how do i get 3.5mo to sleep in?

[heidiruthie]

hello! my ds2, samuel, was on a great routine for awhile taking 3 nice long naps and going down around 6:30-7:30pm, sleeping 12 hours with a NW here and there to eat. lately, though, the 30 min & 45 min. monsters have created a need for 4 naps per day and he somehow REFUSES to take his 4th nap!! i've even tried pushing him around in the stroller for an hour, but to no avail, which leads to a super early bedtime (5:00...horrors!!!) and that after quite a bit of OT crying and difficulty settling, which makes me NOT want to wake him after 45 min only to do the whole song and dance one more time....

ANYHOW, so the issue is that of course he is now waking up at 5am for the day, which really sucks. DS1 has been getting up around that time or earlier, but he can sit in front of the tv with his breakfast while dh and i go back to bed. ds2, not so much. now that his routine starts at 5 in the morning, it always seems to end at 5 in the evening and i can't get it to go any longer for fear of an OT meltdown!!! today he had 3 really good naps (2 long ones and a catnap) but the catnap ended at 3:15pm. with his A time of 1 hr 30 min-1 hr 40 min,  that would mean putting him to bed at...you guessed it 5:00!! what do i do? he's a very easy going baby, but the only times he's put up a big fuss has been for his bedtime when he is OT.

thanks for your help!

[*Liz*]

We really need to stretch the naps to stretch the day out a bit and get you back to a decent bedtime.

Can you post your routine for us to have a little look at?

Sometimes these short naps are developmental and sometimes you have to ride out to a degree, but other times a routine tweak can help straighten things out.

[heidiruthie]

every day is different these days in terms of EASY, but i can post yesterday's routine so you can see if i should have done something differently. his A time is around 1hr 30 min-1hr 40min. and he eats anywhere from 3.5-4 hours.

5:00-awake and EAT
6:30-9:00-sleep (2.5 hours )
9:00-EAT
10:40-1:00-sleep (2 hours 20min)
1:00-EAT
2:30-3:15-sleep (catnap)
4:30-EAT
5:30-sleep

-i was quite happy that his naps were so long and thought it may lead to a later bedtime, but sure enough his last nap was a catnap...i tried extending it, but he was WIDE awake, happy and "talking" to me in his crib. i was able to stretch him out a bit more at bedtime (normally i would have put him to bed at 5:00) but he was definitely OT because i tried putting him down at 5:15, but he cried till 5:30, so i don't think i should he was ready to have 2 hours A time in the evening. still, i thought that *perhaps* he'd sleep till 5:30 or even 6:00 this morning....nope. he was up at 4:30   (ds1 is having EW issues as well, because of not napping, which is a whole separate issue, but he was up at 4:10, so i was pretty much in tears by the time ds2 woke up as well) left him in the crib until 5:00 in hopes he'd fall asleep, but his happy talking turned to crying by then and i knew he just wasn't tired.

the only tweak i can possibly see is if i had woken him up from his "bedtime" sleep at 6:15, then tried putting him down around 7:45. what do you think? that's quite a bit later than i'd like, plus that means that his day would have been nearly 15 hours long!

oh, and on a short nap day, if he refuses a 4th nap, i just keep him awake as long as i possibly can and then put him to bed (usually around 5pm) but he is SO OT by then. of course he also has more NW's when he's OT so i really don't like doing that.

[*Liz*]

That all looks pretty good TBH. Not sure if there is anything I have to add really.

I'm guessing that the days of short napping might actually be developmental ie he is still learning to transition the sleep cycles so long naps are not reliable yet.

Some find naps longer than 2 hrs eat into night sleep - but if you are finding the nights better on good nap days then it is not likely an issue for you at the moment.

I have always struggled to stretch J's A before bed and had more joy doing it in the morning. He does shorter A's as the days goes on. But I only really figured all this out when he was quite a bit older.

I doubt you will have much joy extending the CN on days when ghe has had 2x2.5 hr naps though - she will have had enough day sleep by then.

Sometimes people manage to extend an A a bit by just spending longer doing what they usually do - so a longer bath and a longer massage etc rather than more play time.

[chelled17]

Hey Heidi, Have you tried to wake him after 1.5-2hrs for both his naps?  My DS I've just switched to a 3.5 hour easy so he is having 3 - 1.5-2 hr naps, and I just eliminated the CN (which he was refusing in the evening anyway)  It's seems to work better for us now.  His A time right before bed is longest still, 2 hrs.

the only tweak i can possibly see is if i had woken him up from his "bedtime" sleep at 6:15, then tried putting him down around 7:45. what do you think? that's quite a bit later than i'd like, plus that means that his day would have been nearly 15 hours long!

If would try this for a couple of days, just to get his daytime to start later, and his bed time a little later as well.

[heidiruthie]

thanks for the replies, ladies! today is a classic short nap day so far...he is on nap # 4 and it is 2:00 in the afternoon!!!

michelle, i never thought of waking him from his nap early to have 3 longer naps and eliminate the CN (which is the bane of my existance at this point, so would love to be rid of it!!) but it may be worth a try. i do think that tonight i will keep giving him naps and, if need be, wake him if it looks like he's going to try to do his night sleep starting at 5 or even at 4:30 since that's when he woke up for the day. i would love to have a 6:30 bedtime, that sounds perfect to me. so i'll keep working on it...

liz, interesting about your lo having shorter A times throughout the day. i always thought that the morning A time was the shortest....this morning i accidentally gave him 2 hours A time (nodded off on the couch while the boys watched tv, oops) and he did seem a bit OT but settled fine and napped longer than 45 min.

[*Liz*]

Most babies have A's that get longer as the day goes on - but not all. Some like their longest A in the morning (like my DS) and others stay pretty much the same all day long.