15 wk old sleeps 11hrs at night but only 30 min naps. How do i extend naps?

[lorna1518]

Hi There

I am new here, hope Im in the right place etc!

My DD is 15 weeks old and is a lovely little girl.  She sleeps so well at night after a consistent routine, bath, feed and bed (I used to feed before bath but made her sicky), I put her down in her cot awake and she may take 20 mins to go to sleep but does so with no tears.  She doesn't have a dummy, no lullabys or light shows!  Just goes off to sleep in a dark room.  She stirs a lot during the night but I see her self soothe and go back to sleep.  She goes down anytime between 5.30 and 7pm depending on how tired she is due to poor daytime naps!

She wakes up between 6 and 7am has a bottle and starts yawning so goes back to bed till 8.30! (I know im lucky!)

Then the daytime starts and it all goes a bit wrong!  We have followed the EASY routine since she was 2 weeks old so she never feeds to sleep.  She can only stay awake for 1 hour MAX, she gets very fussy and upset and tells me she is tired so we start our nap routine, go up to room, sing a song saying bye bye world for an hour or two(!?) whilst pulling the blind down, put her in her sleep bag (she starts to cry but always has had to cry down since birth), I sit and rock and shh for a little while until the crying decreases and her eyes are heavy, put her in cot sleepy but awake.  She cries down for 2-5 mins then is fast asleep.  She sometimes sucks her hand as comfort.  She will sleep for between 25-45 mins.  That is it!  so every hour I am putting her to bed for half an hour!  It feels like all I do is put her to bed.  The first couple of naps, she wakes up happy and seems refreshed but as the day goes on, she gets more and more grumpy and tired and awake time can decrease to 30 mins!  I have tried leaving her in her cot when she wakes.....she just cries out.  Ive tried getting to her quickly and trying to soothe her back to sleep but with no success.  As the day goes on the naps get shorter!

Sometimes, I have to start bedtime routine at 5pm as she is so OT that she just wants her bed.  Is this ok??

A typical day is below

E - 7
S - 7.30-8.30
A - 8.30-9.30
S - 9.30 -10.15
E - 10.45
A
S - 11.15-12
A - 12
S - 1-1.40
A
E - 2.15
A
S - 2.40ish-3.10
A -
S - 4 - 4.30
A - bath etc
E - 5,30
bed @ 6pm!

Can anyone help me to extend naps??  I have tried shhhing her back to sleep and rocking her but she resists and either laughs and wriggles as wants to get up or cries.  Do you think 6pm is too early for bed?

Please help!!!

Thanks

Lorna

[amayzie]

bumping this for you!

[Emami]

Hi and welcome to BW!  I don't think there is anything wrong with a 6pm BT, especially if she needs that long night to catch up from short naps.  But if the naps lengthen and she is well rested during the day then you should be able to get to a later bedtime (if that's what you want).

I know you say she struggles to get to 1hr A time, but I do think this might be causing the short naps.  It's pretty low for her age, the average is around 1hr30:
Average A times- BOOKMARK ME!!
Of course, as an average there are some who need more and some who need less.  Your DD may need less, but even so I think if you push it a little her naps might improve

[Florena49]

Oh you are so lucky with night times! We hae lots of sleep problems, but i had the same problem with A time just recently, LO is 14 weeks now and went throigh a growth spurt at 12 weeks, all he wanted to do was sleep!so his A time was an hour for a few days, once he went back to normal, he would show signs at an hour mark but once i started puttibg him to bed he would fight it, get screamy and hysterical. So i braved it and from Minday extended his A time to 1.20! We are on 1.30 now. It was difficult forthe first 2 days as he would still how signs at an hour mark and for the next 20 mins i would have to distract him....granted his naps are still 40 mins but it is gettibg easier to resettle him once he wakes. We do have a dummy which i think is an issue, so we will be getting rid of that soon to see if sleep will improve. I would try and extend A times by 10 mins first to see how LO does

[lorna1518]

Hiya!

Thanks for your replies.  After rreading some other threads yesterday I decided to try and extend A time today......it was awful! She started showing signs of tiredness after 45mins of A time so I changed rooms and walked around talking and looking out the windows, this pacified her till the 1hr mark but she was starting to cry and protest so I took her up to her room to play with her toys and she went mad. I had to pick her up and thought id change her to try and extend further, she just got more and more angry do I gave in and did naptime routine quickly but she had got herself so worked up that I just couldn't settle her.....  Usually, she is asleep in 2-4 mins in her cot but it took 20 mins and I had to go in and calm/shh her.  She still only slept for 30 mins.  I didn't try and extend the next A times!!

Should I really persist?  I am worried TBH.  Worried that I will do more damage by letting her get so upset.

Thanks again xx

[Florena49]

It wasnt pleasant for the first two days, u will know your Lo the best if sensitive u might want to extend just one A time at a time so say only the first one of the day before the first nap say by 5-10 mins and hold it for 2-3 days at least at that. See how that goes, they do get into a habit of stayibg awake a certain period of time so will show signs at the same time.

[Emami]

I agree with Florena - I know it's hard but you can't tell much off one bad nap.  I would give it a few days to see how she adjusts.  But also as you said, with a short nap you don't want to push the next A time as she won't be rested and will struggle.  So I would focus on trying to get the first nap sorted as that sets you up well for the rest of the day.

As for letting her get so upset... You didn't 'let' her.  You were there with her and she knew she was safe.  She's just learning something a bit different and letting you know she's tired and frustrated, but that's ok.  Routines at this age are hard as they change so quickly and it can seem like as soon as you've got things working you need to change it again.  You won't damage her hun x