Need help with set naps

[sianie]

Why don't you try to get him caught-up a bit over the next few days....go with his sleepy cues & don't worry about 'nap times'.

It might be that set naps don't suit him (they don't work for every LO).

[amandag]

DS just turned one.  We had a birthday party over the weekend, and had some short nights with all of the excitement and houseguests.  I have been trying to get him caught up on sleep the past couple of days, so I have been putting him down for his first nap a little earlier, about 9:20 - 9:30.  He has been waking at 6 the past few days.  I have been letting him sleep as long as he wants in the morning, which has been 1.5 or 2 hours.  However, he will only sleep an hour in the afternoon with the long morning nap.  Perhaps I should start putting him down for his morning naps a little earlier, but continue with capping the morning nap at an hour so we will get a longer afternoon nap?  The nightwakings haven't been getting any better (he was up 6 times last night).  I might try a 7 pm BT tonight to help with the OT.

[sianie]

TBH, I wouldn't move the nap forward.....9.30am sounds reasonable to me.

2.5hrs total sleep for his age is fine & I wouldn't expect him to sleep for much longer than an hour in the PM (plus you don't want to start too much day-time sleep affecting his night sleep). Are you sure the NW's are OT & not UT?

I would keep it as it is for the next few days. 

[amandag]

I did mean 9:30 as the earlier naptime (it was 10 before).  So I will keep with that.  There is no doubt that the NW are OT-- like clockwork he is up .5 hours after BT.  He starts getting cranky around 6pm.  He is only getting about 10 hrs of sleep at night.  It seems like we have tried so many things the past few months to get more nighttime sleep but nothing has worked.  I don't know if you remember, but we tried the long am nap/short pm nap and were getting all kinds of NWs.  I then tried the  short am nap/long pm nap and initially had success, but then had NWs again.  Just not sure which is better at this point.  I will try to follow his sleep cues and see if he naturally develops a pattern.

[sianie]

I will try to follow his sleep cues and see if he naturally develops a pattern.

That what I would do too....sometimes when you feel you've tried everything then you need to take step back & re-evaluate.

See how it goes for a few days & let me know how you get on!

[amandag]

The past several days I have been putting him down earlier than usual - at 9:30 and then again about 1:30.  At first I wasn't capping his AM nap, and he would sleep for 1.5 hours, and then only take a 30 minute or 45 minute afternoon nap.  The past 3 days I have been capping the morning nap at 1 hour, and he is taking 1.5 hour afternoon naps.  I have been putting him to bed at 6:30 (asleep about 7 -7:15), and that has helped somewhat with the NWs.   He is still waking up, but not nearly as much.  He is still only sleeping about 10.5 hrs at night though.  I won't be able to put him to bed so early during the week, but I will put him to bed as early as I can.  I just don't know what else to do to get him to sleep more.  If I put him to bed earlier, he just gets up earlier.

[sianie]

It might be that until he transitions to 1 nap that his nights might stay on the short side. This is all part of the 2:1 tricky-ness!

Some LO's naturally are low sleep needs when it comes to night time sleep & do sleep around 10hrs or so no matter now much you tweak their routine. I guess the key is whether they wake happy etc rather than crying & grumpy.

[amandag]

I have accepted the fact that he's not going to sleep more than 10.5 hrs at night, it just seems that he still isn't getting enough sleep and is OT.  Yesterday he took a 1 hr AM nap and a 2 hr PM nap, and was asleep at 7:30.  There were a couple of short NWs.  He was up at 5:30 this morning, and not happy about it.  There is no way of getting him back to sleep after the EW.  So I guess letting him sleep an extra .5 hr yesterday robbed him of .5 hr nighttime sleep?  I am going to stick to the set naps today, but limit the pm nap to 1.5 hrs.  I think I need to have him asleep by 7 to avoid a dozen NWs.  I still think he needs more sleep but don't know what to do. 

[sianie]

I think you need to look at the total amount of sleep he's getting in a 24hr period rather than just the amount of night sleep. So he averaging around 13hrs or so, is that right?

It could be that he's getting a it too much day-time sleep so I would cap 1 nap at 1.5hrs & then do 45mins/ 1hr for the 2nd (up to you which way round you want to do it)

[amandag]

Well I wouldn't say he averages 13 hours- he gets 13 hours at most on good days.  And 11 or 12 hours on the not so good days.  He is still OT even after 13 hours of sleep.  He has been chronically OT for months and months , so maybe it will take awhile for it to go away.  Or maybe he does need a tad more sleep.  I am going to stick with this routine and hope for the best.  Thanks again.

[amandag]

About a week and a half ago I decided to concentrate on getting him to fall asleep independently using GW, hoping that would help with his routine. We went from patting on the back to sleep, to hand on the back, to now mommy just being in the room.  The first several days were difficult and we had lots of short (or missed) naps as a result, but he is falling asleep independently now (takes about 20-30 minutes).    The good thing about the short naps though was he started sleeping 11 hours at night.  I decided at that point to limit his daytime sleep to 2 hours so he would continue the 11 hour nights.  So this is the current routine I am aiming for:

6:30ish wake
9:30-10 nap
1:00 - 2:30 nap
7:30 BT

The NWs however have not stopped.  We still have a least a couple early NWs (around 9-10 pm), and sometimes later NWs (2 or 3am).  Twice in the last few days he has had extended NWs (once from 2-5, and once from 3-5 am).  Once I have gotten him  back to sleep at 5, he only sleeps for another 30 minutes and is up for the day.  I am sure the NWs are OT related-- I have to HTTJ most of the time otherwise he can't get back to sleep.  For the extended NWs, he will lay there and try to go to sleep, but just seems restless even though he is yawning.  When he finally does go back to sleep, he jolts awake so I have to HTTJ.  What in the world do you think is causing these long NWs?  Do you think he needs more A  time before BT?  Or less?  Yesterday he had 2 good naps (9:40- 10:10; 1:15 - 2:45), yet we had the extended NWs.  He seems to do better at night when he is way OT and short on sleep?  I am considering trying one nap and see how it goes since nothing seems to be working with 2 naps.

[sianie]

Firstly, well done on the GW!! It sounds like you've done a great job & seen a real improvement! 

NW's around your LO's age (he's 12/13 mths now, right?) can be part of the whole 2:1 transition, one of the reasons it's a tricky transition!

NW's are usually caused by OT/UT &/or pain & discomfort....any teething going on?

When he wakes, how does he behave, crying/wanting to play etc...this can give some insight into what's going on.

I do wonder whether you could push the AM nap forward to 10am (30 mins) then do PM nap at 2-3.30pm with BT at 7.30/8pm? With your current routine, his last A-time is on the long side (5hrs), which is a lot for his age.

What do you think?

[amandag]

Thanks, I am so glad I finally did the GW.  I was dreading it and kept putting it off, but it really wasn't too bad.  Now I just have to get out of the room!

He is 12.5 months now, no signs of any new teeth.  The long NWs are strange, he cries but once I come in the room he is calm and lays down and tries to sleep.  He is restless and fidgety- you would think he is UT but I know that is definitely not the case.  We had another bad night last night- up at 3, I think he might have slept from 4-4:30.  I couldn't get him back to sleep after that, he was jolting awake and I couldn't hold him through them.  At 5 I finally gave up and held him so we could both get some sleep.   Even in my arms he was a fitful sleeper (which is unusual), and kept jolting awake no matter how tight I held him.  I think he did get some sleep between 5 -7 am though.  I think he is majorly OT despite an early BT at 6:30 last night.

I think you are probably right about the A time being too long before BT.  It won't be a problem to move the first nap to 10, but maybe I will have the 2nd nap at 1:30?  I had orignally had his naps at 10 and 2, but he was having a short 2nd nap of only 30 minutes because he was OT.  I think he can only handle 3 hours A time after a 30 minute nap right now.   I am going to try and get him caught up on sleep today, so I might let him have a longer am nap and probably an early BT.  Thanks so much for your help, i