Average nap lengths for 7 mo

[Mandy.kamal]

Is it possible that 1 hr 10-15 min naps are the longest I can get from my 7 mo?

He used to take 2 hour naps- which I was told is rare for this age now- but I thought under 1.30 were UT?

It seems like when I push A times to extend, he gets way OT, so I drop back to 3 hours A and get the 1.10 or 1.15 nap. If that's the longest nap I can get then I don't want to keep forcing the extra A time and causing unnecessary OT.

Any advice? Are 1.10 ish naps restorative enough?

[Mandy.kamal]

Also, I did revisit the FAQs where it mentions average day sleep is 2, 1-2 hour naps, but from what I've been told and read elsewhere on the forum, that less than 1.5 hrs in usually UT.

I'm just confused on what to do now. Keep or push A time with else these hour ish naps. I'm so exhausted from these OT naps and its completely messing with our 3-2 transition...

[Layla]

Not all babies will do 1.5hr naps and your lo may have a shorter sleep cycle. For us anything from 1hr onward is a good nap. Don't push your bub is he's getting overtired. How many sleeps is he doing now and how are his nights?

The 1.5hr is an average - not all babies will do :-)

[Mandy.kamal]

Thanks Layla!

I was kind of hoping that was the case! I was just confused because he went from 2 hrs down to 1.5 hours, down to 1. We are battling this 3-2 transition still and I felt like I was pushing to much for a longer nap and causing him to be OT. Now we seem good at 3 hrs A time for all As and having 2, 1 hour naps. His nights are around 10-11 hours with an occasional but VERY rare now 12 hours. We've been having to do EBT since he's still adjusting to no CN and has been OT for both naps.

DS is still waking around 4:00am and takes a bit to resettle but falls back to sleep until 6:00 ish. My IDEAL is to get his schedule to be closer to 7:30 am WU and 8:30pm BT. But these shorter naps aren't letting that happen unfortunately. Should I just wait it out until I extend his A times later on when he's ready? Or bring back the CN for a few nights to make his BT later?

Thank you!!!!

[ZacsMumme]

At this age I got lots of 1hr15 min naps, and for T it was 2 sleep cycles so I was happy enough with them you can try a A bump?

[Layla]

If you are good with 3 hrs across the day then I would leave it for now. From what I remember you were getting 30min naps at one stage?

DS is still waking around 4:00am and takes a bit to resettle but falls back to sleep until 6:00 ish. My IDEAL is to get his schedule to be closer to 7:30 am WU and 8:30pm BT. But these shorter naps aren't letting that happen unfortunately. Should I just wait it out until I extend his A times later on when he's ready? Or bring back the CN for a few nights to make his BT later?

Do you feed him at all at night? Do you think he might still need a night feed? Its not unreasonable for a 7mo to be needing 1 night feed (or even 2). We didn't drop all night feeds until 9months or so with dd1 and it took a little longer with dd2.

With regards to pushing the day forward - I am not sure that a catnap would do the trick here. If he has been taking 2 naps consistently, I would probably suggest a very gentle push (like 10 mins every 3-4 days) starting with the morning nap to hopefully get a later wake up time.

But glad that at least things are looking up for you 

[Mandy.kamal]

Thanks ladies So helpful as always!!

Ill try a tiny A bump in a couple days and see if he does better. I did a 20 min CN tonight (I know....I messed up!!!!) but he was SO tired at 5:00 and I really didn't want his bedtime to be that early. I'm sure ill regret that tomorrow when he has an EW

In regards to NF; no he hasn't had a night feed for 3 months now. We were actually trying to drop the DF because he seemed annoyed with it and not very hungry. But he woke (like normal recently) at 4:00am this morning and was struggling going back to sleep so I just fed him in case it was due to hunger. We will be doing the DF tonight and will try dropping it later.

Do you think the EW may be from hunger and not the issues with the 3-2 transition? He only fusses and doesn't do the 'hunger cry' but that doesn't mean he's not hungry I guess.

And yes Layla, I am thrilled to have gotten past the 30 min naps and am happy with the hour naps!!! I just didn't want to stay with them if they weren't restorative enough. I can always try pushing the A in a few days and try again.

[Layla]

I did a 20 min CN tonight (I know....I messed up!!!!) but he was SO tired at 5:00 and I really didn't want his bedtime to be that early. I'm sure ill regret that tomorrow when he has an EW

Haha, this will be me tomorrow - dd3 is going through 3-2 as well and she's been doing really well being on 2 naps but today she was particularly tired at 2hrs A time during the day (she may also be teething). I just knew she wouldn't be able to make it another hour so I put her down and that means we'll have to do a catnap today. Like with any transitions, I think a "catch up" CN is ok ... it might just not give us the same wake up time as we want (or maybe it will )

[Mandy.kamal]

Reassuring we are in the same position! I just hope you have a much better outcome!

He woke up so many times last night that I lost count and up for the morning at 6:00 so only a 10 hr night....sigh. I swear we make just a little progress and then end up taking 10 steps backwards. This is unbelievably discouraging. If he naps poorly today, should I just do EBT and not the CN since it seems that even with an 8:00 BT like last night, he STILL wakes early??!

Mine is teething too...fun times haha!

[LovelyLilyandJack]

I literally just posted in the 4-6 month birth club to say my 6 month old seems to think 1hr 20/25 is a full nap so that's what I'm treating it as too.  If I push his A times we either get an OT nap or he does one slightly longer nap and then goes back to slightly shorter naps.  We were stuck with 11 hour nights and those slightly shorter naps too a couple of weeks ago and I just pushed A times a tiny bit more for that first nap and did as late an EBT as I thought he could handle if he'd had decent naps. Though if I thought that even pushing him he'd need to sleep before 5.30 we'd do a 15 minute cat nap,  followed by about 2 hrs A time which gave a slightly later BT but pushed the next morning back a bit so we could do 2 naps the next day.

Hope that makes sense?!

[Joannajmiller]

Feeling your pain. LO is being awful today, obviously shattered. And naps have reduced to 20 mins. 20!

[Emami]

You might get a return if the 2hr nap... When mine went through the 3-2 it seemed like I could never get it right.  DD went from 2x 2hr naps plus CN to 2x 40min naps a lot of days!  It drove me nuts, I knew there was no way she could be UT but that's what it looked like, she would wake happy too.  But I think sometimes they just have to get used to the change.  The 40mins lengthened to 1hr 10ish like you're getting, and then went back up to 'full' naps, one of 1.5hrs and one of 2hrs.  No amount of tweaking did it, she just lengthened them herself.  And then the 2-1 started 

[Mandy.kamal]

Thank you ladies My exhausted, tear filled, anxious morning is much better now after reading your posts! I swear, I don't know what I'd do without you!! Wish we all lived closer and I'd buy you all dinner and drinks

Lovelylily- does you LO always have 11 hour nights? I feel like thats what mine was doing, but if I do a CN and later BT (like yesterday) I only get a 10 hour night! Is that an indication that he may have gotten too much day sleep yesterday? I will try pushing the first A time a bit after a couple days of decent day and night sleep and see if that'll help. I had to lessen his A time today by about 10 minutes because he was acting a tired mess so I am desperately hoping for a good nap!!!

Joanna- I am so, so sorry to hear about the shortened naps...ugh. I hate that for you both. I feel your frustration today for sure. Keep me posted on how things go the next couple days. I'm really hoping its just a one-off situation and you'll go back to longer naps again! Just survive today as best you can!

Emami- I sure hope you're right about the 2 hour return !!! I also feel like I can't get it right!! DH thinks I'm being too hard on myself but I know I keep screwing up with his A times and can't ever tell if a CN will hurt or help! I am so ready to get to 2 decent naps and get closer to a 7:30am-8:30pm type day!! I hope my LO is like yours and just does it on his own; all this A tweaking is driving me mad ! And I know, as you mentioned, as soon as we get this right...the 2-1 will start haha! These little stinkers!!

[ZacsMumme]

I think the longer day and shorter nights with CN are an indication you may need to do the final push and ditch it. Use EBT to catch the OT if your 2 nap day goes a little bust. The only time at 7 mths I did 3 naps was if all naps were 30-40 mins

[Mandy.kamal]

Perfect, thank you so much Sara.

He took 2 decent naps today (both with a wake up and resettling back to sleep, but an hour total). We had to do an EBT and he was WAY OT! Took almost an hour to calm him and he finally fell asleep around 6:45. But, I refused to do the catnap and will continue that way unless we get 2 micro naps as you suggested!

We shall see what tomorrow brings

I hope all is going well with your LOs!!