need some wi/wo advice

[NolaFae]

Hi,

Our 14 month old daughter has always had sleep issues, a lot of screaming at bed and naptimes. The finally we found out that she had an ear infection, maybe she had been having them on and off for a long time.. poor thing.
Now the going to sleep is not such a drama anymore... finally!!. But another thing has come up (is it ever smooth sailing ). She is in a good routing of eating and naps (we think).
0700 wake up and a bottle (with oats?.. like porridge, dunno how you call it in english).
1000 naptime (she is a steadfast 45 minute napper.. has been since day 1)
1100 some fruit
1230 bread
1500 naptime (45 minutes)
1730 dinner (unless it is a daycare day.. then it is 1815 dinner)
and 1930 to bed (give or take 30 minutes).

The thing is that we have to stay with her the entire time till she falls asleep. for the naps it is usually up to 30 minutes. But at bedtime (1930) it is the better part of an hour. During this time we do nothing, besides sitting in her room. And she is lust tossing and turning to catch some sleep... then some blank staring and then she dozes off.
If we try to walk out of the room while she still is awake it is drama.

And when she accidentally wakes (sometimes after 45 minutes, but also sometimes after a couple of hours... never later then 0130 though) she cries loudly and is sitting up in her bed. About 3 months ago we gave in, and took her into our bed (after 11 months of waking anywhere between 1 and 30 times). We know we maybe shouldn't have.. but we needed the sleep... BIGTIME.

She also has issues when we walk out of her line of sight during the day... we have trained this alot with peek-a-boo, and walking in and coming straight back... so now we can sometimes go to the bathroom ourselfes when needed.

We think she is totally dependent on us, and has seperation anxiety. Will walk in/walk out be an option during bed and naptimes? And how do we do it exactly... do you walk in/walk out 30 times if needed? We read in the books that you say good night when she is calm and relaxed, walk away, and when she starts crying get back in immediately and settle her down again.. and walk out.... After how many days should we get progress..... should we also start leaving her in her own bed at the same time... or should we start that when she can fall asleep on her own?

any help is highly appreciated.

PS. when she sleeps between us she does not wake up anymore till the next morning (rarely she wakes up, but settles her self again and goes back to sleep).

[Layla]

Hi there,

There's a couple of things going on here. Overtired from the short naps, transitioning to 1 nap, SA & the inability of falling asleep without you.

Naps - I actually think that her pm nap is quiet late and this could be stopping her from sleep longer than 45min. I would suggest the following nap times:

7am - wake for the day
10-10.30 - morning nap
10:45-11:15 - she wakes up
2-2.30pm - afternoon nap
3.30-4pm - wake from nap
7/7.30pm - bedtime

Sleep training - you can still use wi/wo when they have SA because you come back to reassure her. It really depends though... if she's having a really hard time at the moment with SA, then I would do GW instead of wi/wo. Here's the link to sleep training methods for toddlers which explains the 3 methods & the other link is which option is better to chose.
https://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=63896.0
https://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=80750.0
If you have chosen wi/wo, you do it for the duration of the nap length (so 45mins in the morning & 1.5hrs in the pm.... but I honestly can't see myself walking in and out for 1.5hrs so I would do it for an hour. At night you do it as long as it takes for them to get to sleep and to fall back asleep when she wakes at night.

After how many days should we get progress..... should we also start leaving her in her own bed at the same time... or should we start that when she can fall asleep on her own?

It might take about 2 weeks before you see some progress. Yes, I would do the sleep training in her cot/own bed. You don't want to do wi/wo in your bed and then in her bed (is that what you were trying to ask?)

Overtired - I would really try and extend that pm nap. By putting her to nap earlier she might sleep longer than 45mins but if she still wakes at 45mins, I would do wi/wo to extend it (if thats the method you have chosen). If she's not having any of it, I would do an earlier bedtime (like 7pm to be asleep by). By putting her to bed earlier, it might also help with the nightwakings

Let me know what you think
Layla