Extend final A time or cut back nap lengths?

[londonlady]

Hi,

Just wondering if I'm asking for trouble in cutting back on my 8 month old son's naps?

To cut a long story short, reducing his naps slightly (from 2x 1hr 20 to 2x 1hr) has helped with his settling and staying asleep in the early evening period after his 7.30pm (ish) bedtime.  We had been experiencing around 1-2 wake ups between 8-10pm where he needed our help to resettle (PUPD / shh pat) and then would sleep through the night as usual. This was playing havoc with our evening time and DH and I would end up eating dinner at gone 9pm every night... I've played with extending the final A time with varying success - every day would be different.

He goes down for naps beautifully and I don't like the idea of waking him before he's ready, but my biggest worry is that it'll get him in a habit of short naps which may cause problems later when we then reduce to 1 nap which will need to be a good 2-3hrs. Is this likely?

Should I persevere with extending A times to try and find the magic final awake time before bed, or am I ok to reduce these naps slightly?

Any thoughts would be really appreciated.

Rachel.

[*Natasha*]

Could you post your current routine?

[londonlady]

Hi,
Thanks - will do below.

Usual routine with the slightly longer naps is:
7am awake
7.15am bottle
8.30am solids
9.45am / 10am nap
11-11.20am awake (nap is always about 1hr 20 when I let him go as long as he wants)
11.45am solids
1pm bottle
2.15pm / 2.30pm nap
3.30pm -3.50pm awake (nap same as before 1 hr 20)
4.45pm solids
5.45pm bath
6.15pm bottle
Then look for sleepy cues. Can be awake between 3.25-4.25hrs after last nap. Try for 20 min wind down, quiet time, books, song, cuddle and then into bed with his cuddle blanket.

He was previously having a wake up at about 30 mins after bedtime, then this moved to about 10.30pm, but once resettled he sleeps through as usual. I'm pretty sure he's not over tired as the wake up was happening regardless of putting him down earlier or later, so I think it is A time extending or nap shortening that needs to happen. Just finding it hard to find the magic time to put him down successfully as his cues are very difficult to read, where as shortening the naps seemed to have a better / more predictable outcome. So I was just wondering what is the better option in terms of long term nap quality / habits as I don't want to cut his naps now and pay for it later!

Thanks,
Rachel.

[KathrynK]

hi Rachel
Most babies of 8 months are having 2 x 1.5 hour naps in the day so your ds looks pretty normal! Our routine at 6 months was almost identical to yours. Don't worry about waking him from naps, if that's what you need to do to ensure he gets a good nights sleep. I started having to wake dd from naps at around 10.5 months as she was getting too much daytime sleep and it was affecting her night- 3 months on I still have to wake her from every nap.
Personally I would aim for the same set bedtime every night. For us it is 7pm, regardless of whether dd woke from her nap at 3, 3.30 or even 4pm. I think it helps her body clock to set so she knows it's time for bed. We do her bath & bed routine at the exact same time each evening. For us it works best to do her bath at 6.30, right before bed, as the nice warm bath zonks her out totally. So once she's out the bath it's into her bedroom for jammies on, story and bottle, all with the lights turned down low. She doesn't go back downstairs where any toys are and I am sure it helps her to settle well each night.
hth
kathryn

[londonlady]

Thanks for the advice Kathryn.

We've been aiming for the usual bedtime, but he basically was going nuts and wasn't happy to settle (lots of tears all round) which is so unlike him (or was!) So I tried making bedtime a little later and he'd eventually go off with lots of reassurance, but then we'd get the wake up.  Last night, he did a final A time of nearly 4hrs and went off with no help needed, and no wake up despite having the 2 x 1hr 20 naps. But that left us with a bedtime of around 8pm which leaves us eating our dinner at about 8.45pm! (Our kitchen is next to Max's room so I have to leave it a while before cooking!) 

So you think there won't be any major knock on problems of cutting his naps back (other than the supreme grouchiness when he first gets up!?) I just worry that he'll be so in the habit of doing 1 hr naps that when I eventually need him to do longer to get through the day on 1 nap, he won't be able to do it.  Just wondered if it was a general no-no or if most people find it ok but it sounds like it's ok...

Thanks again.
Rachel. x

[KathrynK]

hi Rachel

some babies just need less sleep than others! I have been waking dd from her naps for 3 months now and I still need to wake her- she hasn't gotten into a habit of having shorter naps. Sometimes I  onder if this means she needs more day sleep but trust me having experienced 5am wake ups for weeks on end due to too much daytime sleep I am going to keep waking her to preserve that nighttime 12 hours!
Why don't you give it a go and see how he does? You may have to do it for two weeks or more before his body clock gets used to it and bedtime becomes easier so stick it out and don't lost heart after a couple of days.
I think dd is not as grouchy now when I wake her as she used to be. I just know how much I absolutely loathe being woken up (I LOVE my sleep!) so I am as gentle as poss when I wake her and for a good 10 minutes after, just to let her properly wake up before I try to do anything like feed her or get her to play.
let us know how you go
xx

[londonlady]

Hi,

Had a good night last night. That's 3 in a row of no early evening wake ups....
Think it's just going to be a day by day balance of weighing up how good / long his naps were and whether he needs a longer final A time or not. It's become so difficult to read his cues of an evening so at least the experience of the last few days eliminates some of the guess work. Glad to hear your DD hasn't had problems with being woken from naps... Makes me more confident about doing it on the days we need to.

Thanks,
Rachel.