Waking from naps screaming - please help!

[bree912]

My daughter just turned 3mo old yesterday.  We follow BW closely and have her on a good, structured, 3-hr EASY routine.  She is bottle-fed and sleeps excellently at night (about 9-10 hours), has fairly good nap habits as well.  For the past few days though she's gone from a 1-2 hour nap 3x a day (plus a catnap early evening) to 30-45 min catnaps 3-4x a day.  She is waking from these naps screaming, and is clearly still tired.  I shush/pat her in the crib when this happens but she rarely will go back to sleep.  Once she's up though she's miserable and I feel so bad.  Nothing has changed in her routine, but she seems to be OT before she's even out of her crib.  I am keeping her activities to gentle singing, taking short walks outside, and tummy time on a plain white blanket.  I just can't seem to get her to sleep longer!  So far it hasn't impacted her nighttime sleep, but I'm afraid if this continues it will, and will make it very difficult to transition her to a 4-hr EASY routine.  Any advice?

[becky1969]

Welcome!

You've hit the infamous 12 week short-nap phase.  Most babies have this problem at 12 weeks because their REM/non-REM sleep changes and they begin to have a light sleep phase somewhere between 30-45 minutes into their sleep period.  That light sleep phase is new to them, so they often totally wake up! They need to learn to just ride out that little waking and go back to sleep.  We have those light sleep phases too; we will sometimes wake up enough to fluff our pillow, our cuddle our partner, or we might even talk! But we're so used to doing it that often don't even remember doing it. 

You're going to *teach* your baby to go back to sleep after that light sleep phase.  The most common way to tackle this is the "hold-thru-the-jolts" method.  I've taken this excerpt from the FAQs to help you:

Going in at the 35 min mark and waiting for the jolt. The beginning of the rise from deep sleep happens at about the 38 minute mark, so if you are there at the 35 you will catch it. Prepare to spend 20-45 mins in the room the first few times you do this. I started it today and it is already working. Get comfy, perhaps on a stool or standing by the crib and gently place your hands on your babys upper arms while she is swaddled. You are basically providing some pressure so that when/if she jolts, your pressure will prevent a startle awakening. If baby opens her eyes, use one hand to hold her arms and the other to shield her eyes with your hand. If the room is really dark you may be able to avoid the eye-part. Otherwise, maintain this position until baby falls back into deep sleep again. You will notice her breathing quicken when she comes out of sleep and she may grunt, life her legs and roll her head side to side. If you use a paci, you can insert it, but don't do so before she opens her mouth for it. Shoving a paci in there when not requested can actually wake her up more. Follow her cues for paci or out. You may put it in and she will close her eyes, rest and spit it out (keep holding her arms) and then suddenly seem like she needs it again - put it back and continue being careful not to let her come out of sleep due to jolts or wanting that paci - it can feel like a juggling act

The first time it may take her 20-30 mins to fall back into a deep sleep, but if you continue this for all naps, you will see that the time it takes her to fall back shortens and this means you will spend less and less time at the cribside.

In my experience, many babies will be back to longer naps after 3 days.  But you have to be consistent about going in EVERY SINGLE NAP.  You may want to just sit and observe the first nap so you have a really good idea about when she begins the jolting process.  You can usually set your clock by them -- each baby has a different time when they begin jolting, but they are all consistent to THEIR time, if you see what I mean.  So watch her for 1 nap and then be sure to be in her room BEFORE that time so you can hold her down thru all the jolting. 

First time you try she'll probably still wake up all the way.  That's OK.  By the end of the first day you will hopefully see some progress.  Just remember that this takes time and that eventually your good napper will be back! 

Feel free to ask questions!

[bree912]

Thanks Becky!  I have started to go in and while I haven't noticed a difference yet, I'm sure it will come soon.  The first few times I think I left too early.  She seemed to be in a deep sleep and I held through several jolts, but then I left the room and 5 minutes later heard her moving around.  A few additional questions:

1) If she wakes up after I leave the room and just seems content to be awake (not crying, etc), should I still go in and try to shush/pat back to sleep or just let her go in the hopes she'll fall back to sleep on her own?  (She's been going about 10-15 min before she cries, but by that point is well awake and won't go back)
2) Do you find the holding through jolt process more successful than the wake to sleep method?  I haven't tried that yet.
3) Part of the BW routine I was reading talks about using the PU/PD method around 4 mo.  I haven't tried that yet either since she's just over 3 mo.  Should I just skip that part of the routine?

Really appreciate the help, and any additional advice you can give me!  I am afraid this is starting to affect her nighttime sleep- she woke up at 4:45 last night and couldn't put herself back to sleep....

Thanks!
Bree

[becky1969]

It sounds like you need to stay longer to help her thru the jolting.  Don't worry -- the time you spend with her will get less and less over time.  So, just plan to stay at least 30 minutes to help her thru her jolting.  Like I said, you'll find that within a few naps that time will get shorter.

If she wakes up after you leave the room and she's not one to usually go back to sleep on her own, then absolutely go in and try to soothe back to sleep, even though she's not crying.  Once she gets thru the jolts successfully that will not be a problem anymore, most likely.

Holding thru the jolts is the method we use at 3 months old.  WTS is for a different sleep problem -- when you have habitual wakings, mostly at night.  We're trying to teach her to get past the light sleep phase right now, and W2S doesn't necessarily do that.

Pu/PD is only for older babies.  Not useful here.  Keep up with pat/shush.  If your LO doesn't respond well to pat/shush, you can leave out the pat and see if shushing and gentle pressure on her bum or tummy work better.

[bree912]

Perfect, thank you Becky!  I'll let you know in a few days how it all went down