What to do after a short nap?

[Neen77]

Hi there,

I am struggling to get my 5month DD on an EASY schedule. Right now we are battling short naps. I am unsure of what to do to the schedule after she has a short nap. For example, if she eats at 8am and then goes down for her nap at 9:30, but only sleeps for 45mins then she will have already been up for 45mins before her next feed at 11. By 11:45 she is tired again and I put her down for a nap. By the time the end of the day rolls around I am feeding her right before her next nap. I am working on extending the naps and have gotten her second nap up to 1.5hrs, but there is still an hour left after she wakes up from that nap until her feed. Do I move the feed up until I get the naps extended? Thanks.

[Aishi]

Could you post your easy as EAS please?

I would shorten next a time by 10-15 min if you get a short 45-1hr nap, a little more if you get an OT 30 min nap

[Aishi]

Ps I wouldn't worry about moving feeds around whilst tweaking routine so if you have to feed before nap that's ok as long as you're not fds so quick nappy change afte feed or book etc...

[Neen77]

Thanks Aishi,

Here is my EAS:
6:00 wake
7:00 BF (she woke at 4 for a BF and went straight back to sleep)
7:50 sleep (1:50 A time)
9:20 wake (1:30 nap!)
10:00 Bf
11:20 sleep (1:20 A time)
12:00 wake (40 nap)
1:00 BF
2:00 sleep (2:00 A time)
4:20 wake and BF (2:20 nap!)
6:30 Feed and wind down
7:20 sleep (3:00 A)
8:30 woke and shhed back to sleep
10:00 DF

In looking at the A times before naps it looks like she did better on longer A times. I looked at anther day and noticed the same pattern. Don't know why I didn't see this before. Might try to extend the A time by 15 mins and see if that gets a longer sleep. That seems to be contrary to what you are suggesting. What do you think? Thanks!

[Aishi]

Hi

Nope I agree with increasing a times after looking at your easy...average a times at this age are 2-2.25hrs so I would increase your a times. However start with the first a and increase by 10-15 min, hold for 3-4 days to give lo time to adjust and if u get an OT 30 min nap then reduce next a as in pp to prevent OT accumulating. Increase first a time till you get a restorative 1.5h nap. Once you're getting a good first nap consistently I would increase second a too till u get good naps there too. The last nap is CN so 30-45 min is ok there. The reason for gradually increasing a times and one nap at a time is to minimise risk of accumulate OT as you may get that wih a time increases anyway iykwim? Hth!

Typical Amounts of Day and Night Sleep

You may still be a way off losing the CN but thought u may want to be prepared

How do I know its time to drop the cat nap and move to 2 naps?

All about the 3-2 transition- 5/6 months

Good luck with it and let us n ow how u get on in a few days x

[Neen77]

Thank you! What you suggest makes a lot of sense. I will let you know how it goes.

[Aishi]

[Neen77]

Just wanted to post an update. I tried to extend DD's 1st A time in the morning by 15mins two days in a row. It was a disaster. She only slept for 45mins and then I put her down for a nap the rest of the day whenever she showed signs of being tired. She had a total of 4 or 5 naps both days for 30 to 45 mins and started to wake up before 6am which she had not previously been doing. I then decided to just try and put her down for the suggested three naps a day. The fist day she woke at 6:30am and I put her down at 9am totally exhausted. She fell asleep straight away and slept 1.5hrs. The rest of the day was a mess with lots of 30 and 45 min naps and I put her to bed 1/2hr earlier that nap as she seemed tired. The next day she woke at 7:15!!! Gave her 2 1/2 hrs A time again and she slept for 1.5hrs again! She stayed up for 2hrs and went straight to sleep again and has been asleep for 1hr 45mins so far!!!!

To summarize: I decided to put her down for her naps somewhere during the sample timeframe suggested. One day it was 9am the next 9:30. DD was completely exhausted and I would have said almost past the window. The second nap the first day didn't go past 45mins, but the second day is at 1.45 so far.

I think I must have been misreading my DD's cues or she has a longer window than normal before she gets over tired. Pushing her A time seems to be working. Fingers crossed she keeps this pattern up.

Thanks for all your help!!

[Aishi]

great update!