13 months and EW's due to OT

[~*Nicole*~]

popping on quickly and haven't read through completely properly but when I glanced at this:

thanks for your reply. our eas is like the following:
wu 5.30
feed
breakfast
10 am snack
10.30-11am nap till 12.30 or 1pm usually, sometimes longer like 2. 20 mins other times 1.5 hrs
BT 6.30, often doesn't fall asleep for like 45 mins.

I have tried a few times BT at 6am but bare once it completely backfired and she only went down around 7pm. I know her early wake ups and NW's are linked to being OT by BT but early BT unfortunately doesn't work.
I have tried to have the nap later so the A time to BT isn't as long but then she does an OT nap which is shorter then...

I wondered if you'd tried a super early bedtime, like 5:30 actually. I have done this with DD2 when she's tired from either waking super early or having only one nap or accumulated OT from being out and about and she's slept straight through til morning.

The other thing that sticks out to me is that you mentioned she has fallen asleep in the car after 4 hours A time and I do wonder if she's not quite ready for the one nap and is OT from the NWs but some of that has become a habit of waking up and looking for help settling in some way? Especially in the early morning it's hard to fall back to sleep when you are OT but feel like you've had a decent chunk of sleep. I might try to do car/stroller/sling catnaps in the morning if that is possible and maybe stick to the same time afternoon nap and the same time BT in order to make those timings more of a habit since she seems to be tricky with needing a certain amount of A time and needing to feel a certain amount of sleepy before she can actually fall asleep. My oldest was this way. Very resistant to falling asleep, needing less sleep than my other two, dropping naps earlier and needing to feel properly exhausted before she could fall asleep. It was quite a balancing act with her. The other two slept more consistently and were quite as tough and my DS still naps at daycare at 5 years old (DD1 tried not napping after she turned 2 so that was a shock for me).

Sorry I am rambling a bit. Best of luck! This is such a tricky age!

[zissi]

hi there,
thanks for your suggestions. unfortunately DD2 is at daycare, so they can't APOP any naps. the usual time for a nap there is around 11, 11.30, so I have to go with that. I have another child, so driving around for naps won't work and DD2 doesn't nap in the stroller either. but I will try BT at 5.30 and see if that would help. at least at weekends, because during the week we are only home from daycare around 5pm.
the reason we moved to 1 nap early at 10 months was that DD2 would wake in the middle of the night and be up for hours. I figured that was OT and since she can handle long A times very well it wasn't a problem to move to 1 nap. obviously all those short wakings are OT now, so I think she is def between 2 chairs there...

[zissi]

ok so for the last 2 days we have tried super early BT, I had her in bed at 5.45pm, the earliest I can do. while she settled better than usual, within 10/15 mins instead of 30/45 mins she had the first night a long NW of 40 mins and this morning she was up at 4.30. I think I mentioned before that she only ever does 10/11 hrs at night. so I don't know if that sort of early BT can work for us. I certainly can't have her up at 4.30am. but I will give this new routine another couple of days to see if it will make a difference. after that I really don't know anymore. and today she woke for her nap after 45 mins, DH is still trying to settle her. she was in bed at 10am, but only fell asleep at 10.20. its so difficult to know what to do with her. DD1 was on set naps and BT at this age but with her wake ups and different durations of naps I don't know if its a runner with her? worth a try?

[ginger428]

Hugs Franziska! 4:30 is rough! You must be exhausted. I bet you tried to resettle her? How?

TBH, with an EW of 4:30, I would apop or support however until 6:00, then expose her to light. Totally use your judgment with these, but a 10 min CN around 9:00 may help. Then put her down for a proper nap around 11:00. The goal is to get her to 11:00/11:30 consistently without accumulating more OT.

I know it must be extremely difficult to handle apop CN's with another child.. I can't imagine! however, it (morning or evening CN) may be your saving grace during this transition.  If not at all possible, it's ok.  If there are opportunities to do so, it may help.

I'm sorry to hear that the EBT isn't working completely for her. It may be worth a couple more days to see if she can tack on sleep in the morning. I agree with what Nicole said, such a tricky stage! Independent sleep is when you can put her down awake, leave, she falls asleep, and does not need you to return for any support. If this isn't the case, then we can also work toward giving her opportunities to self settle.

Keep us posted!

[~*Nicole*~]

I'm also sorry about those super early wake ups! I know how tiring that is!

This is such a tough age. I remember my DD being very much like this. She needed a long A to be tired enough to nap and then there weren't enough hours in the day and she'd resist and then get OT and the early wake ups would start up. Then she'd be so tired she'd take two naps and then bedtime would be really late and the nights would be short because she got too much daytime sleep. And on and on.

I don't truly remember what I did exactly. I'd have to look it up hehe. I think I may have had a period of time where I just planned to alternate 2 nap and 1 nap days. I think the 2 nap days would have one long nap in a crib and one APOP nap in the car. I think I just ran an errand or drove a longer way home from daycare or whatever. Then bedtime and wake up next morning would be later so she could take just one nap at a reasonable time the following day. This may have helped us get over the hump but I could also be remembering things incorrectly. I'll see if I can find any of my old info. LOL

[zissi]

ok so over the last week we nearly had all days EBT of 6pm BUT one thing is really weird,  when asleep so early she would wake 30mins after BT and then every hour or so. and when we did normal BT at 7pm for many weeks before that she never had those wakings in the first few hours after BT. so I wonder if this really early BT makes sense in our case. I thought it would be a good idea to keep the day max 12 hrs but it totally backfires. today I tried to have her in early, but it didn't work out, she didn't settle, so eventually fell asleep at 7pm and she sleeps wonderfully at the moment without wakening. she stirred at 45 mins but settled herself. so I am wondering if this 6pm BT really isn't for her. any ideas?
her day today was like this:
wake up 5ish
nap 10am-12.45 (in daycare)
in bed 6.15, asleep 7pm.

day before:
wake up 5.30
nap 11-1.15pm(in daycare)
BT 6pm
many many NW's and awake for the day at 5ish, I must add she has a cold, so doesn't feel too well...

[~*Nicole*~]

If it's not working for her, then maybe sticking with set bedtime is the better option for her. Have her nap times been changing each day. I see one day she napped at 10 and the day before at 11. Do you know if she is sleeping straight through those naps at daycare or if she's waking at all and being resettled or resettling herself? Sometimes that can help you decide if she's OT or UT and see what is going on.

Also, I meant to ask, but totally forgot; Does she have her molars and canines yet? Is she teething at all? When you said she had a cold, it reminded me that those teeth are often trying to push trough around this age as well and that can sometimes cause a lot of trouble. My DD2 was a fantastic teether for the first two on the bottom and on the top, but then she started cutting her molars. Totally different experience. She's super cranky and irritable and has been waking some nights looking for some comfort. I gave her ibuprofen one day and you could see her become much happier about 20 mins. later after it kicked in. Just a thought.

[zissi]

yes, we don't have set nap times, I usually go for 5 or 5.5hrs after wake up and tell them this in daycare and they usually put her down at the time I ask them too (but they cannot do multiple naps etc) she often wakes in between her naps and needs a little resettling, usually only lying her back down. its the same at home. I figured that around 1.20 or so is OT for her whereas 45 mins naps are classical UT.
last night she slept through without any wakings till 4.20 and was up for the day then. this obviously isn't great wu time but at least she didn't have frequent NW's. so we had to do 2 naps today and she was so miserable that I had to APOP with of them in the sling, something I haven done since she was sleep trained initially at 6 months
she may be cutting more teeth, I have no idea, she is sucking her fingers a lot. and she is quite sick. so I guess she has to get better first before we can say anything about her sleep...
fingers crossed we don't have such an early start tomorrow again.