Help please! 4 week old not staying asleep!

[MomOfKaylee]

**Please forgive me... I posted this on the General Sleep Board, too - I probably should have posted it here, instead.... newbie mistake! ***

Hi there! Thanks to everyone on this board... it has been a lifesaver! Smiley Smiley I am looking for some help, please...

My 4 week old DD has been on EASY since Day 1. I love it! It makes it so much easier to read her cues and predict what she needs. She is pretty much a textbook baby except possibly for sleep. She has a really hard time settling down for naps. Here's her <rough> schedule:

E - 7:00am Wake/Eat (bottlefed - I tried my best breastfeeding but we both had problems!)
A - 7:30 - 8:15
S - 8:15

E - 10am
A - 10:30 - 11:15
S - 11:30 -

E - 1pm
A - 1:30 - 2:15
S - 2:30 -

E - 4:00
A - 4:30 - 5:15
S - 5:15 -

E - 7:00
A - 7:30 - (bathtime or long winddown)
S - 8:30 -

E - 11:00 Dreamfeed
S -

E - 2am or 3:00am

E - 6am or 7am

Our problem we have is that she really has a hard time staying asleep. It started that she couldn't fall asleep (that's because we had to break her of the habit of falling asleep in our arms (AP!) - and now we're having a hard time keeping her asleep.

We have a pretty consistent routine - after the 1st (or maybe 3rd) yawn, we bring her to her nursery and follow the same wind down routine and right as she gets drowsy, we put her down in her crib, and ssh/pat until she falls asleep. For the past few days, she has fallen right to sleep, sometimes waking after 10+ minutes, and always waking at 45 minutes. We can usually keep her in her crib and ssh/pat her back to sleep. However, the last several naps, she has not been able to fall asleep. We ssh/pat her for 45 min to 1.5 hr and she catnaps through the whole thing, waking after just a few minutes of being asleep. Then we end up running into her next feed. Today, I just let her sleep for an hour after she finally fell asleep - this pushed her 4:00 feed to 5:00.

Okay, and I have to laugh that in Tracy's book, I was classified as a "textbook" mom, too! So here I am, scouring the internet, looking for help and affirmation that I am doing everything right!

So what's happening with her falling asleep and staying asleep? Smiley What can I do differently?

THANK YOU, IN ADVANCE, FOR YOUR HELP!

[malialeanne]

Hi there. Congrats on your new baby!

The first thing I notice is the 1 hr 15 minutes is a lot of awake time for a 4-week-old. Most babies are back to sleep within an hour at that age. I think we were still doing 50 minute awake times at 6 weeks. Overtiredness can make it hard for babies to settle and get a long nap.

It's OK if you don't make a 3-hour EASY at 4 weeks. A lot of moms are at 2.5 hours at that point. I don't think we did 3 hours consistently until she was 10 weeks and could stay awake for 1.5 hours.

HTH,
Malia

[MomOfKaylee]

Hi! Thank you SOOOO much for responding back! And thanks for the congratulations! I love being a Mom! Definitely, without a doubt, the hardest thing I have ever done, but so worth it! (Especially when I get one of those amazing toothless smiles!!!)

Okay, so maybe this is a dumb question, but does "awake" time include when she is eating? So she would potentially wake/eat at 7am, then back to sleep at 8am? Then should I wake her around 9:30 if she doesn't wake on her own? (She is pretty consistent about not being hungry except every 3 hours... she wakes up from her naps hungry.)

Thanks again for your help! It's nice to know I'm not alone out here.

[malialeanne]

Yes, being a mum is so much harder than you think it will be! Who would have thought we'd put so much effort into getting our babies to sleep!

Yes, awake time includes eating. For many moms at this age, it's just a feed, diaper change, and back to bed. Since our feeds didn't take too long as she's an efficient eater, we filled the rest of the time with very low-key A, just sitting in a bouncer staring out a window, or sitting in the swing.

You can cut back the A time by 5-10 minutes per day to see how it goes.

Good luck!