Help - am I doing the right thing? trying to withdraw pat/shush

[mystifiedmum]

Hi there,

I'm trying to help my son with two things right now - independent sleeping and very short naps (he takes between 4 & 6 a day).  Since I figured that it would be easier to extend his short naps if he could get back to sleep on his own I decided to set aside this week, not go out too much to make sure his A times were short and really concentrate on independent sleeping.  He's 14 weeks old and has only ever been able to get to sleep without pat / shush a couple of times (and this was only from week 8 onwards, before that he was falling asleep on me / in the sling etc).  So I'm trying this week to withdraw pat/shush so that he can start to learn how to do it on his own - I would have done it before now but he's sometimes completely regressed and wouldn't even respond to pat/shush.

It started off really well with nap 1 this morning, he only needed a minimum amount of shushing and no patting, nap 2 needed quite a bit of shushing, nap 3 he didn't need either - just my hand on his arm, nap 4 he completely freaked out and I had to abandon to feed him and then nap 5 he started crying as soon as we got in the nursery, had a freak out, finally calmed down in my arms and kind of collapsed when I put him in his cot (he must have been really, really OT by this point).

I'm really worried that I'm going about this wrong and that if he has too many of these freak outs that I’m just going to have a harder time settling him in future.  Am I doing the right thing? Do I just have to be patient and he’ll get the idea of what he has to do and will stop fighting it?  Any comments really gratefully received; I’m so worried that either I’m going to go completely down the wrong path or that we’ll need to take drastic measures to teach him how to sleep on his own.

T so much IA

Here's his EASY for today
Wake 6.15
E 7 (I didn’t realise he was awake, he doesn’t cry)
A 6.15 – 8.05 (1hr 50 incl 15mins settling)
S 8.05-8.40 (35 mins)
A 8.40 – 10 (1hr 20 incl 30 mins settling)
S 10-10.40 (40 mins)
E 10.40
A 10.40-12.10 (1hr 30mins)
S 12.10-12.50 (40mins)
A 12.50-3.50 (3hrs incl failed nap attempt which went from 1.50-2.30 & 30mins settling for nap 5)
E 2.30
S 3.50-4.20 (30mins)

[deckchariot]

I'm going to pop this over to the naps board, as I think you'll find more support there.

But a few things I notice from your EASY - his A time is too long.  At his age, about 1.5 hrs is average, and the first A time of the day is often the shortest.  So if he was up at 6:15, I'd start your winddown by 7:15 and aim to have him in bed by 7:30.  An OT bub will be much, much harder to settle - and that, I think, is why you're having troubles with pat/shh.  Also, if he has a short nap (anything under an hour), his next A time will need to be much, much shorter.  At that age, with dd, if she woke early, I'd try to extend for 30 min, if that was a no-go, I'd get her up, feed her (unless she was clearly not hungry), then do 30 min max of A time and put her back down again.  Otherwise, the OT just builds throughout the day.

Pat/shh if done correctly, will not become a prop, and he will learn to go to sleep and stay asleep on his own.  What are you doing for a wind down?  Is he swaddled?  Here's a couple of helpful links:  http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=128419.0 and http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=64275.0

hth
michelle

[mystifiedmum]

Wow only half an hour's A time - I thought I'd done well to cut it back to an hour before I tried to put him down.  OK I'll give that a go.  His wind down is, remove stimulation like play mat / toys, go up to nursery, sing lullaby, sit or stand with him in my arms for a few minutes silently (but he never seems to fully relax).

[deckchariot]

I know that seems super short, but if he's only napped for 30 min, he just can't handle his regular A time.  Remember, on a good nap, he probably can only handle 1.5 hrs max, so on a 30 min nap, it needs to be way less.  Also, that's 30 min after I tried to extend for 20-30 min.  That extension time counts as A time if he doesn't go back to sleep.

It doesn't sound like he's swaddled - I would HIGHLY recommend that, and incorporating that and pat/shh into the wind down:  http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=64277.0

[mystifiedmum]

OK so I should be looking at an hour total of A time after a short nap, which is what I did with the second nap of the day, but maybe he was already overtired from being up so long from when he woke up?

I did use to include pat/sh as part of the wind down, but I was trying to reduce/withdraw it to encourage him to learn to do sleep by himself.  Is the point that I won't be able to withdraw pat/shush unless he is not OT?  And should I be shortening his A time 'artificially' so even if he doesn't make any tired signs that I should put him down regardless after an hour?

[deckchariot]

Since you're having so much trouble with sleeping now, I would not withdraw shh/pat.  I don't think he's ready.  And even when you aren't using it in the crib, still use it in the wind down - it's a sleep cue for him  - he knows (or will come to know) that shh/pat means it's time for bed.  Is he swaddled? Eventually, you won't need to do it in the crib anymore.

In terms of the "one hour" guideline, it's just that - a guideline.  The idea is that if he has a short nap, and you try to extend and cannot, then he will not be well rested enough to handle his usual A time - how short it needs to be may vary (for example, did he sleep well at night?  Did he have a good first nap, but a busted 2nd nap etc.), so it's a combination of cue watching and radically shortening that A time.  Have a look at that link above about A times and short naps, that will help make sense of it.

[mystifiedmum]

ok great - thanks so much for your help, I'll also give swaddling another go and see if he fights it as much as he used to!!!

[deckchariot]

Just because he fights it doesn't mean he doesn't need it.  At this age, they're still figuring out how to control their limbs, swaddling does it for them.  So many bubs wake themselves up when their arms and legs move while they're sleeping, and swaddling can be super, super helpful in working with that.  If he is starting to find his fingers to suck on, you can swaddle him with one (or both) arms out.

[mystifiedmum]

Well today was a little less stressful!!! No progress on the self settling, he still needs a good 8 minutes at least of pat/sh in the cot before he will go to sleep, but I think I might have extended his naps? Between 35 mins and 65 mins I pat/sh'd and held him through to the end of his first sleep cycle and then through the first 20 mins of the second. Twice this resulted in him completing 2 sleep cycles, the third time he only stayed asleep for 10 minutes after I stopped. During the 30 mins of pat/sh he stirred quite a lot and his eyes flicked open a couple of times. So a couple of questions:

1. Did I do a proper extension if he was stirring like this?
2. Do I count the 30 mins of pat/sh as sleep or activity?
3. After the nap at 11.20 he got tired again after only an hour. Have you any ideas why he got tired so quickly? Is it because he has been OT for 3 months or is it due to his routine today? Or because he stirred so much during pat/sh?


Thanks again for your help on this- I was feeling really rubbish yesterday.
Woke at 5
5-6 tried to resettle
6 AP feed to sleep in family bed
E 7
A 7-8.15 1 hr 15 (15 mins to settle)
S 8.15-9.50 1hr 35 (30 mins p/s)
E 10.30
A 9.50-11.20 1hr 30 (10 mins to settle)
S 11.20-12.55 1hr 35 (30 mins p/s)
E 2.00
A 12.55-2.20 1hr 25 (10 mins to settle)
S 2.20-3.40 1hr 20 (30 mins p/s woke again after 10 mins)
A 3.40-4.45 1hr 5 (25 mins to settle)
S 4.45-

[deckchariot]

That actually looks really great!  As he gets more settled into the routine, the amount of shh/pat will lessen - are you doing it during the wind down now?

In answer to your questions:
1) yes, you did just fine on the nap extension.  It looks like he may be jolting awake between sleep cycles.  That's really, really common.  And swaddling can help with that.  You could also try w2s or httj:  http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=64168.0

2) that depends - if he was half sleeping/half waking, I'd be tempted to count it as sleep, but watch the next A time very carefully.  If he was mostly awake, I'd count it as A time.  I'd count total nap time as time before and after the extension attempt.

3)could be any of those things you mention - at this age, A time is still pretty short, so if you're aiming for 1.5 max, for him to be tired after 1 hr isn't all that unusual to me, especially given the broken sleep that's become the norm for him.  Great job though to you on watching his cues.

I think you're doing a fabulous job!!!  He'll get it, really, he will!!

[mystifiedmum]

Oh thank you! That's very nice of you to say!! The tired cues after the 11.20 nap were pretty easy to spot- he started crying in his buggy and closing his eyes, he was being very overdramatic!!!!

I have put pat/sh back into the wind down, which he does respond well to, I'll give swaddling a go tomorrow, didn't have time today to read up on how to do it.

So with the nap extension, would you expect the stirring during the 30 min period to become gradually less, or would it be there one day and gone the next? Or is it simply a case of him being able to deal with them on his own?

And finally- promise- is there any disadvantage to using White noise instead of sh-ing? My throat is knackered!!!,

[deckchariot]

I know a lot of people use white noise because the shhhhhhhh kills their throat - so go for it if that works for you.  I plan to try it with #2, didn't with dd.

With the nap extension - if he's always stirring at 30 min  - no matter what the A time is, and once he's settled into a good routine, then it's probably that he's having difficulty getting past the transition between sleep cycles.  Generally we see that happen at 40/45 min, but it could happen at 30.  If it's sporadic, then it's probably an OT issue, not a transition issue.  He may knock it out on his own as he gets better with independent sleep - loads of bubs do and you never need to worry about httj or w2s.  See if swaddling makes any difference and we can take it from there.

gotta love the overdramatic tired bub - nice that he made that easy for you at least

You'll be a sleep training pro here soon!

[mystifiedmum]

Oh what an awful day!!  I only managed to extend one of his naps and the other attempts were such hard work and sooo depressing!  And then it took 45 minutes of screaming to settle him to bed because he was so exhausted.  On a positive note, the swaddling did have a good effect, in that he couldn't wake himself up so much when he stirred which he usually does by raising his arm, but it didn't assist him in moving past 35 minutes...he doesn't really jolt, he just stirs and wakes up.  I've given HTTJ and W2S a go, but W2S doesn't seem to work and HTTJ doesn't seem to be enough, he still needs me to pat and sh for the full 30 minutes.

Ah well, try again tomorrow....

If, once I've got him on a good routine and he's not overtired but is still doing 30 minute naps, is there any point in trying to extend his naps if he hasn't got the hang of independent sleep? or would it be more pragmatic to just make sure he has very little activity and then straight back to bed quite quickly?

Also, I'm pretty sure that we are doing pat/sh right after having read the link above, but I really am worried that it is turning into a prop since he seems to be needing it more and more rather than less and less even when he's not OT e.g. for his first nap.  What would be the wrong way to do it that would cause it to turn into a prop? 

[deckchariot]

{{{{{hugs}}}}} It's really common to have some bad days, it's not at all unusual.  Pat/shh really should not become a prop:  http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=64275.0  I wouldn't move to pu/pd just yet, but that may be an option to look at in the future.

Here's a couple other links on short naps that might be helpful:  http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=64161.0 and http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=64159.0

So, no, I wouldn't give up on nap extension yet.  We did w2s for 2 weeks to extend naps  - every nap, every day....and I only succeeded in extending naps about 50% of the time, but yet, that seemed to be enough that she figured out how to move beyond the transition in sleep cycles.  So don't despair.  Sleep training is just long, slow, hard work.

{{{{{hugs}}}}}

[mystifiedmum]

So...a bit of an update and more questions of course!! ;0)

Nap extension has been going now for about a week...Saturday and Sunday I wasn't that dedicated, mainly because I felt like I was going a bit mad, but the other days I have been persevering.

Good news is...that he finally seems to be taking a step towards self settling - hoorah!!!  He still takes ages and ages and ages to wind down with pat/sh (apart from his first nap) but by the end of it he suddenly goes calm and when I stop patting and shhing he's still awake and he puts himself down rather than relying on me - which is fantastic since it means I can leave him during the night to sort himself out when he wakes up!

Bad news is....that even with me trying to pack in more naps and to extend them, he is still always massively overtired and needs the winding down that I mentioned above and is completely frazzled by the evening.  Even when I manage to extend his nap to an hour and a half, he still shows tired signs after only half an hour / forty five minutes!

So, questions....
1) Can it really be true that (bearing in mind he's 16 weeks on Saturday) he can only manage A time of 30-45mins?  I know his naps are ridiculously short -37mins- but I'm worried that I'm mis-reading his signs and am becoming a little bit paranoid?!!
2) Even when I manage to get W2S to work (rather than just pat/shing him through half an hour) he doesn't seem to ever descend back into a deep sleep - he moves around a lot and seems to stir.  Is this *right* and should I be doing anything about it? - can't think what!!
3) No matter how correctly I manage his A time e.g. for the first nap, he always wakes up at 37 minutes, does this mean anything?

Sorry for another massively long post!  Hope it all makes sense and I'm not just whittering!