Will EASY work for us? 3.5 month old

[nancy2009]

Hi, I"m going preface by saying, I'm sorry if this sounds like it's all over.

I have a 3.5 month old daughter who's schedule is all over the place, I'm trying to loosely implement EASY, but I'm not sure if it'll work with our lives.  I also have an almost 2 year old in the mix, which makes it a bit hard.  YDD is a textbook baby.

Before 2.5/3 months, my ydd had a pretty good sleep schedule, she would sleep for 1.5-2 hours each nap, went to sleep pretty easy a little bit of rocking and then she'd go down.  Sometimes she'd wake up after 40 minutes, but then I'd be able to rock her back to sleep.  Slowly I'd have to rock her, or nurse her so she'd sleep longer more and more.  Night time initially was difficult, sometimes it'd take an hour before she'd settle for a long stretch of sleep, but slowly that has been getting better, but it's usually because she'd have a long nurse, and then be so drowsy I'd just put her down after a burp and she'd drift off to sleep.  Lately though (the past couple of nights) she's been more awake after her last nurse that I'd have to rock her or shh/pat her for longer for her to finally fall asleep.  Also she'd have a few times where she'd be asleep and wake up after a couple of minutes. 

Now another problem is that I usually take my ODD too some sort of activity from 930-12, so YDD has to nap in there.  She's starting to be more alert now, and so at our outings sometimes she'll sleep for 2 hours, sometimes it'll only be 10-20 minutes, and that throws everything out the window.  Also she used to only have 2 wake ups, she'd have one long stretch of sleep, 6-7 hours, then every 2.5-3 after that.

Here is a rough outline of our day.

830 wake up, nurse
930 our the door for our activity
will have a nap in there, length varies.
12pm nurse
hopefully another nap around this time too, usually it's short too.
I try to nurse her again after her nap, but she usually doesn't eat too much. 
2-230ish another nap (my ODD naps at this time too, so I try to coordinate it together)   if she wakes up after 40 minutes, I'll pick her up and rock her back to sleep (sometimes nurse her back to sleep, and I'm having to do this more and more now) and she'd sometimes sleep for 2-3 hours.
630-7 nap and eat when she wakes up.
715 bathtime
8pm bedtime.

Then lately she's been waking up at 1130-12 (it varies, sometimes not until 1am) she'll grunt/moan, and I"ll nurse her.
And then she'll wake up every 2-2.5 hours after that, I'll try rocking her to sleep, and if she doesn't go back to sleep I'll nurse her.  (Last week I was able to rock her back to sleep more often then I am now)  Wake ups aren't at the same time every night, so I"m not sure if she's going through a growth spurt or not.  She seems to eat longer and take bigger gulps at night vs the day.  I think maybe a couple of weeks ago she went through a growth spurt and I've caused some bad habits from them?

Help?!  I'd like her to nap longer then 40 minutes on her own and sleep for longer stretches of time at night!

Can we be saved, especially with an almost 2 year old around, and having activities during the day?  Even if we stay home for a week, we'll have to resume our daily schedule and I'm not sure how to work around that.  I'm hoping she'll sleep in my arms when we're out and about (or the stroller) for 1.5 hours at the appropriate time.  (It seems now though, when there's so much stimulation it's hard for her to stay asleep)

[Buttonbobs]

Hi nancy. It sounds like you are doing really well so far, and have been managing to get some good naps from you DD2. This is an age when my DD started to find it harder to nap out and about but it is possible.

The aim with BW is I work towards helping our LOs to sleep independently, I.e. without needing a parent's help to get back to sleep. You say that shh/pat has worked and this is a technique that is very suitable for a LO of 3 months so you can continue to use this to help your DD2 to learn to self settle. Feeding a baby to sleep can sometimes become what we call a prop. This is because it is an activity DD cannot do without you present and if it becomes a prop your DD2 may begin to wake more and more requiring your help to settle.

I note you have at times been feeding until drowsy & then putting down to sleep. This is a really good start at preventing BF becoming a sleep prop, perhaps ou might like to try adding something like a nappy change in before sleep to really help. Over time as the routine sorts itself out, this will become easier too.

There are a couple of things I thought of that might help. Try not to worry about needing your DD2 to take a morning nap out of the house. You can't stay in all the time to settle her sleep and your DD1 needs to get out and about etc. Do you have a sling or wrap you could use and would DD2 sleep in it. I say this as I know my DD found it hard to sleep with noise & light etc, but with a sling I could cover her head, rock fairly easily & pat her bottom which I found really helped her to sleep. Also, it leaves your arms free to play with DD1.

Something that may really help you is getting the length of time between naps right. As a LO gets older they start to need longer between eyes open and eyes shut.

Average A times and "Is my baby ready to increase A time?"

This link will take you to a piece about average A times for babes of different ages. A baby the age of your LO would usually require an A time of about 1hr & 20/30 mins.

It's not altogether clear for me to see what times exactly your DD2 is sleeping. Could you please write a day out for me in EASY format.

I haven't commented much on the nighttime problems as yet. It may be as your day is sorted out a bit, the night becomes better, but if not it will be easier to work out how to help if the day is more in the EASY pattern if you see what I mean.

You are doing realy well so far, don't get dispirited there are lots of us here to support you through this.

[nancy2009]

Thanks for your reply (and getting through my long winded post!---  sleep deprived mama here!) 

So, we've been working on some things, and I've been trying to consciously pay attention to ydd's sleep habits.  Here is a summary of how our schedule has been the past few days:

(bedtime 830p,-830am)

830am - wake up for the day (last night time nurse was probably at 6am)
E- 930/10am (she is a very distracted eater, and also will not eat a full meal if she's not hungry, so may just take a sip (bf) and then I'll offer again in 30minutes, and see.
S-1030-1230
E-130 (again may snack a few times until naptime)
S-2-4/430
E-530
S- 630-7

Bedtime wind down with a bath starts at 715.

I know 2 naps plus a cat nap/short nap isn't what a 3.5 month is supposed to do, but it works with your older daughter's schedule, she naps from 2-430.

Also, in order to have a longer nap, for the first nap I'll put her in her carseat when it's nearing the 2 hour mark, or when she becomes grumpy, and then just rock her in there.  Most times at the 45minute mark she'll stir, and I'll just rock her in there again, and she'll go back to sleep.

For her second nap, I'll put her in her play pen sleepy.  Sometimes she'll fuss, I'll try rocking her in her playpen, and if that doesn't work, I'll pick her up, settle her a bit, then put her down again and rock the playpen.  Also at the 40 minute mark, I'll have to rock her again, before I'd have to nurse her back to sleep and keep her in my arms, but the last couple of days, I've been able to just rock the playpen again, and she'll go back to sleep.  But at this point, I"ll have to sit by the play pen, since she'll wake up every 15-30ish minutes and I'll have to rock it again.

I used to do a dream feed at 1130pm.  It seemed to work the first couple of nights, extending her sleep until 4am or so, then she'd wake up every couple of hours and I'd nurse her again until the morning.  After the first couple of blissful nights, she started getting up at 1am, and then every 1.5-2 hours.  Last night I decided to not do the dream feed, she slept until 130, I fed her, she slept until 4ish, I just rocked her play pen, she went back to sleep until 6ish, I fed her then, and then she went back to sleep.  She would stir every 30ish minutes, but I'd be able to just rock the playpen and she'd go back to sleep.

What do you think of how we're doing?  How to I get her to stop stirring so much during her sleep?  If I don't rock her, then she'll eventually fully wake.  Do I just keep plugging along, and hopefully she'll extend her sleep herself?  Or am I creating more sleep props?

Thanks for your help!