9mo - need help with 'A' and 'S' part of EASY

[Dairy Queen]

Hi,

LO is 9 months old now and I’m having so much trouble with the EASY schedule.  I just can’t seem to get it right.     

Saturday:
5:45 wake.  I tried to put him back down, but couldn’t.  He started yawning as of about 7am.
9:30 – 10:30 nap 1
2:30 – 3:45 nap 2
7:45 bed (but he actually fell asleep at 8:00).  He woke 2 times at night.

Sunday:
5:30 am wake.  I couldn’t put him back down.  I breastfed him and he played in crib until 6:15am.
9:00 – 10:00 nap 1
2:00 – 3:00 nap 2
7:30 bed.  He woke once at night.  I resettled.

Today:
5:40 wake
10:00 nap 1.  He woke crying after 30 min, I put him back after 15 minutes of struggling, same scenario after 20 min, I put him back and he slept until noon.  The reason I kept putting him down was that he wasn’t waking up ‘happy’.  He was sleepy, crying, pulling my hair, rubbing his eyes etc.

In fact, he’s often waking up unhappy after his nap (or his night time sleep).  Because he’s much bigger now (and stronger), it becomes increasingly difficult to put him back to sleep since he just sits and fights and cries.

What am I doing wrong here?  Too much A time?  This has been going on for a while, maybe 6-7 weeks?  Not sure i I shouldbe posting this in the sleep forum...?

Thanks for the help!
Sherry

[Ima shel Alon]

Hi Sherry!

Hugs, this was one of our more difficult ages. I think the mistake we did back then is not understanding in good time that DS started the 2-1 transition a bit earlier than other babies and I think this is what is happening with your LO. I wouldn't aim anymore for 2 full naps, but one long nap and one CN.
There is some info about it here: From 2 to 1 nap transition (10-12m and older)

At 9m you are looking at around 3-4h A times. It's a pretty big range, so it will take us a while to figure his right A times, but I think we can do it.
Right now he is doing in the morning 3.5h, right? There is a chance that this is a bit too much, so I would take it back to 3:20h A time and stick with that in the morning for 4 days. We can then look at the first nap during those days and think if he should still stay with that or increase it gradually.
It's really important that during the time you tweak A times you are very consistent with times and with the way he goes down for his nap.

With the second nap it's a bit more difficult to say, at least until we figure out the first nap. I would offer the same A time as in the morning in the next few days.

The other very important thing is to aim for a 12h day, 13h tops. Right now your LO is doing 14h days, which mean 10h night and it's really not enough.
At the same ttime as you are working on A times I would bring his BT way back, to around 19 the latest on days he wakes up at 6ish.

HTH, let me know if you have more questions .

[Buttonbobs]

Hi sherry,

It sounds like he may actually need a little more A time, at least before one of his naps anyway. You want to aim for him having at least one long restorative nap each day (more than 1.5hours long) with perhaps a shorter nap or CN to carry him through to BT.

You can choose whether to aim of a short morning nap (say 45 mins) and a long pm nap or vice versa. When we did it we went for a long morning nap as that had always bee he most reliable nap for my DD. The idea is that by helping your DS to have one longer nap he will be better restored and will be less OT by BT, which may wel be leading to the NWs.

The A times you have put are possibly a bit low for his age, some children are getting nearer to 4 hours A time:
Average A times- BOOKMARK ME!

You could try:

WU: 6.15
Nap: 9.15 aiming for him to go down slightly UT and to wake him after 45 mins.
Nap: try 1.30/2 and see if you get a longer nap
BT: depending on nap could be 7/7.30ish

Or:
If you want to aim for a longer morning nap you'l want to start pushing that morning A time to make it longer, perhaps trying 15 mins longer and then holding for 3 days. Keep moving out until you get a longer nap.

What do you think?

Posted with Noa

[Dairy Queen]

OK, well, yesterday was like this:

5:45 am Wake
10:00 - 12:00 nap 1 (but he woke up twice and I put him back down after lots of shush-pat PU-PD)
3:45 - 4:45 nap 2
7:15 pm BT.  We had 1 NW.

So we did manage to shorten his 'day' to 13.5 hours but I think that's still pretty long.  I have an easier time playing with the AM A time that I do with the second A time.  I could put LO to sleep (I think) after about 3 hrs of A time.  I can try that and see whether he ends up waking after 45 minutes on his own?  In hopes of a longer PM nap?

5:50 am Wake
9:15 - 10:35 nap 1 (so 1 hour and 20 min.)  He was in a good mood until about 1:30pm. 
2:40 -  ?

Here is my question... is 1 hr 20min considered a 'good' nap?  I mean, LO tends to sleep or 1hr 20min for most naps (2 sleep cycles?) but I never know if that's considered the long nap or not.  Should I try shortening it? 

Back in the good old days, he used to take longer AM naps (and a shorter PM).  He also transitioned from 3-2 a little earlier than average.

[Ima shel Alon]

So you are aiming for a long PM nap?
We, like Naomi, had a long AM nap so I don't have much experience with a long PM but I can imagine that he will not go down easily after 3h A time, but of course you can try.
I wouldn't let him sleep as much as he wants, 'cause then you'd need to have a capped PM nap which sounds like you don't want. I would cap it at around an hour at this age and later on at 45min.

Re the length of naps it's hard to tell. For many babies a 1:20h nap would be an UT nap but there are some who have their sleep cycles shorter (40min) and by the end of the second one they wake up as soon as they are in the light sleep stage.

[Dairy Queen]

I actually don't have a preference (whether AM or PM is the longer nap), I just can't seem to get LO to sleep beyond 1hr20 for naps.  Today:

5:40 am Wake
9:15 - 10:35 nap 1 (so 1 hour and 20 min.)  He was in a good mood until about 1:30pm. 
2:40 -  4:00 nap 2 - it took  me about 15 minutes to calm him down (more than usual) before I got him to settle down and go to sleep.
7:10 pm Breastfeed and bed.

It's almost 10pm and he's gotten up twice already.  He went back to sleep on his own the first time and I resettled him the second time (took me 5 min). 

The good thing is that I've managed to pull BT from 8-8:30pm to 7-7:30pm.  If I could just figure out when to put him down for naps!!

Yesterday was pretty similar except that nap 2 only lasted 40 minutes (nap 1: 1hr20).  Boy was he cranky in the evening!!
 
Has anyone had success with W2S for lengthening one of the two naps, or is that technique mostly for habitual night time waking?

[Buttonbobs]

I think if you don't have a preference you may just need to bite the bullet and decide which nap is going to be the long one. Your LO will not know to lengthen one nap until he has consistency of the pattern iyswim.

Seeing as you are getting a 1hr20min first nap this is pretty good - perhaps stick with long am short pm pattern and see how you get on. What is his mood when he wakes from that first nap? Is he happy or grumpy? It does sound like he may still be slightly UT for that first nap so oh may need to lengthen that first A a little more.

W2S can work for nap times and I have seen people use it here (although I have no experience personally). However, it would only work if the A times were right for your child and he was tire enough. Waking him early from a UT nap is unlikely to lead to a longer nap. I would say work on the A times first and then see how you get on.

HTH x

[Dairy Queen]

Hi there

OK, we,ve spent the last couple of weeks trying to tweak A times to figure out the best routine for LO.  He is now 10 mo.  I did read the posting on the 2-1 swith as well, which certainly helped understand his behavior.  We basically lengthened the first A to about 4 hr, to get a nice 2hr AM nap.  This was a first!  LO always slept for 1hr20min max :-) Then, we had to shorten nap 2 to about 30-40min.  So here is what EASY looks like now:

6am wake
10:00 - 12:00 (or 12:15) nap 1
4:15 - 4:45 nap 2
7:45 (sometimes 8pm) bedtime

Naps are definitely better.  Although sometimes, he is cranky around 9:30am... but I try and keep him up until 10am to ensure he sleeps a full 2 hrs.

But how do I get a 11 or 12 hour night?  He's not sleepy at 6:00pm (or even 7pm)... in fact, I actually have to BF him to get him a little sleepy before I can put him down.  Otherwise, he is excited, stands up in his crib and eventually starts crying for me. 
 
Any suggestions on tweaking my EASY?

[Buttonbobs]

Hi there, wow what an improvement!! Well done you xx

Your LO is definitely working towards dropping that second nap, although it may not happen for a little while. Until that CN goes the day is likely to be longer than 12 hours, and the night less than 12. Once he's ready to drop the nap, and cope with even longer A times the nap will move later, BT will move earlier and his night may be longer again iyswim.

If you start to get lots of NWs or other problems this would be a sign that he may be ready for a longer A time, but it all looks to me at the moment.

[Dairy Queen]

Hi there

Thanks or the encouragement :-)

So... Right now, I am getting 1NW, usually around 1am.  It takes less than 5min to settle him and he goes back to sleep.

One more question... is it OK that I am shortening nap 2?  Right now, I go in and wake him up at 30 min (since I don't want him to go to bed too late) but I can see that he is tired and would like to sleep more.  Is this OK?

 

[Buttonbobs]

What you are doing is absolutely the right thing. If you didn't cap the second nap he would sleep for a long nap and then BT would be much later leading to a very short night which would be much more tiring in the long term.