8.5 month, frequent night waking, great day sleeps ....

[mrstired]

Hi, my daughter is 8.5 months old and we seem to have gone backwards after her most recently wonder week where she was impossible to settle so I ended up bringing her into bed with me.  This has meant she is comfort nursing a couple of times through the night and I realise I need to regroup, nip this in the bud and get her back to her cot.

An example of her schedule, from yesterday is as follows:

Awake: 7.30am then BF
Plays until 8.30am the solid breakfast (isn't particularly interested but consists of pureed fruit & toast)
10.am - nap (usually lasts 1.5 hours)

11.30am - wake up & BF
Plays until 1pm then lunch of solids such as risotto, shepherds pie etc (usually loves lunch)
2pm - nap (yesterday sleep for 45 mins and woke up crying, usually sleeps for 1.5 hours)

3.30am - BF
Plays until 5ish
5pm - dinner (yesterday tuna, rice & vegetables otherwise shepherd's pie or spag bol or similar)
6pm - night time wind down - bath, changed, stories, bed
7pm - asleep

Its impossible to get her to have a late cat nap and ends in hysterics if I try via a walk in the car etc.  90% of naps are in her cot with the occasional naps in her pram if we have to be out and about for some reason.

So not so bad, until the night time begins.  Then it all starts:
7pm - goes to bed and self settles
7.45pm - wakes screaming, can't be settled, resort to BF
12am - wakes, BF (I assume she's hungry?!)
3.00am - wakes - BF (realise I shouldn't have fed her then) and bring her into bed with me
6.00am - comfort nurses, no actual feed
7.45am - Wakes for the day with a big smile...

The only change to the routine is that if she wakes at 7am, which she does 50% of the time, then I pull her naps forward by 15/30mins

So I guess my question is how often should she need to feed at night and how do I stop feeding her back to sleep.  I have tried the PU/PD which my understanding is to assist babies to self settle but she's able to do that.  I do wonder if I stopped too quickly but she starts to hyperventilate and the BF calms her.

Any thoughts, opinions would be appreciated as I am keen to resolve this and would appreciate input to ensure I'm on the right track and limit the upset to bub.

[jessmum46]

I think she's probably UT at night, hence the frequent wakings.  She only has A times of 2.5, 2.5 and 3.5h in a less than 12h day.  At 8.5m she should be able to handle 3h A time at a minimum, and many LOs are having more like 3.5h.  LOs who are still having two long naps at this age generally have a 12.5/13h day to fit in enough A time.
 
Yesterday she was probably short term OT at BT from the short pm nap - you definitely don't want to be doing a late CN at this age so if she has a short pm nap try to give her an early BT.

I would suggest that you gently push out your first A time to at least 3 hours (increase 10-15 mins, hold for 3-4 days then increase again) and do the same with the second one.  You may find if she has enough A time in the day that some of your NWs resolve without you having to anything.  If not, then we're here to help

[mrstired]

Wow, thanks for the quick response! That was certainly not the answer I was expecting.  I have previously kept her up longer but she has ended up only having a 45 min napping or being difficult to settle which is why we have decided on a 2.5 hour awake time.  I kept her up an additional 10 mins today and she is still asleep (an hour and counting) so we'll see what happens.  We're away at the moment and she's in a portacot so there isn't too much I can do for the night time until we get home.  She went down easily this morning though but last night was hideous (I did make the mistake though of putting her down at 7pm when she didn't get up until 7.45 & had 3 hours of naps during the day - obviously she wasn't sufficiently tired!)

Couple of quick qus:
 - Should I start stretching both A times or start with the morning one first?
 - Should I continue has normal at night until the A times are stretched to 3 hours as this will take a week or so?
 - What's the max time she should be awake in the evening before bed?

Thanks SO much for coming back to me. I'm feeling energized about working on her A times as it is something I totally haven't considered

[jessmum46]

Glad I could help!  If she is a bit touchy with sleep, perhaps work on extending just the first A time to start with, then work up to increasing the second too.  I'd be tempted to do as you are at night for now, then once she is having appropriate A times in the day you can see if the nights are still an issue.  If they are we can help to work on them at that point

Before bed I would say 4h is a maximum given she is probably reasonably high sleep needs, maybe closer to 3.5h especially if her naps haven't been good.