Routine for 6 mos with no supper catnap!

[jana224]

Hey Bonnie
Your little guy might be ready for 12 hours of night sleep, but I guess what I'm thinking is that he may not sleep straight through at this age.  He might still need to feed once or twice and go back to bed right after.

4-5 hours during the day at 10 weeks sounds reasonable, you shouldn't need to change that yet.  I assume he's taking 3-4 daytime naps?  How long is his A time?  1.5 hours?

In our house, we started putting DD to bed at 8:30pm when she was around 10 weeks and she'd still wake to feed once in the early morning and then go right back to bed.  Around 4 months we started getting more consistent 12 hour sleeps.  Sounds similar to what's going on in your house.

If you want an earlier bedtime, like 7-7:30pm, you could start giving the dream feed around 10 or 11pm?

[b0nni3]

Hey Jana,

I don't mind feeding him in the middle of the night - in fact I expect it. We've tried dream feeding but he never responded well - he wouldn't actually open his mouth despite me trying to wiggle my nipple in!

I guess what I'm hoping would happen is that the LO would realize "night time" starts at 7 or 7:30, not at 9 or 10! (i.e. how to tire him out enough after a "day" so that he'd want to go to bed at 7.) Not sure how to accomplish that though. Anyone else have any thoughts?

Also I don't mean to usurp the original thread, and this might be better moved to the one I started in the Activity forum about transitioning to 3.5 hour EASY...

[Bmcdnld]

Charm-

1. What do you mean by an early bedtime?  Do you mean earlier than 7:30?

2. The other day because we were ahead of schedule I extended his A time by 15 minutes and instead of going to sleep by himself in 10-15 minutes he cried and I had to spend 15-20 minutes getting him settled and stay in his room until he fell asleep.  Is this to be expected as I try to extend him or a sign that he is not yet ready?

3. Did I misunderstand that the book said the catnaps should be no more than 30 or 45 minutes?  I didn't realise 45 minutes was preferred.

4. No, I do solids and nursing at the same time.

5. Regarding naps- today, for example, at both his morning and afternoon nap he woke up at just past 1 1/4 hours but if I didn't have a video monitor I wouldn't even know he was awake.  He lays there completely silently.  The book said that 1 1/4 hours was ok to get them up but yesterday he woke up after 30 minutes and it was the same thing.  I just kept watching him hoping he would put himself back to sleep (which he didn't).  He didn't make a sound for over 40 minutes.  I wasn't sure what I could have done to intervene and extend his nap.  He wasn't crying so pu/pd didn't seem to apply and I think if I were to go into his room at all he would think it was time to get up and play.  Any suggestions?  Besides extending A time is there another way I should be adapting to these shorter than 2 hour naps?

Thank you

[Bmcdnld]

Bonnie-

All I have is a "what happened at our house" to offer- my son started with a late bedtime too.  He started sleeping through at 7/8 weeks so at 10 weeks he was probably sleeping from about 10p-6/7a or something like that.  I'm not sure exactly when, but I'm thinking at around 3 months I started doing a bedtime routine at around 7pm and putting him down at that time (also adjusted the late afternoon so that he would be tired then).  At first he did just think it was nap time and would wake up- but I found the naps just kept extending and eventually he was sleeping through. 

[b0nni3]

Hi, thanks for sharing your experiences. Last night we put the lo down at around 8:30 after a feed but he struggled with us until about 10:30; then at 11:30 he woke again (I tried to nurse him at that point to see if it would settle him) and he ended up waking up ever 15 mins until 2am! Sigh. He fed again at 5am.

One of the difficulties we have is that my LO refuses a paci (blessing or curse?!) so when he wants to be comforted he would only suck on our fingers (he hasn't yet found his thumb). For the past two nights when he was really upset (and still having congestion from a slight cold) we ended up moving him to our bed (too desperate for sleep) and at around 4 or 5 he'd wiggle and fuss - and I'd let him suck on my finger. He'd do so for an hour or an hour and a half, and fall back asleep, then wake at 7 for a very big feed. So I am never quite certain whether that early morning 4/5am feed is really necessary or just a comfort thing. Again, I don't mind doing it - I just don't want it to become a habitual thing if it is indeed that.

Well, maybe we'll just stick with the late bedtime and move it back 10 mins at a time or something...! DH and I are sort of flexible so our routines can vary up to 30 mins from day to day, which makes it hard to implement a "set" bedtime...we just _sort of_ go with how the day has gone to determine when bedtime is. Is that a bad idea?

[charmie]

BMCLD He is probably not ready to extend then, so the only other way to control the length of naps is by waking him up for the feed.  It would really be useful if we could see your routine. 

As for the catnap the book does say 30-45mins, but many los are sound asleep at the 30th minute while at the 45th they are in between sleep cycles so are more likely to wake up happily and easily.

It is recommended that you do solids 1hr after milk eg. milk at 7 and solids at 8.  This will allow enough time for the baby to be hungry for solids and thus more receptive.  It will also allow you to get more calories into him during the day.

1hr15 mins nap is ok.  30min nap might be OT or OS though.  So maybe keep your a times very low key for the next couple of days.  And if he needs to go to sleep earlier than usual let him.


xxx
charm

[Bmcdnld]

Charm:
Maybe I'm not following our conversation...which feed are you suggesting I wake him up for?  I'm not comfortable separating his milk and solids at this time but I will keep your suggestion in mind.  I'm not sure that hunger is what's causing his night wakes- he was awake from 2:30-4:30 this am but wasn't hungry and went back to sleep without nursing.  I guess it's a combination of all the other things happening at 6 months.

Here is our schedule- the meal times are always within 5-10 minutes of this but the nap times may vary depending on how long the previous one was:

6:45: awake and nurse
7ish-8:40: A
8:40-9: Wind down (this includes 10-15 minutes of him awake in his crib...putting himself to sleep)
9-10:30/11: S (he plays in his crib until 11 if he wakes up early)
11:Nurse and solids
11:30-12:40: A
12:40-1: Wind down
1-3:S
3: Nurse and solids
3:30-5 (or 6:45 with no nap...): A (includes bath time but not bed routine)
6:45: nurse and solids
7:20 bed routine (jammies, stories, etc) "lights out" around 7:30
10:30 dreamfeed (started using formula so I could see how much he's taking- ~7oz)

I'm finding myself less and less concerned about his schedule- I started BW mostly because he had stopped going to sleep easily and that doesn't seem to be a problem.  I think that the night wakes will probably sort themselves out...if we stick to the routine and he adjusts completely to the new solids.

[charmie]

It's totally up to you how you structure your day.  We can only give our suggestions, the rest is in your hands    However I would really consider separating the milk and solids when you are ready to make a change.  This will allow for enough time for him to be hungry for solids and increase in quantities.  Maybe you can look it up on the feeding solids board.  Also wanted to give you the heads up that as he grows you don't need to stick to the 4hr easy anymore.  His a times will stretch and his naps will be pushed backwards so his feeds will be more spaced out.

As for the waking from map for feed I wasn't referring to any one feed in particular.  But because you cannot stretch his a times further, the only way of controlling naps is by actually limiting them.

The 1st nap seems ok... 2nd nap too.  And there is plenty of time to do a catnap at around 5ish for 45 mins, until he stretches his a times further and it won't fit in anymore.  The long a time before bed might be causing his NW's.

As I said, it's up to you. 


xxx
charm

[Bmcdnld]

Thank you for your time and suggestions.  I really appreciate it.

Bethany

[b0nni3]

Hi Charm and Bethany,

You both mentioned that it's not uncommon for LOs to have a slightly later bedtime (8/9-ish) - which is definitely the case for my LO. If that's the case could you give me some tips as to how to structure his naps, particularly the early evening one?

Yesterday night he woke 4 times! I think it must've been because he was OT in the day; his napping was all over the map yesterday:
E/A 7:30-9:10
S: 9:10-10:50 (i woke him up)
E/A 10:55-11:10 (yes - 15 mins)
S: 11:10-12:20 (he actually fell asleep in his bouncy chair)
A: 12:20-1:50
S: 1:50-2:20 (showed tiredness cues; I put him on my bed while I was drying my hair and the next time I turned around he had fallen asleep!)
E/A 2:20-4:00
S 4-4:30 (in stroller; was out running errands)
A 4:30-5:30
E/A 5:30-6:30 (so a total of 2 hrs A time between last S and this next S)
S 6:30-7:10
A 7:10-8:20
E 8:20-8:40
S Put down at 9pm
Then starting at 10pm he woke up intermittently like, 5 times, between 10pm and 7am. (at around 10, 10:30, 11, 2, 4:45)
Night feeds at 11:40 and 5:10

I think the NWs last night might have been because his afternooon naps were so poor (only 2 30-40 mins ones. At least that's what I hope...because it means we can do something about it today, hopefully!)

Right now we are on 7 feeds per day (5 feeds before 8pm, 1 at around 10:30/11 and one in the middle of the night, usually between 4:30 and 5:30). He has 4 proper EASY cycles before bedtime (after the 5th feed he has chilled out A, and then is supposedly down for the night). How should I deal with the nap that comes after the 4th cycle?

I'm still on a mix of Babywise and BW in terms of the routine - feeds every 3 to 3.5 hours depending on what else is going on that day, and then watching for tiredness cues for nap time.

Charmie: I have thought about just watching cues and no clock for a day or two, but would you advise that I still abide by the principle of not letting naps be longer than 2 hours?

I think he seems to need about 4.5 to 5.5 hours of nap time a day, so I'm not quite sure how to distribute it across the four nap times given how the last nap is in the evening. Any thoughts? E.g., Nap 1 being 1.5 hrs, nap 2 being 1.5 hrs, nap 3 being 1.5 hrs, and nap 4 being 30-45 mins or something?

[charmie]

Bonnie, I think your lo must have become OT somewhere along the way.  I agree with yo that last night's NW's were due to hi being OT.  He seems like he is in need of a lot of sleep right now, so I would oblige him, until he is out of the OT cycle.  I never mentioned late bedtimes, never did them with dd.  I think 12hr day and 12hr night works well, as long as you have the right amount of sleep during the day.

How old is your baby again?  So I can find you a link with typical routines for your lo's age.

If you decide to ignore the clock for a couple of days, (and I highly recommend it when los are OT), I think you can let him sleep until next feed, so nap could be longer than 2hrs.  But do wake him up for the feed, and put him back down for the next nap as soon as he is tired.  That way he can catch up on his lost sleep.  This might take more than 2days though, depending on how OT he is.  As he comes out of the OT cycle you will notice his a times start to extend again 

xxx
charm

[charmie]

Bonnie I have opened a new thread for you so you can get age appropriate advice.  Please follow this link for Bonni's thread;

http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=140903.0

And continue here for Bethany's thread.


xxx
charm