Author Topic: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?  (Read 4163 times)

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Offline sjolson3

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #15 on: June 26, 2008, 02:39:21 am »
I feed usually every 3 hours and he takes anywhere between 4-6 oz.  Sometimes he doesn't quite make it to the 3 hour mark if he doesn't take the full 6 oz. the feed before.

the rest of the day after the long nap was horrible.  DS took a 38 min, 25 min, and 33 min nap and bedtime was the worst yet.  it took over an hour to get him to finally fall asleep and stay asleep.

hope tomorrow brings a better day.

Offline brenda2

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #16 on: June 26, 2008, 02:55:44 am »
yes, hope so.

so could you post your day today so i can see A times and lengths of naps?  maybe something will stick out.  30ish minute naps mean OT, so i would say you need to shorten your A time, especially after a short nap.  i know you are trying to lengthen them, but if you do too much when he's not ready it will make him OT thus giving more short naps.
7 E
8:30-10 S
10 E

can you post it like that and i'll take a look.
   

   


Offline sjolson3

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #17 on: June 26, 2008, 21:40:52 pm »
Here is the day so far...

500-E (4 oz.) then back to sleep
655-Awake
700-E (only 1 oz.)
758-rock/put down/back up/sway/down
812-Asleep
853-Awake
920-E (5 oz.)
1022-Asleep
1112-Awake (tried for ~30 minutes to get back to sleep)
1136-Up
1205-E (6 oz. while being rocked--too fussy to take bottle otherwise)
1232-put down
115-Finally asleep
150-Awake
245-E (6 oz.)
310-Asleep (fell asleep while eating with DH again)
400-Awake

Not sure why today he wants to eat every 2.5 hours...but he is taking full bottles so he must be hungry.

Thanks again Brenda for all your help...we had an appt last Friday with our pediatrician and she didn't seem concerned and encouraged me more than once to buy a sling or baby carrier to keep him with me and at least I could have my hands free.  I told her that is not what I wanted but she thought it was best.  Hopefully with your help and time we can get this figured out.

Offline brenda2

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #18 on: June 27, 2008, 01:25:53 am »
ok.  he's 3 mo right? 

he may be having a growth spurt and that's why he wants to eat often, or you may be misinterpreting his cues and thinking he's fussy because he's hungry but actually he's fussy because he's tired.

i think he's OT, that's why you're getting the 30 min naps.  you need to reduce his A times until he's caught up on sleep and on consistent naps and then you can work on getting his A time up to around 1.5 hours (max) which is normal for his age.

can you follow sleepy signs at all?  does he yawn?  look away/avoid eye contact?

i would try this:
7 awake and feed
8:15 -   sleep
if it's a short nap then try putting him back down about an hour after he gets up (this is lying him down in the crib, after the wind down etc).  if it interferes witha feed try your best or feed early at 9:30.  if it's a long nap then try putting him down closer to 1.5 hours.  45 min naps can mean OT or UT and it can be a fine balance to figure out the A times to get a long nap.  you have to be consistent.  any change in routine is goign to take a few days to see any change.

i think a lot of the short naps you had today are due to OT.  shortening the A times should help.

   

   


Offline sjolson3

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #19 on: June 28, 2008, 12:17:07 pm »
Well, yesterday was pretty much the same except we have 3 50 min naps and then a 2.5 hour nap in the afternoon.  Then he slept 7.5 hours last night, ate at 4:30 am and went back to sleep until about 6:45 am.  He wasn't as fussy either. 

He is kind of hard to read for his sleepy signals.  He'll be playing and then all of the sudden just start to fuss and turn his head.  That's when I take him back to his room and about the only thing I can do is turn on the white noise and sway for a minute and put him down.  Very rarely does he cry and if he does, I just pick him up and shh for a minute and put back down and he goes to sleep.

We'll see how today goes.

Offline brenda2

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #20 on: June 28, 2008, 17:20:26 pm »
that sounds better.  keep at it, it'll take a few days for him to catch on :)
   

   


Offline sjolson3

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #21 on: June 30, 2008, 02:40:27 am »
Well, we've gotten a long nap again the past two days in a row.  Once in the morning and then today in the afternoon.  Otherwise all other naps are still around 40-50 minutes.  He has been getting back to eating closer to every 3 hours but sometimes still only makes it 2.5 hours.  And his night wakings have been sporadic...still usually only once but at random times...never the same.  I'm going to keep at what we are doing and hopefully we will get a pattern going and then can try to extend A times a little longer.

Offline brenda2

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #22 on: June 30, 2008, 03:57:10 am »
hi sjolson
how long is his A time now?  and how old is he now?

great you're getting more long naps.  i suspect the 40-50 min naps mean he's ready for still more A time.  keep extending slowly.

only one NW at this young age is actually really great and if it's always at a different time definitely means he's hungry, are you just feeding and straight back to bed?

sounds like you're doing well.
   

   


Offline sjolson3

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #23 on: June 30, 2008, 12:09:45 pm »
Thanks.

His A time is usually about 1 hr 15 min.  I try taking him back around 1 hour and wind down and usually he goes down okay by himself.  Sometimes some resistance and it takes longer.  He is going to be 3 months at the end of the week.

Yes, I feed him and put him right back down.  Now I need to try to get him to sleep longer in the morning also.  He keeps waking at 5 to 5:30 and I'm not sure if I should feed him or just try the pacifier?  This morning he just babbled for about a half hour and then started crying so I gave the pacifier but it only lasted for about 20 minutes and then I just got him up for the day.

Another question...I don't go back to work for another 10 weeks but when I do I will probably have to get him up by 6:15 or so.  Should I start doing that now so that he is on that schedule already or just wait an transition later?

Thanks again
Stephanie

Offline brenda2

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #24 on: June 30, 2008, 18:04:00 pm »
by 3 mo he should be increasing to about 1.5 hours A time.  so he still could go a bit longer, especially if you're getting 50 min naps - probably means he's ready for a bit longer.  just do it slowly.

most babies wake in the early morning because they've had a lot of sleep at this point.  it may be another sign he's ready for slightly longer A times and stretching him may help this.  your approach of letting him babble and seeing if he'll go back to sleep by himself is good.  if it's been more than 4 hours since he fed he may well be hungry.  you could feed him and see if he'll go back down for another 2 hours or so and then top him up when he gets up to start your day.  or use the dummy if you don't think he's hungry or if it's only been a couple hours since he fed.

up to you about when you start his day.  10 weeks is a long time in a baby's life. personally if he'll sleep later now i'd go for the sleep in and change it later.  they change so much and we've had such different wake ups times over the last 10 mo...
   

   


Offline sjolson3

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #25 on: July 01, 2008, 03:01:18 am »
Well, I feel like we had a setback today.  He woke at 6:30 (I think...he was up at 5:00 and I let him babble and which I still heard at 5:45 and then I fell back to sleep until 6:20 when I heard him talking again so I'm not really sure of his wake up time) and ate.  Then was fairly fussy right away and I had him back to sleep at 7:40 but he only slept for 30 min.  Here is the rest of the day

9:15-E
9:25-S
10:15-AWAKE
11:25-S
12:08-AWAKE
12:15-E
2:00-S
2:30-AWAKE
3:00-E
4:15-S
4:50-AWAKE
6:00-E
6:15-S
6:25-AWAKE
7:35-S
8:20-AWAKE every 15 minutes or so until 9:00 and is sleeping now.

All day I tried really hard to watch his sleepy cues but I must have missed them.  And when I did take him in for wind down he just couldn't settle.  I watched from outside the room...his eyes would close and then he'd jolt and his eyes would be wide open.  This happened for about 45 minutes twice today and then he'd finally start to fuss which eventually led to full out crying.  I'm not sure if I should try to only allow 1 hour or so of A time since I'm having trouble reading his sleepy cues and then add 5 minutes every other day to see if this helps or what.  There is just no consistency is seems from day to day so I'm having trouble.  (Plus, my 3 year old is starting to feel my negativity and is acting out and not letting me deal with the situation too easily)  I'm not really sure where to go from here.

Offline brenda2

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #26 on: July 01, 2008, 03:53:25 am »
hugs.

so you had 45 to 50 min naps at the beginning of the day and then 30 min naps by the end of  the day.  i think he was UT first thing leading to a short nap, but after that he got progressively OT as the day went on giving you even shorter and shorter naps.

so tomorrow why don't you try 1 hour 20 min A time when he wakes up tomorrow.  if the first one is a long nap try 1 hour 20 min A time again, but if it's only 45 to 50 min nap try 1 hour A time and if it's only 30 min nap try 45 min A time and see what happens.

after a short nap the A time is going to be much shorter.  i think he was really OT especially by the end of the day which gave you trouble at bedtime.

if he is OT and having trouble settling to sleep (taking 45 min and putting going to sleep off even longer when you already know he's OT) it may be a good idea to do some AP on purpose to get him to sleep and catch up on some sleep so you can then go back to getting on a routine.  so i mean letting him sleep in the car, stroller, slong, wherever he usually has a good long sleep to catch up.

what do you think?
   

   


Offline sjolson3

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #27 on: July 01, 2008, 18:36:19 pm »
I'm going with the plan you have today which sounds great.

He got up around 6:30 again today so I did 1:20 of A time and he slept only 30 minutes.  Then I put him back down after only 45 A time and he actually slept 1 hr 10 min.  I couldn't believe it.  So then I did 1 hr 20 min A time again and we only had a 40 minute nap.  After this his sleep time and eat came close together so I feed him 15 min early and had him back in bed by 1 hour after he got up from the 40 min nap.  I can hear him rustling around a bit now for about 15 min but no crying or fussing.  If he wakes up early, I'm going to do my best to get him back to sleep and then let him finish nap in his swing or bouncer which usually gets us at least an hour nap.  I'm going to keep at these time you gave for a few days and see if we can get that longer AM nap to stay this length or get even longer and then try adding A times slowly.

Thanks again for all your help.

Offline sjolson3

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #28 on: July 01, 2008, 22:41:06 pm »
Well, he ended up sleeping from 1:15 until 4:00 when I had to wake him to eat.  Then A time until 5:10 and he was back down at 5:15 and is taking his catnap now.  I hope tonight can go just as great as today has.  I hope tomorrow is just as great.

Offline brenda2

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Re: OT, UT, OS....short naps, what's the cause?
« Reply #29 on: July 01, 2008, 23:35:58 pm »
 :)  i hope so too.  keep us posted!

it usually takes a few days of any routine change to really see progress, so just keep at it and be consistent.