How much A time after 45 min naps?

[ellenjess]

Hello
DS is 15 weeks and is making some progress with easy...but not much.  Can you advise how long A time I should give him after 45 min naps?  He mostly doesn't get past 45 mins.  I have extended his morning A time to 2 hours and that sometimes gets us a long nap (1.5-2hrs) but I have to do wts and probably shh pat too to get this.  I then try and leave 1.75 A to get a second long nap but have never got more than CNs for the rest of the day.  He has some ok nights but is back to waking every 2 hours max all night long.  Help!!!!!

A good day looks like this:

WU 730
E 8
A
S 9.30-11.00
E 11.15
A
S 12.45 -1.30
E 2.
A
S 3.00-3.45
E 430
A
S 5.15 - 6.00
E 7ish
A
S BT 730ish

He sleeps for upto 6 hours in that first stretch unless I wake him for a dreamfeed.  the df makes no difference to rest of his night.  He then wakes every 90min-2hrs all night. I mostly feed to sleep as I cant afford for him to scream the house down and wake my toddler.  He self settles for all naps and bt but cant manage it in the night for some reason. I do occasionally shh pat in the night but I think the patting bothers him - he'd rather suck his fingers to sleep.  sometimes he is just wide awake particularly around 4am. 

should I extend or shorten those daytime A times?
Often he takes a while to settle for naps (but isn't crying) so we only manage two CNs plus the morning sleep (3hrs total). He then goes to bed 6.30/7.
He isn't a big baby (25th centile).

I'm really starting to struggle as I can't sleep at all during the day cos of DD (age2) and I'm finding my fuse is getting pretty short.  I do recall that DD had awful sleep between 3 and 4 months too so the rational/logical part of me is telling myself to just ride the storm but the sleep deprived monster in me is getting hacked off! 

[Emami]

Do you think he is LSN?  2hrs is quite long for a 3 month old, but if that gets you the best morning nap I would stick with it.  After a short nap I would try pulling it back, maybe around 1hr20.  45mins is often an UT nap, but I would be surprised if he was UT with long A times.  Short naps are really common around this age though, as you found with your DD (mine too!), and there is a sleep regression around 4 months that he might be hitting early.  So with that it's hard to know if it's a case of riding it out or if it can be tweaked, but I would try shorter A times towards the end of the day when he's only had catnaps.

[ellenjess]

Thanks emami. Is lsn learning something new? I don't know the acronym!  Well bedtimes have become quite hard so I'm going to try shorter As at the end of the day. It means putting DS to bed at 630pm which worries me a bit - might mean he gets up at 630 too!! Had better night last night but feel like I am going to look haggard forever.

[Emami]

Sorry, LSN is low sleep needs.  I asked because 2hrs is getting you a decent nap in the morning but that's a long time for a 3 month old.
Average A times- BOOKMARK ME!!
This is an average though, so if he needs a bit longer that's fine 

I think a 6:30 bedtime is fine - we did this for a long time with a wake up anywhere between 6:30 and 8! Once he is in a good routine if a 6:30 start doesn't suit you can try to shift his day by an hour or so, but I would see what a 6:30 BT gets you first!

[ellenjess]

Thanks again for your tips. We've just come back from a week away and ds sleep has worsened a little with all the changes. He still self settles but just can't manage it in the night. Usually up every two hours. I suppose this is a NW question now so I'll hop over to that board and read there. Tired! Xx

[Emami]

Hope he gets back on track and you get some better nights soon!