Intro from CO

[thebug]

OK, here is today's schedule thus far. This isn't that different than usual.


5:30am: Wake (sometimes up around 4-4:45am)

Sometime between 9:30 and 10:30: 1st nap. Usually I cap the AM nap at 15-20 minutes max. Today he was inconsolable so I had to let him sleep earlier - around 8:15 but that is unusual. Hopefully we don't pay for it tonight!

11:30-12noon : Lunch

12:30-1pm : Begin 2nd nap. (It takes me about 30-40 minutes to get him to sleep. I have to do some form of CC because my presence in the room is so upsetting and stimulating to him. Today it took me 40 minutes to get him to sleep and then he only slept for 20 minutes! Ugh. Normally he'll sleep 30-40 minutes.

6:30pm: Bedtime routine, and in bed by 7pm. While he will fall asleep during book time, he cries when we put him in bed. He will cry about 12 minutes max and then fall asleep.

He wakes up around 3am and we go in once to comfort him.

Thank you for your help. I'm at a loss. I hate all the crying but I don't feel like I have another way out of this. Anytime I show my face in the room he ramps it up and screams harder and jumps up and down for me to get him out. 

[cath~]

Hi there, I think he's prob ut for his second nap, hence all the difficulty you're having (and the resulting short nap).

Maybe try putting him down 30 mins later and see if that helps. If you find that's still no good, maybe try capping first nap at 10 mins.

Also, just wanted to check what you mean by "some form of CC"?  As you may know, bw doesn't believe in CC because it breaks the bond of trust between LO and parent.  However, if you mean you're doing WIWO (see FAQ board if you're not sure what I mean) then that would be different as you'd be listening to your LO and going in when you hear an "I need you" cry. Lots of LOs settle better without a parent's presence and so of course you don't have to stay with them if their just making settling cries rather than I need you cries.  Another option rather than WI is to try shhing or saying a sleepy phrase from your lo's door if/when they get upset.

However, hopefully if you try putting him down a bit later you'll get less resistance.

WDYT?

[thebug]

Yes of course what I'm doing is WIWO and not leaving him to cry. What I find is he's suoer upset when I'm there and for a few minutes after I leave. Then he ramps down and just does a "protest" cry which then turns into a tired cry. He will stay sitting up in his crib doing tired cry for a long time! He fights sleep so hard at NT but not BT. I'm conflicted on how frequently to go in at NT b/c it seems upsetting to him. But yes I try to decipher cries and go in as he needs me. I'm so making sure to give LOTS of extra connection time during awake periods so as to protect our strong bond.

I will keep trying to push that AM nap back. Question for you - as we're still transitioning off two naps, should I do the second nap based off when he wakes up from first nap? Or should I do the nap based on when I want him to be going down for second nap?

Thank you! I did check out the 2-1 transition thread but doesn't seem very active?!

[thebug]

My other question is how do I extend naps? He's only napping in the afternoon for 20 minutes!

[cath~]

Hmm. I'm wondering if it's time to go cold turkey now to one nap since your LO is about 18 mos now (is that right?). I'm going to ask the other mods what they think...  Will get back to you!

[jessmum46]

Oh yuck, those are some early mornings! 

Just popping on to offer my perspective.  I think Cath is right that now may be the time to jump to one nap, your LO is the right kind of age for it and I wonder if hanging onto two naps for perhaps a touch too long has ended you up where you are now. 

If 5.30am is a typical WU right now I would probably set your naptime at 10.30am to begin with with set BT at 5.30pm.  Very quickly (as in over a week or two) I would be looking to push that to at least 11am/6pm, and then to 11.30/6.30pm or whatever works for you.  With set times we often suggest if you get a stupidly EW then you can bring nap earlier by 15 mins, but no more, and up to 30 mins for BT if the nap is a complete disaster ie less than an hour. 

Set times in general will lead to some short-term OT but if you stick with it for a week or two you should start to see improvements, or at least be able to resettle an EW. 

What do you think?

[cath~]

Just wanted to add that ITA with this suggestion ^^^

Short am nap and aiming for long pm isn't working so I think it's time for the am nap to go.

What do you think? Will you give it a try? How has the weekend been ?

[thebug]

I'm totally on board with this idea. We will start tmrw. Weekend was the same but was so busy i couldn't do the early long nap either day. Thankfully he had two good afternoon naps on sat and sun, so should start the week off rested.
Thank you guys SOOO much! Really hoping this does it! Our BT is down to book, song, put in crib, rub back for one minute and leave. He lets out one or two protest cries but then falls asleep. He's still sitting up in the MOTN (@3:30) but goes back down. Hopefully well eliminate that too. Crossing fingers!!!

[cath~]

Great sounds like BT is going v well.

Keep us posted with how things are going with one nap.

[jessmum46]

Good luck!