Arrrrh 45minute naps forever

[Rizo]

Hi, this is my first time posting so hope I give all the correct info...

I have been following BW since my DS1 was born and now with my DS2 who I have attempted EASY with since birth.

DS is 14 weeks now and has always been a horrible napper but great night sleeper (much like my DS1). He has been sleeping a min 8 hours straight at night since 6 weeks. Until about 8 weeks we either had 10, 20 or 30min naps or he would crash after a day of short naps for 3+hours.

Since 8 ish weeks he has been doing 45mins every nap, except we may get 1 longer nap once a week (1hour or 1h 30m)

He goes to sleep in 5mins with his dummy and cuddly with no help from me. I can resettle a short nap with dummy maybe once a day. I have just increased his A time from 1h 30 to 1h 45m. At the previous A time I could hardly ever resettle a nap so perhaps a bigger A time is needed.

I am trying to work our way to 4 hour easy, most days we are doing 3 1/2 but a few days he has done 4hours if he has finished his bottles.I should also mention that he previously was sleeping through but has started waking again. The waking started at 5am, then 4am, then 3am and now 2 weeks on we are at 2am. He takes a full bottle and then sleeps til 6-7am when we get up for the day.

Please help!!! After DS1 I promised myself I wouldn't have a short napper again but here I am desperate!!!!!!!

Approx easy:
7am wake and feed (180mls)
8.45 Sleep (45mins)
9.30 wake and activity
10.15/10.30 Feed
11.15-12 Sleep
12 activity
1.30 feed
1.45 sleep
2.30 wake and activity
4.15 sleep
5 wake and feed
Top up feed at 7 and bed

If we are having a 3 hour easy day we do 5 naps but if he is doing 3.5 or longer we do what we can, usually 4 short naps

[Rizo]

Anyone with any ideas?

[creations]

Hi there and welcome to BW

At this age it is pretty common for LOs to have developmental short naps.  You may already know that they work out their night sleep before they work out their day sleep.  With a good routine (which you have - good work mummy!) it is common for naps to lengthen at around 6 months.
At this age my LO had 4 or 5 naps of 40 min per day.  At 5.5 months his first nap suddenly extended (he was born 13 days over so you could say he was 6 months adjusted!) and later his second nap improved too.
You can do as you are, trying to extend his nap, either all of them, or choose one to try on that one every day (the first one of the day is good), or you can accept that this is his routine at the moment and just get up and get on with the day.  There are benefits to short naps as you feel less guilty about going out knowing that you aren't interrupting a good long sleep
I think you were right to try the longer A time, if it was very recent he might need some time to adjust to it.

Hope this helps

[Rizo]

Hi Creations, thanks so much for getting back to me!

Good to know you think we are on the right track, kind of thought it may just be a wait it out scenario as he is such a good night sleeper and an extremely happy baby all the time.

As far as A time goes do you think this is about right for now? It is more towards 16ish weeks that I could start pushing it out to 2 hours isn't it?

Oh, one more question, could it be possible that pushing for a 4 hour easy may lengthen the naps or better to just go with his natural extension of feeding routine?

I must say this site is soooooo helpful, I have always browsed through the forums to fins similar situations to us for both DS1 and DS2 and the info is so fantastic!!!! Thank-you!!

[creations]

This is a useful link (you'll find it in the naps FAQs if you need it again in the future)
http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=64158.0

And yes, I think you are spot on for now.  Of course the A times are only guidance and some LOs will need longer or shorter.  If you have been on 1hr 45 for a little while with no increase in nap length you could try extending to see what happens, it could lead to a better nap length or it could lead to OT (showing usually as a 20 min nap waking very unhappy and usually able to resettle to extend or AP to extend).  It depends if you feel like experimenting to see if your LO likes a super long A time for age.

I don't think pushing to a 4hr feed will alter naps.  Some LOs are on 4hr E and still do the short naps.  My LO had silent reflux and never could go to 4 hr E, stayed on 3hr until 6 months when solids were introduced.  Don't forget too there's a big 4month growth spurt coming up and going 4 hrs between E at that point will be near impossible, you could expect the E time reducing dramatically (and/or feeds to go up dramatically, plus night feeds even though he is a great night sleeper) for a few days.

I'm glad you find the site useful, me too!  I'd be lost without it