Need some eyes please. I can't figure it out on my own.

[lesliemarie]

DD is almost 12 months old and I've just gone back to work.  She is in a home daycare where it is just her and the care provider's DD who is a week younger than DD.  They have to do a school run from 8 until 9 (a long walk) and from 2:30 until 3:30.  This is really screwing with schedule and is resulting in totally messed up sleep.

DD will go to sleep independently but still wakes frequently overnight.  I think that most of this is habit and once she gets over this silly cold I'm going to to really start working with the sleep training overnight but it is hard with being back at work now.  Anyway I need some ideas for a schedule that will work for DD with the school runs. 

This is what she was doing:
7:30 wake
9:30/10:00 sleep (it really doesn't seem to matter if she has only been awake a short time but 9:30 seems to be her preferred nap time)
10:30/11:00 wake
2:00/2:30 sleep
3:00/3:30 wake
7:00/7:30 sleep

These are approximates but she was pretty consistent in being able to stay awake about 2.5 hours in the morning then 3-3.5 hours before second nap and bed.

Now last week she was doing:
6:30 wake
9:30 sleep
10:30/10:45 wake
1:30 sleep
2:30 wake
6:30 sleep

This seemed to work fairly well but then this week she started to refuse to nap before the school run.  So she wasn't getting to nap until 3:30.  This meant that she wasn't tired enough by the time bedtime came around and was just generally in a bad mood and more clingy.  This could also be because she has this cold and it seems to have hit her pretty hard.

I really need some opinions and some help trying to figure out a schedule that will work for her.  When she is feeling well she seems to be able to do 3 hours before nap 1 and between 3 and 4 hours for nap 2 and bedtime. 

Yesterday was terrible.  She woke from her 2nd nap at 2:30 and then by 4:30 she started getting cranky and by 6 she was a crying, runny nosed mess  .  I ended up putting her down at 6:15 and gave her some meds to help the nose.  That actually helped her sleep and she only woke at midnight and I gave her more meds and a bottle then she slept until 5:15.  Woke happy as a clam and wouldn't go back to sleep.  So it seems she is becoming an 11 hour sleeper but I need to get this sorted out because this 5am waking is not going to fly.  On a bright note she hasn't had only 1 NW since I started sleep training at the beginning of august and even then I only got two of those before it quickly reverted with all of the teething and sickness.

Sorry for the long post but I just don't know what to do here and not being the one who is implementing this is making it even harder.

[*Liz*]

Sorry for no replies honey 

How long are the first and second nap usually on you own routine?? Is it one long and one short??

I wonder if one nap would be better  . Just that way she could potentially get a big 2-3 hr nap.

SO pleased she is sleeping so well at night for you though honey. Long time coming, hey?!

I think I will move this to sleeping for toddler since she is almost 1 now  .

[lesliemarie]

She does at most an hour and 15 minute naps.  If she has one a day it is still an hour and 15 minutes.  I can count on one hand the amount of times she has slept for more than an hour and a half since she was 2 or 3 months old.  She has had some 5 plus hour stretches of A time and still only slept for an hour and 15 minutes.  I just don't get it. 

It is a long time coming but we aren't there yet.  The reason I think she is sleeping a bit better at night is because I'm drugging her for this cold    In the past few days she has started waking at 10:30 and 4:30.  Both times she will have a bottle and go right back to sleep.  She was down to one bottle but since being sick won't go back to sleep without one.  Then still with the EWs.  At least this morning I got to sleep in until 6:30

Thanks for moving it.  I hope i will get more help there

[scucci1979]

Leslie, I agree with Liz. I wonder if you can start pushing her to one nap. I really think you need to move that am nap out gradually. 

[lesliemarie]

That is what I've been thinking the whole time but the girl just can't do it.  This morning she was a total mess after 2.5 hours.  I did have her up to 3 hours at one point but then that regressed with sickness and teeth.  She is a terrible teether.  She is still sick now and I'm wondering if there is another tooth coming.  Actually I know there is because I can see it and feel it under the skin but it has been like that for 3 weeks now.

Anyway, do you think I should just start trying to push it out by 10 minutes or so every couple of days?  I would really love to get her onto one nap and ideally it would be at noon so that it gives her the opportunity to have 2.5 hour naps before the school run.  Not that there is really any way she would sleep that long 

Would you also do an early bedtime?  She is consistently giving me 11 hour nights with the exception of last night was almost 12.  That was actually after a day with a 6am wakeup, a 1 hour morning nap from 9-10 and then she refused to go down until after the school run and slept from 3:30 until 4.  I managed to keep her up until 6:45 after that.  The babysitter told me that she was just a mess for most of the day though.  Nose running all over the place and just cried unless she was holding her (or more accurately letting her climb on her). 

She seems to think it is separation anxiety with her but I doubt that.  I think it is more likely the cold and the transition.  She has been off and on cranky since the beginning of August.  Most of it I thought was teething related but I wonder now if it isn't partially the transition.  She is so happy playing on her own or with DD1 or the sitters daughter for the first hour after the nap but then after that is when the crankiness kicks in.

This is all just so frustrating because if I were at home I could hopefully work on it better but I just don't know.  Grrrr