Trying to balance OT w/increasing A time

[Hethir]

Hi, there! I've been getting lots of guidance on the general sleep board as I am completely new at this sleep training thing. I haven't heard back quite yet and am in need of quick advice!! Here's a link to our thread: http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=168262.0;all

How do you lengthen A times for a baby that is overtired possibly due to short A times?

Quick background: Jericho is 9 months. It seems his A times are too short; the first being 2.5 hours and the other two are 3 hours. He wakes up OFTEN at night and often has EWs. His naps were also very long; he was napping between 4-5 hours a day. Our plan was to lengthen his A time while shortening his naps. Wellllll, my little guy has been teething for the past two and a half weeks so sleep has been AWFUL. Although last night I realized his wakings may not have been teething related as he still woke up a lot of giving him Motrin (I'm the type that doesn't do meds unless it's dire).

[deb]

For now you may have to go with shorter A times if his sleep is that badly disturbed with the pain. I'm not a fan of lots of meds either, but the Baby Motrin saved us when Josie was teething, as did Orajel once she got used to it. When she didn't (or doesn't, still!) get her sleep, she's a MESS, so getting her some sustained sleep really was key to us getting the day off to a good start.

If your DS is already waking up tired, you might try getting him back to sleep straightaway in the morning and see if he'll do another sleep cycle for you, and I'd probably let him nap as long as he needs to for at least the early nap(s) while the teeth finish their torture. Lengthening A time and shortening Sleep while his night sleep is so awful might be more than he can handle right now.

[Hethir]

Hmmm.... That's a great point. I'm thinking I should just wait to switch everything around.

DS TOTALLY wakes up tired! He woke up at 5:30am and I tried everything I could think of to get him back to sleep. Major AP. By 6:30 there was no denying his was ready to start his day. I kind of 'forced' him into snuggling with me until 6:50, though. Once we got up, he was already rubbing his eyes and fussy by 7:30. I just put him down for a nap at 8:40 and I'm afraid he was very OT. Which means it may be another bad night. Followed by OT naps tomorrow, LOL! It's amazing what a cycle OT can be!!!! Man, I just realized I sound like such a downer today!! :-)