleep much, so I can not wait that long, because normaly a baby did has his sleep like 1,5 hour but she didnīt. So now the wake time is very long, but she still only sleep 40 minutes.

If I now wait till seven she will get very overtired so i have to put her later to sleep at 16.00 for again 30 minutes, if i wait to long then the last sleep is to close to bedtime. Do you understand wat i mean . Do you know why she is not sleeping longer at her age.  In total she sleep only 11 hours night with wakenings so it not exactly 11 hours. In the day not even 2 hours.

[Kellyjs]

I know it's scary, and she might indeed wake earlier, but you need to find a time in the morning that you're happy to wu and treat everything else before that as a NW. If that's 7, that's fine.

Here, my DD has woken as early as 5.30-6am and as long as she's not crying I leave her until at least 6.15 (ideally 6.30) until it's time to get up.

I think you need to power through and extend that first A. 2hrs 45mins is just not enough to get a decent nap length. It needs to be around 3.5hrs or more. I know that you say she won't fit in a good nap later on and the timings get all messed up before BT. But it can't get much worse nap wise can it?

If she's on reasonable A's that she's obviously capable of considering her short naps, you may be able to get to at least one nap of a decent length. Sometime the day does get a little long about now in order to fit everything in. She might be a little too old now to expect 2 long naps if you want to keep the day to 12-13hrs. I think most at this age are doing one long nap and one shorter nap.


So how about something like this:
Wu 7
Nap 1 10.45-12.15 (hopefully)
Nap 2 3.15- 4(this is purposely to get an UT nap so your day doesn't get too long)
BT 7.15 (asleep by)

If the first nap is short, don't worry, you can work on getting the second one longer instead, but you must be confident to increase those A's past 2hrs. If both naps are short, again, don't worry, do an early BT and start again the next day!
 It's going to take some time to find the right A for him, so please be patient, we'll get there. I went through this with my DD (45mins naps for 8months) and with the help on here she now naps beautifully! 

[Kellyjs]

I forgot to add, you'll need to extend the A time slowly. Please don't jump from 2hrs 45 to 3hrs 45 in one go. You'll need to do it as 15mins every 2-3 days or so until you reach the routine example I gave you. As I said before, your days may get longer in the meantime but please try and keep to an absolute max of a 13hr day.

Please come back to me if you need me to explain it further.

[mary12]

Thank you again.

Okay, I will try tomorrow what i don't understand is, if i get to very short naps then ik can put her earlier in her bed.

But how much earlier and will this not mess up her night sleep. For example, we start a 7 she sleep in the morning 45 en in the afternoon 45.

So first nap 10.30 like 45 minutes and then i wait 3,5 hours later.
14.45 she goes to bed for again 45 minutes, then she will be tired, how late can I put her in bed?

It sounds very long 3,5 awake time, are you sure this is normal for almost 9 month old?

I preffer a shorter nap in the moring and a long one in the afternoon, is this okay or not a good idea?

How long did your baby sleep after help here? How long do babys sleep in the daytime in total for 9 month olds? Sorry, for so many questions, but my baby has not much sleep since she was born, always catnaps and very short.

[mary12]

What I also don't understand is that if you make the a time so long this means, that the hours before bedtime are very short because you don t have enough hours.

For example 3,5 awake time

wake: 7
sleep;10,30
awake 12.00

sleep 15.30
awake 17.00

and the 19.00 to bed, I thought you had to keep the hours before bed the longest, like to 2 hours awake in morning, 3 afternoon and then 4 hours a wake before bed, for a good night sleep.

[Kellyjs]

Not always Mary, my LO actually preferred it the other way round... Took a while to figure out, but got there in the end. But some do like a long A before bed, we just need to figure out what's best,for yours.

The idea is after the shorter nap, the A time will be shorter. Lo's can go longer after a longer nap. I just suggested the longer am nap and the shorter pm one as that's the way I did it here. Many others have had lots of success the other way round so if you'd like to give it a go, go for it! For me, it just took the stress out of the rest of the day. Once we had that first long nap, the other shorter nap could be in the car or out and about.

You have to take the whole day into consideration too. You can have a varied A times to make sure she isn't OT before bed.

For that routine you posted, you need to not work on 2 long naps otherwise up your day will get too long and will cut into NT sleep. I think you should try to work towards 1 x 1.5hr nap and 1 x 45mins nap. Similar to what I posted earlier. You can swop the A's around if you'd like to do it the other way round so:
Wu 7
Nap 1 10.15-11 (UT 45mins nap)
Nap 2 2.30-4
BT 7

It'll take a lot of tweaking to try and get the timing right for that second nap. As you've done over 3hrs before, I've suggested 3.5hrs. Try this first and see how you go. If it doesn't work, extend the next day by 10 mins, hold it for 2 days and see what happens. If it doesn't work again, repeat. I have a feeling you'll need to get to 4hrs but we'll see how it goes!

For me, I took a week of help on here before our first 1.5hr nap. I was over the moon!
 Then it stabilised and she went back to 45mins. I had to up the A again and again until we found where she wanted to be! This forum is great for that.

I'll be back in a minute for the average sleep needs for babies. Need to find the link. Bear in mind it is just a guide. Many, many babies do not fall into the 'average' sleep needs.

Typical Amounts of Day and Night Sleep

[Kellyjs]

Sorry, forgot to answer your question about EBT.

If you do the routine I posted on the last post with a short am nap and longer pm nap and both are 45mins, I would do BT by latest 6.15/6.30 if it were me xx

[mary12]

Hello,

Thank you again. 

This moring she woke up at 6.15 and i give her a soother she slept til 7.00. So we got up and i did give her, her food. I extend the A time till 10.00, i first tried to put her at 9.30 because she was crying. But she didnt want to sleep so i got her out of bed. She was only 10 minutes there and she didnt want to sleep. I tried again at 10.00 , so the A time was 3 hours.

She only slept for 38 minutes!  I preffer a longer nap in the afternoon. So i did make her A time 3 hours en 15 minutes and she was really tired. But again she only slept for 45 minutes.

Do i have to count the a time from the last time she slept. So if she sleeps in the morning til 11.00  I have to count from 11.00 even if she only sleeps 30 minutes?

I am afraid it will to work, i will put her now to bed at six en hope she will not awake even earlier in the morning. A afraid so less sleep is not good for her health.

I this normal she did not make her sleeps today longer? In total she slept 79 minutes.

Hope you still can help me.

[Kellyjs]

Hi again Mary,

Please don't worry too much, it's just going to take a little time to figure out the right amount of A your LO needs. Mine did just fine on 45mins naps until we sorted it out. And now, there's still some days she'll only sleep a hr in total throughout the day!!

Firstly, that's great she went until 7. She may get grumpy around the usual time you'd put her to bed, but most of the time that is just learned behaviour and you have to push through. Here, we still have a grumpy 10mins, then she's all fine again afterwards!

Ok, so technically the first nap was fine considering we're shooting for a short first nap and longer second, so let's keep that at 3hrs tomorrow ok?

It's just that second one we need to work on. I think you'll need to push her to 3.5hrs from wu from first nap until pd to the 2nd nap. How does that sound? If she does get grumpy and looks tired earlier, just do some low-key stuff like carrying her around and pointing out some things around the house. Those last 15mins or so can be hard work, but it will be worth it in the end when we get there 

It is totally normal the sleep time can be a bit erratic during a change in routine. EBT is key during these transitions so you give her the opportunity to catch up on lost sleep.

Trust me, you are definitely not alone in this. I was in exactly the same position as you a few months ago. Your LO and mine sound so similar! It will stabilise out and there are other things we can try once we get to an appropriate A time.

Hth xx

[mary12]

Hello Kellyjs,

Thanks again! I really have problems believing this will work, I have problems with sleep since she was born, so if this works it would be amazing.

How long did you LO sleep after you increased A time? And you are now on one nap? How long is that? Its good to hear that you had similar problems with your baby, because everyone I know has normal naps. And my baby is so awake since birth, its also very trying, always trying to get her to sleep and not being succesful.

I will keep you posted, tomorrow I will do first 3 hours and then again 3,15 minutes en then the next day go up with 15 minutes for the second nap. I hope she will show beter naps tomorrow.

xxxx

[Kellyjs]

Sorry hun, I meant go to 3hrs 30mins. (3.5 means 3 and a half!!). Hopefully you'll see this in time.

A baby's sleep cycle is between 38-45mins, if they are not tired enough, they simply will wake up after that time and not go back to sleep. We call this an UT nap. Once I knew and understood this, it made it so much easier to justify increasing the A times. We just need to convince her she's tired enough to go over to the next sleep cycle, to do that, we need to find the right awake time for her.

I was really doubtful to start with too as she'd been a 45-minute napper forever! To be honest, we found a good routine for her and it worked for a week or so, then it was like she got used to it and went back to 2x45 mins naps again  . But I knew then she was capable of doing a longer nap, so I increased the activity time again with the reassurance from people on here. It really helped to give me the confidence to do it. Then we were good for a couple of months on a longer nap of 1.5hrs in the morning and a shorter 45mins in the afternoon until she started going through the 2-1 transition. Don't worry about that too much yet! I have a feeling because she was UT her entire life, that's the reason we are going through transition early, but don't quote me on that! To answer your question...She now sleeps between 1.5-2.5hrs (sorry, 1hr 30-2hrs 30) on one nap. But it's taken us a long time to get here, so please don't be tempted to try it yet!

I have a feeling your LO is going to be so like mine in that she can do a full A time on a short nap. I think that's because they're used to it! But we'll see. On the plus side if it helps, my LO handles OT really well compared to a lot of babies, so if ours are similar she will be able to handle quite a jump in A.

Let me know how you get on with the 3hrs 30mins A in the afternoon. And of course how the night/wu is xx

[mary12]

Hello Kellyjs,

No succes today again.  In the morning she woke up at 6,15  at  9.10 she went backt to sleep, again 40/45 minutes.
She went back to sleep at 13.20 slept at 13.30 and woke up at 14.10, so she slep only like 30/35 minutes. So the awake time was like 3.20 and she slept 10 minutes later, so her awake time in total was 3 hours 20 minutes.

My question is she is tired, extend awake time is meant to be sure your baby is tired, but she is tired and still does not extend her nap.
How far can you go? I am no on 3,20 minutes before I did 2,45 and in the moring like 2 or 2,30 but the she got more sleep because I put her more often in bed.

I wil put her in her crib for the night at six, I don't think a third nap is smart to do? What do you think of our day?

[mary12]

 I mean her awake time by the second nap was 3,5