8mo ongoing NWs

[becj86]

So with wake to sleep, keep doing it for 4-7 days then stop and see what happens. That should be enough that he's learned how to get through the transition and he's probably well out of the chronic OT now with that much of a sleep increase.

It is reasonable to knock out that 3am-ish feed. Id be tempted to get OH to see if he can resettle since he doesn't have tasty milk... another thing you could try is thinking about increasimg the first A time because if he's awake and happy for that long, he may need more A, especially now he is getting much more restorative sleep.

[Rak10]

Last night 1st wake up was 3.30am, best ever!

[becj86]

Yay! Glad things are improving for you

[Rak10]

Hi

Things are now looking so completely different to when I posted at the start of the month, possibly need to be on the naps board.

Nights have improved beyond all recognition since doing shh/pat not feeding to sleep. It is the exception to get a NW before he wakes for 1st feed. This has got later to 3.30 often. We even had a sleep through to 5:20am - 10 hours!

I got some longer naps by doing wake to sleep now these have stuck on their own getting mostly 2hrs for first nap then second needs to be short.

He will be 10 months in 2 weeks. I’d say he has quite low sleep needs. So now we have the longer nap once again EMW has hit with 5.20 wu, can sometimes briefly resettle.

So is the long nap too long / should I cap it?
It makes second nap harder to fit even a cat nap - is this the early signs of moving to 1, he is still pretty young for it but does long awake times.

Sample routine
5.20 wu, feed may briefly resettle
10-12 sleep - push awake to 10 or later
3.30 - 4 sleep - wake him at 4
7.15 bt

So night is too short, he is tired up to 1st nap

One day last week I went to a baby group and he slept at 10.40 for 2h20 so I pushed him thru til bt with another long awake of 5h30, he was ok. The next day he needed 1 long and 1 x 20 min cn. Today he was woken from long nap by DD1 after 1h50 at 11.50 and I tried from about 3-4 but refused second nap so had to push him from 11.50 to 6.10 bt. He was tired but ok, ate food fine etc.

So NW are good, nap is good but EMW means night is too short. And 2nd nap is very hit and miss meaning bt could be 6.15 or 7.15 or between.

Any thoughts appreciated on how to structure naps. DD1 wakes 6.20 so don’t need massive change to wu. Anything after 6 is fine, pushing him to 11hrs night sleep plus.

X

[becj86]

It makes second nap harder to fit even a cat nap - is this the early signs of moving to 1, he is still pretty young for it but does long awake times.

Yes, it is the early signs of going to 1 nap but that doesn't mean you'll be there in the next couple of weeks, it usually takes months of this back and forwards. I've seen reasonably frequently a LO go to 1 nap around 10-11 months then going back to 2 naps a month or two later before really dropping to one nap completely.

Now, wrt naps... there are a few options:
1. You can keep going as you are
2. You can push the long nap later and APOP a CN of 20-30mins. That may help with the EW though his sleep total is reasonable and this would probably just shift BT that bit later to be more consistently 7:15-7:30 rather than sometimes being 6ish. When he's going to bed around 6pm, when is he waking for the next day? If that's 5:20 still, that actually is around 11hr night sleep. By APOP, I mean accidental parenting on purpose - you may not want to do this as you've just weaned feed to sleep and it could mean he goes backwards but its not something I would expect to happen.
3. You can do a short first nap. I did this for a while with DS. It can take some fiddling to get A times and such sorted because its quite individual but I ended up doing a normal length first A time, capped nap of 20-30mins, A time of 1.5-2hr which was miserable and I basically had to keep feeding him or changing activities every 10mins because he was TIRED then a long PM nap. It was hard. The good thing was though that he had 2 naps each day which gave me some predictability and I could just cap the AM nap shorter and shorter til I disappeared it and he went to one nap.

[Rak10]

Hi
Thank you for your quick and always helpful replies, your advice & support has been absolutely amazing to set me on the right path.
Yes I don’t think he is ready for 1 nap but it is tricky to get a consistent routine when he is switching between 1 & 2.
Bt was 6.10 last night. He did perhaps his longest sleep ever of 10.5 hrs, amazing, til 4.40am then was ready to wake up but I did resettle him by holding him for a bit til 6 then didn’t want to go for 1st nap until 10.45 and refused 2nd again. Early bt again.

Thanks for your ideas on naps
1. Having the good night sleep and long nap makes such a difference to me the early wake bothers me less now it is light in UK that early too.
2. Not sure I totally understand APOP here, yes he pretty much wakes at 5.20 now regardless of bt. So yes the early bt gives an ok night. I’d prefer bt later as fits with DD1’s rather than 1 after the other. I know it is always changing at this age.
3. I am tempted to try this, I did it with DD1 cutting 1st nap down. Would you start with 30min or 20min? & stretch it less say 10am rather than pushing it so far as I do to get long one? Would it need a week or so to tweak and see if wu pushes later? My apprehension is not getting a long 2nd nap we went so long with 40min naps i’m always fearing their return!
I know this phase will eventually change again.
Thanks so much again x

[becj86]

2. Not sure I totally understand APOP here

Sorry, so basically a car nap or a pram nap or something where you know he will drift of reasonably easily and reliably and you can wake him after 20-30mins.

3. I am tempted to try this, I did it with DD1 cutting 1st nap down. Would you start with 30min or 20min? & stretch it less say 10am rather than pushing it so far as I do to get long one? Would it need a week or so to tweak and see if wu pushes later? My apprehension is not getting a long 2nd nap we went so long with 40min naps i’m always fearing their return!

So I would probably start with 30mins then cut down to 20 and so on. Being woken after 30mins, I find will be enough to get baby through another couple of hours in the day and make the day longer without stopping them wanting another nap because they're still tired. WRT bringing the nap earlier, that's quite individual. My DS wouldn't go to sleep UT, so I didn't but some other people have had success bringing the first nap a little earlier and capping it. You'd probably have to give it a week to bed in before tweaking much as its a pretty big change from his current routine.

[Rak10]

Ok thank you, he is taking longer & longer to get that 2nd nap in, usually pushchair or sling works, car takes ages.
I am psyching myself up to move the naps around next week as have both this week (1/2 term) so won’t be able to fully focus! X

[becj86]

Good call to wait til you can focus on it a bit more. All the best

[Rak10]

Hello
LO is nearly 12 months!
Looking back I did mostly nothing and let him do the longer morning nap and then a cat nap
We have had teeth that disrupted nights, chicken pox, more teeth.
Now he is pretty much on 1 nap. It seems to have stopped EMW. I worry I stretch him but he seems fine on it, just seems early on 1 nap at 11.5 months but there isn’t room for 2.
Routine is generally
06.30 wu
11.30 - 2 nap
19.15 bt
NF around 04.45 can be tricky to resettle or takes an hour as so near wu time.

It’s quite long awakes but get at least 2hr nap sometimes 3.
He is still EBF but only takes a feed in the night and 1 before bed (not to sleep) then water in the day.
He is still pretty inactive just showing signs of wanting to try to crawl, he might get more tired when he moves more?
We never seem to get a good run of nights without wakings but the wakings are often teeth, cold etc. I think underneath he is ok and can do a decent long stretch.
Does this routine look ok?
X

[becj86]

Looks absolutely fine, I think you're right in that he may need less A time once he's moving more, but if its working for him, stick with it. You could potentially move BT a touch earlier and that may (or may not) help with that long NW.

[Rak10]

Thank you as ever Bec. I am coming to the end of wanting to EBF so going to post on that board as my concern stopping is how it will affect the early morning wake.