How do you teach independent sleep to a constantly OT baby?

[mummy_bec]

O.K. so after struggling with short naps and trying for months to rectify them I'm pretty much stuck accepting 1 longish nap (1h15-30) in the morning followed by 3-4 short 30-35 min naps for the rest of the day. In the morning I can get my LO down fairly independently. That is after his story I can put him in his cot with music and he will settle within 5-10 mins, with a winey cry that is saying "I don't want to go to sleep but I'm not really going to argue that much with you" which just peters out after a while. Sometimes if it gets more intense rather than settling I do a couple of pats and a shhh here and there.

BUT, the rest of the day it's sh/pat, for 15-20 mins, screaming, crying and I can hear in his cry, "I'm sooo tired...I'm sooo tired".

How do I teach him to sleep independently in the rest of the day. He needs so much help!! Any ideas?

[brenda2]

hugs
sorry you've been at this for a while 

do you want to post your routine?  maybe it needs a tweak. if he can put himself to sleep independently sometimes i think it's more likely a routine problem.

does he go down by himself at night?  how is he overnight?

[mummy_bec]

Hi there,

His routine is the dame every day though the times will vary. I'll put a typical day for you. I forgot to say he doesn't have a paci though I can sometimes get him to chew at it with his gums, he can't keep it in his mouth)

A: 6:30
E: 7:00 (will not take 1st feed any later than 3.5 hours after his last night feed so first feed can vary according to time of last night feed)
A: 7:10 - 8:15
S: 8:15 - 9: 30 (Depending on tired signs I try to have him down at 1 hour 45 to 1hour 50 after wake up.  I can't get this nap longer than 1hour 15-30. If I put him down at 2 hours I get a short nap so I've been building up the A time and length on this nap very gently and slowly)
A: 9:30 - 10:30
E: 10:30 - 10:40
A: 10:40-11:10
S: 11:10 - 11:45 (35 min nap - I try for 1 hour 40 mins A time before this second nap)
A: 11:45 - 1:15 (Usually spends this A time crying a lot with me trying to get him to stop)
S: 1:15 - 1:45 (By now he does a 30 min nap to let me know he's REALLY OT)
A: 1:45-2:30
E: 2:30
A: 2:40-3:15
S: 3:15 - 3:45 (30 min nap)
A: 3:45-5:15
S: 5:15-5:45 (30 min nap. Often fights this nap really badly and can be very hard to get down)
A: 5:45 - 6:30
E: 6:30 and begin bedtime routine.
S:7:15 - 7:45
E:745 (Treated as a night feed and goes back to sleep. Sometimes doesn't wake but usually does.

Dreamfeed between 10 and 10:30
Nightfeed anytime between 2:00 and 5:30 on average at around 2:30 or 3ish but often aroun 4:00

I've tried to make it cover everything for you. I'm rally struggling here. I have tried for so long and I am happy now just with the one long sleep and the 4 short naps but for the fact that he is spending so much of the day crying, He is just now happy or refreshed after his sleeps.

He doesn't go down by himself at night, it can be the hardest sleep to get him down for but overnight he is only waking the one time now he's on 4 hour EASY in the day.

I just hope that there's something in this that you can see that I need to tweek!

[cbald1976]

Hi Mummy_bec-

Thanks for posting your routine.  I was looking it over & noticed that you are splitting up the A time.  I would say at this age, he should be at 1.5 hours A time at the max.  so, i would tweak as follows: 

E: 6:30
A: 6:45-7:45
S: 7:45- hopefully about 1.5 or 2 hrs

E: 9:45
A: 10:00-11
S: 11 -??? hopefully about 1.5 or 2 hrs

E: 1:00
A: 1:15 -2:15
S: 2:30- hopefully about 1.5 or 2 hrs

E: 4:30
A: 4:45-6pm including wind down routine
S: down for the night by 6:30

DF at 10ish
NF whenever he wakes at night, though i suspect it will be more around the 2:30 mark now that he's not getting the 7:45 DF.

I would think that he'll probably need about 4 days to begin to get used to the new schedule.  So it may get harder before it gets easier.  Def would suggest E before A time.  Think that could be how the OT is getting worse as the day goes on.  The more sleep he gets the easier it will be to get him to sleep longer.

Let us know how you're getting on & your thoughts

Char.

[Katet]

If he is a constantly OT baby then you need to shorten the A time... so even though in theory he should be at about 2 hours A Time at his age he may actually be only able to cope with less than that... I know my ds1 only lasted 1.5hours at 4.5mo.

Another thing is do you actually know he is first awake at 6.30 or is that when you first hear him... reason I say that is my ds2 used to be hard to work out his first nap when he was about 4mo as he seemed to want sleep about 45-60mins after waking... it was only when dh one day checked on him & he was awake & we kept checking we discovered he'd been awake almost 1 hour  longer than when we first heard him... he spent that time working on rolling & often was at the opposite end of his cot when he called out. So I agree with the PP maybe try an earlier first nap.

[brenda2]

hi
mummybec - your LO is almost 5 mo right? that's what i see on your ticker.  so... sorry but i'd have to disagree with pp.  at 4 mo (and definitely by 5 mo) most LOs are on a 4 hour EASY which is feeding every 4 hours and A times of 2 hours.  of course this is when taking long naps so maybe this is what char meant - because you're only getting short naps to shorten up the A times which of course i agree with.

here is a link to further explain:

http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=128419.0

i would continue to try to stretch his first A time to close to 2 hours (do it slowly, like 5 min every 3 days, as you are right you'll get a short nap if too much too fast).  especially since you are getting a longish nap for this one i think it's ok to stretch.  he should sleep longer if he's just a little bit more tired.  then if he does do a long nap aim for 1 hour 45 min or 1 hour 50 min after this.  he may not be doing a long nap again because the A time is too short, ie he is undertired at this point but then with the subsequent short naps and rather long a times after this he is certainly OT by the end of the day.

also, drop the 7:45 feed.  this is cluster feeding and really should just be done for the first couple months.  stick with 1 bedtime feed and 1 df.  maybe this will move his middle of  the night feed forward so he'll take a full feed first thing when he wakes up.

i would try:
6:30 awake and E
8:20 - 9:45 sleep
10:30 E
11:30 - ? sleep

if that nap is longer than an hour repeat the 1 hour 45 min A time, if it is short do 1 hour A time.  i think this is where you are going wrong - after a short nap his A time is too long, but after a long nap and first thing in the morning his A time is too short.  Ut and Ot will both result in short naps.

continue with counting the A time all day.  ideally he would have 2 long naps and 1 short catnap early evening with bedtime about 12 hours after he woke up.  if you get only 1 long nap he may have 3 more short naps to catch up and bedtime may be earlier.

sorry if this is confusing.  let me know if you have more q's

[mummy_bec]

Thanks for the feed back guys. I will try pushing that first A time further. As katet pointed out it's hard with knowing when he is actually awake. Some days I know that he's awake but not making noises and other days he's still sleeping. I generally try to push the A time on days here I know for sure when he woke. The second A time is a delimma for me. I have never gotten him to have a second long sleep (that is since he went to short naps), its so confusing, surely with even an hour he shouldn't be OT with the A times he's doing?

The reason for the cluster at night is that he wakes after he is put down, like it's a nap. I have tried letting him get up but he doesn't actually want to get up. If I sh/pat he cries for about an hour or hour and half and then I might get him back to sleep. So I found that if I treat it as a night feed it sort of 'tricks' him into staying asleep.

[brenda2]

an hour A time is way too short for his age if it's after a long nap.  i would push the 2nd nap a bit later too. (only if after a long nap...if after a short nap an hour may be fine)

[Katet]

Just to clarify, I wasn't saying the A time was always less than 2 hours, but some children actually do (I had one) need to have a shorter A time first up & then can do longer say 2.5hours later in the day other children the opposite.
 All children are different & the fact that after a reasonable length am nap he then goes to cat naps (as my eldest did... he never followed the "norm" no matter how much I would have liked him too) It was just a suggestion to try out from someone who had a child who was in exactly the same boat at the same age & solved it by doing something different (actually at the advice of another parent with a child like mine). It only took about a week of me having a shorter A time for us to get in a better place.

[mummy_bec]

It's so confusing isn't it. I have read a lot of posts from people that short short A times with both the first and last A times of the day and that it works for them. I'm happy to try anything really, but did do a short first A time the other day and got a 45 min nap so I don't think it was enough. As long as I know when he woke and get him down at 1h 45 or 1h 50 he will do that longish sleep. Having said that today I he was awake for ages before I knew it but was happy and then exploded into a meltdown at 1h 20. I got him down at 1h 30 and he still did a short nap. I think that the minute I wake in the mornings I'm going to have to peep in his room to see if he's awake!

[brenda2]

A times certainly do vary throughout theday.  my Lo always had a short A time first thing and last thing at that age and still does now.  but the fact that you were getting a longish nap for the first one suggested to me that it would likely be ok to stretch it out even more slightly with hopes of getting a 2 hour nap.  i agree that after this you will have to fiddle with the A times to see what works for him.  it may be that he wants a shorter or longer A time after the first one, whatever the case, you know that he is capable of doing a long nap and  that what you are doing now is not helping him to get a long second nap.   if he continues with shortnapping the A times will have to be quite short in order to avoid OT and fit in more naps.

it is confusing...trial and error really.  as long as you stick with what you decide to try for a week to make sure he has time to adjust.

[mummy_bec]

Thanks for the advice. I'll keep working at at and see if I can push that first nap. It's a pain that I have to wait for days that he does have the long nap though. Two day in a row now we've had a short first nap only 20 mins today. I thought for sure that he was only awake 10 mins longer than me but looks like he got me again. At this rate I'm going to have to set an alarm for myself in the mornings!

Katet what did you do to find out what time your Lo was waking in the morning?

[Katet]

ds1 was an early riser (still is) & so when he woke us around 6am (or earlier at aged 2) I'd look to see if ds2 was awake (I've never totally shut doors so I could peek through the crack) generally he was a wake then & so then just took it that even though he didn't make noises until about 7/7.30 he was actually often awake at 6am... BTW unlike his brother he happily did 2.5hours at 4mo... such different children when it comes to sleep - still are & I can tell you ds1 was hard at 4mo & ds2 great, but long term ds2 is the problem sleeper, long story, but now looking at medical reasons as he is up all night sometimes & he is 3yo!.

[mummy_bec]

Thanks katet. I think I might start doing that. DH has his alarm set for 6 so I'll get him to peep in each morning before his shower to see if LO is awake.