refusing late afternoon nap/general EASY question

[Manueli]

Hi,

so I got two problems:

1. My 10 week old sometimes seem to refuse the late afternoon nap. When he wakes up at around 4.30 to 5.30pm and I want to put him down for another nap before bedtime, he either fights it or just doesn't get tired. I have him swaddled in my arm and sh/pat and walk around the room to make him sleepy, but he just stares around or wiggles in my arms. I do that for 30min to 1h and then give up and just let him be awake until I put him to bed at around 7pm. Always when I manage to get him close his eyes he wakes up after 10 to 30min.
Any similar experiences, idees, suggestions? He doesn't seem to be tired, he is all happy and content the whole time he is awake. Shall I just keep him up (I always think it's a waste of time to walk around the room for 1h if he doesn't go to sleep anyways)?

2. He also seems to be very irregular so I have a general concern with EASY. BW always says we should watch the baby and not so much the clock. If I do that my routine is all over the place and sleep/eat times are never even close to a certain time of the day. He has 45min naps which I try to extend but since it doesn't always work he wakes up at completely different times. He also wakes up in the morning at always different times. And when I watch him to see when he is tired his A times are always different as well ranging from 1h to 1h30min (except for that afternoon problem).
So is it ok to just follow him as long as I keep up the routine of eat-activity-sleep? Does he has to have sleep/eat times at approximately the same time of the day?

Thanks for the help. Manuela

[*Liz*]

Can you post what happened today in EAS format so we can see if a routine tweak will help stop your LO fighting the CN?

I think it is best to pick a time when you want to start the day and try and stick to it. The variable wake-up times tend to make the routine harder to organize. Setting your los body clock will help with that. My DS short napped until he was 5 mths and then main thing that helped was commiting to waking him up by 7.30am in the morning.

That said - the main thing is to meet your los needs and follow their cues - that is the essence of BW really.

Just beware that you might not always do EAS when he short naps as you would be feeding more often than 3hrs - which can encourage snacking.

HTH

[Manueli]

My EAS from a couple days ago, when he resisted the CN:

E: 6.30
S: 7.30-9.30
E: 10.20
S: 11.30-1
E: 1.30
S: 2.30-5.30
E: 5.30 and 8
S: 8.40 for the night

But as I said, every day is different.

So do we have to set their body clock or should I wait and see if it will develope on its own? I am also very hesitant to wake a sleeping baby because I have read several good arguments against it, so keeping him on a set routine seems very hard for me.

[*Liz*]

The thing is everything I will recommend to help get your baby on a predictable routine will mean waking a sleeping baby, and I know that is a very personal choice. If you don't want to wake I think will have to accept some variability as at the end of the day your baby will set the routine, rather than you.

We do not usually allow daytime naps longer than 2 hrs as they eat into night sleep, and cut into their E time.

We usually recommend a 12 hr night and 12 hr day - your lo is doing just under 10 hrs at night which is likely due to the very long naps during the day and being OT at bedtime as he refused the CN.

But he has had 6.5hrs of daytime sleep so I am not suprised at all that he resisted the catnap. Even with only a 19 hr night that is plenty of sleep for 24 hrs so I guess he just didn't need anymore.

If you don't want to wake a sleeping baby I think you might just have to accept some variability TBH and try to follow a bit of the EAS format.

It can get harder later with this approach when they are older and not so sleepy - but you can go with the flow for now and cross that bridge when you come to it if you prefer.

[Manueli]

Hi Liz,

thanks for the reply. I know that I have to change my idea about not waking a sleeping baby eventually, but right now he has so bad night sleeps (never gets 10hours even though he spends that much time trying to sleep) that I am happy when he catches up during the day. He usually doesn't make it over 12 to 14h of sleep every 24h. I had days when he didn't sleep that much during the day, but his night wasn't much better so I don't think that is the problem for his night wakings. As soon as I got the night going better I want to get the days better, but I might be thinking backwards?

He usually doesn't has 3h sleep stretches during the day, it is the rare occasion. Also, even if I try to give him a 12h night it wount work cause he wakes early. I don't see the sense of walking around the room for 45min at 6.30am trying to get him back to bed, when he is obviously not tired.
I also can't really put him to bed before 7pm because he has one or two longer stretches (2 or 3h, rarely 4) in the night and then wakes every hour, so that when I finally go to bed he has had all his long stretches and I have to wake every hour, which is sooo tiring.

The problem is that I don't know where to start. I tried making his day better and more organized but it didn't help at night. Maybe I wasn't consistent enough but I just want to give him as much sleep as I can and that includes a fair bit during the day right now.

[*Liz*]

The days andnights ultimately affect each other unfortunately - and yes it is about making sure total amount of sleep is right for baby - but it is also OK for you to need that to be right for you are well. Mummies and Daddies need their rest as well.

A 10 week old will need quite a bit of day sleep - usually that is 3x 1.5-2 hr naps for a higher needs sleep baby, and 11hrs at night.

If your lo is waking every hour after midnight what are you doing to get him to sleep? Does he fall asleep independently? I'm wondering if there is a prop issue at play.

I think your nights are bad due to being OT at bedtime as well though - and that could be helped by spacing his naps out sensibly.

[Manueli]

Well I know that there is probably a prop issue at play since I have to rock him to sleep. We are working on the sh/pat but we have had some bad days lately and don't seem to progress very fast.

Also I try to not get him OT and put him to bed within 1h30min. The times I get him to bed right now is the best I can do. I can't start putting him to bed before he is tired (usually within 1h or 1h30min), but then the putting to bed takes often another 30min so I end up with fairly long A times. I just don't know how I could solve that problem. The same is for bedtime. But even when he had a "good" day, that means going down fast and with a fairly short A time, he wakes up all the time at night.

I will try to get him to learn to self-settle and then see if that improves his nights. It just looks like this will take a while...

Thanks for the response.