4 month old - Naps for 30 minutes!

[regina1987m]

Hello,

My 4 month old is on a 4 hour easy and has been sleeping through the night for a week now, the problem is she has been napping kind of horrible this past few weeks. I say kind of horrible because this happens. She wakes up and I feed her, then she has activity time and at her first yawn or rubbing of eyes (this usually happens 1 hour 20 min after her wake time) I put her down for her nap.
Like a clock, at the 30-40 minute mark, she wakes up. She doesn't cry (she talks or maybe cry a little but not like full on crying just whining) she moves, rubs her eyes, yawns(which makes me thing she isn't done sleeping), talks, grabs her lovey, shuts her eyes... but she stays up for about 40 minutes and then, almost always, goes back to sleep until her next feed. I DON'T HAVE TO GO BACK IN TO SOOTHE HER AS SHE CAN SOOTHE HERSELF BACK TO SLEEP, BUT ITS ALWAYS 30-45 MINUTES AFTER WAKING UP.

I've tried to put her down earlier, later, doing more activity to tire her more, everything!

Is this normal??? Should I go in and do something to help her sleep earlier? Can this be a phase? She is in her crib for 2 hours though and won't fight it but its like she takes two catnaps instead of taking one long nap.

Any suggestions? Please help, I don't know if I'm doing the right thing in leaving her in the crib even when she is not sleeping!!! Am I doing something wrong?

[LaraAndrea]

From what I learned when my LO was around that age is that 4 months is around the time that babies change from newborn/baby sleep patterns to a more adult sleep cycle (which usually runs 40-45 mins) which is likely why your LO is waking after ~40 min.

It can take a bit of time for baby to learn how to link their sleep cycles for longer naps.

Adjusting AT can definitely help... I think avg AT for a 4 month old is 1:45-2h. So you can slowly increase AT if you have not already. You won't likely see results right away but try to stay consistent with whatever increase or change you make for a few days as opposed to flopping shorter it longer AT from day to day.

Does your LO fall asleep independently?

[regina1987m]

Thanks so much for the reply!!!!

I think she's learned to fall back to sleep because she's done it multiple times.. I don't know if giving her a paci for naps ( at the beginning ) is whats causing me the problem but whenever she wakes up she almost always can fall back to sleep without it, and even sometimes she throws the paci before falling asleep in the first place and has no problem.
Yesterday was the worst, she did not fall back to sleep for the second nap so I let her be for 40 minuted the she started cruing so i replaced her paci 3 times until she fell asleep but for other 30 minutes or so. I don't know why I see her relaxing and closing her eyes for about 2 minutes and I get excited that she did it and then she opens her eyes and starts moving again, why does that happen?!?!?

About the Acitivity time, maybe I can stick to one prefetermined AT for this week and see how it goes? If she wakes up at 8:00am, at what time should I be starting the winding down? 9:45am? Or at 10:00am?

[LaraAndrea]

My LO was like yours with paci, she liked it to go down but didn't wake up when it fell out, or would sometimes take it out on her own.

If the paci is a "prop" to her then it may affect her settling, but if you don't normally need to re-plug paci at night etc. It may be ok. That was my situation. My LO still uses paci at her own disgression.

It is not unusual at this age (sleep regression) for a baby who was sleeping well to all of a sudden wake up etc. So it is not necessarily anything you are doing but a phase you must work through.

If she eventually falls back asleep she was probably reasonably tired when she went down. If she does not she may be UT.

You may find yourself in an OT/UT loop for a bit while she learns to connect the sleep cycles.

As for the AT, what is her current AT? And how long is her wind down? If you are doing less than 1:45 now I would work up to in in 15 min increments every few days. Take into consideration your wind down time in that AT.

[regina1987m]

Her current AT is 1:30, if she wakes up at 8, at 9:30 I am heading back in her room and putting her down at 9:37 max.
My winding down routine is actually pretty short, I just take her to her room, sing a song while I change her diaper, shut the drapes, put on the white noise and lay  her on the crib with her lovey. i wait to see if she fusses and if she does I place the paci and leave the room. She usually falls asleep within 3-8 minutes.

I have read a lor about that 4 month regression, my daughter is almost 4 and like I told you on my first post, just started sleeping 12-+ hours at night, so you can undertand my fear! But actually for naps, she has woken up ever since I started with EASY. She has never slept for more than an hour without waking up except when she was a newborn and slept all the time. Sometimes she needs her paci, sometimes she falls back to sleep by herself within 20-40 minutes and less times I have to pick her up because she just wont sleep, but that has happened ever since we started the 4hour easy.

Is there something I'm missing? Is it normal that my baby wont sleep for more than an hour without waking up? Why are the nights so effortless though? I don't understand why at night she can connect her cycles perfectly and in the day its always with an awake time in between her nap.

[LaraAndrea]

Is she swaddled? Has she been rolling over?

She is probably quite tired once she reaches BT, that and her night time sleep rhythm is likely helping her overnight.

I don't know if anybody fully escapes the regression, but some may fair better and be through it faster/smoother with some routine adjustments.

I do think your best bet it working up to 2h of AT. An hour long nap sounds like an under tired nap too me.

[regina1987m]

She was fighting the swaddle  and a month ago I started with the "zippaddee zip" at first to make the transition smoother, and then 2 weeks ago I took her out of it. She sleeps peacefully at night without it so I thought she was ready for her naps, too. She doesn't seem to be jolting any more & sleeps on her back, not rolling over as of yet.

Actually, yesterday was a very good day. She woke up for her nap 3 times in the morning but just for about 10 minutes and then back to sleep and in the second nap I managed to keep her awake for the full 2 hours and she slept for 1:30 hours straight!!! I was so happy!!! Today we're back at the 30 min naps

I think I'm going to count my losses and just survive this phase, I've read that babies this young are not mentally capable of taking long naps... I will keep the 2 hours of AT as you recommended, though - I think in the end she'll get used to ir and sleep for longer stretches!

Thank you so so much for taking the time to reply!!

[LaraAndrea]

It does sound like progress!

It took my LO a few weeks to make the long naps consistent.

You are well on your way.

Good luck