EASY tweak to achieve a 12 hour day - can anyone help?

[CJHMom]

Hi,

My son, Conor, is almost 11 weeks old but was born 3 weeks early. He's been on EASY since birth and I aim for a 7/10/1/4/7 feeding schedule. The dreamfeed has not worked for us (he is completely out of it and will not feed at 10:30/11 pm) so he wakes around 2/3/4 am for one night feed. Then back to sleep til anywhere between 6 & 7.

My problem with our EASY schedule is that he sleeps alot and cannot stay up longer than an hour at a time. He has been crying in the evening time for an hour+ (separate issue posted in General Sleep) and we're beginning to think that it's because of his sleepiness in some way.

My biggest issue is with the cat nap. After his third nap, he's up for one hour and then looks to go to sleep again. He then takes a 30 minute catnap (not a minute more if you were to pay him!!). But this leaves us facing a very early bedtime and therefore not achieving our 12 hour day.

Our EASY is as follows:

E: 7am
A: 7 - 8
S: 8 - 10

E: I wake him @ 10
A: 10 - 11
S: 11 - 1

E: I wake him @ 1
A: 1-2
S: 2 - 4

E: I wake him @ 4
A: 4-5
S: Catnap 5 - 5:30 in front carrier

A: Bathtime/Pyjamas etc. 5:30
E: 5:45 - 6:05/6:10
S: 6:15 (!!!!!!)

So as you can see we're out by 45 minutes in our 12-hour day. This in turn is causing EWs. Plus, on attempting to put him down at this time he cries and cries and cries til he basically wears himself out. We don't let him CIO and use shh/pat and comfort him but he still cries the minute he is put into his crib.

I have tried to lengthen the A times with disasterous effect. One days worth of attempting to lengthn the A time left me with a very OT baby for 2 days (very strange). He just seems to be an extremely sleepy baby who needs the 3 * 2 hour naps in the day with a max of 1 hour A time.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how I can tweak our EASY schedule to accomodate my sleepy LO??

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Triona
xxx

[hjrmom01]

At 11 weeks, but 8 weeks adjusted, it's OK if he's only awake for 1 hr at a time!!!  My lo only did 45 min-1 hr for the first 3 months!!  And he too napped 2+ hours and I would have to wake him to eat.  Have you tried putting him down a little earlier for the CN and see if you get a 45-60 min nap?  He could be getting OT/OS by the end of the day, thus the 30 min nap.  Don't try to lengthen his A time to get to a 12 hour day, he's far too young to expect a good solid routine.  I think at this age I was more focused on doing the sequence of events rather than the timing of everything. So we made sure E was first, A was after E and then S.  When H was that little it was merely wake to eat, burp, change diaper, swaddle, maybe stare at each other for a few minutes or talk, sing a lullabye, and then right into WD.

[CJHMom]

Thanks for replying hjrmom!

We tried putting him down a bit earlier for the CN last night and in his bed and got 40 mins which is an improvement. Still had 2 hours crying at bed time last night tho!!

My qs to you is, how did you structure your day for a child that cannot make the 12-hr day? Any EASY routine I have seen is catered to a 12-hour day with 1.5 hour naps.

Was your LO's day back then an 11 hr day?

Did your LO sleep 13 hours at night then?

What I'm finding is that if I go according to EASY with 3 * 2-hour naps and 1 * 40-minute CN then bed time is really early in the evening. AND he is waking therefore earlier and earlier in the morning because of the early bedtime. Today it was 5:50 am. I nearly cried. He was wide awake and ready to go!

I know it will all come together at some stage in the future. I guess I just wish if I knew better where we were at at the moment and how best to structure my day for such a sleepy baby.

Many thanks
Triona

[clazzat]

My first was a really sleepy one (not so my second!  I reckon if I put them together I would get one normal one!) and she did a 12.5-12.75 hour night.  I didn't do EASY with her, but we did have a structured day.  This may sound really silly, but have you tried putting him down for the night earlier than 6.15?  If he is screaming at bedtime he is quite likely OS/OT - perhaps the bath is too much for him at this time of day and he finds it hard to settle after it?

[hjrmom01]

I'd agree with Clare and go for an early bedtime as he's probably OT/OS by the end of the day.