Help with 4.5 month NWs

[Shiv52]

Honestly your LO is doing GREAT at night. A DF and a NF is perfect at this age and totally totally normal. Especially when BFing.  Although she doesn't cry the fact she's not settling for any length of time without a feed would convince me it's hunger. So don't feel bad about feeding. In a few weeks you can look at cutting down a bit if needs be.

It think your evening sounds lovely. It's fab to have some time with your OH and get some time together before bed x

[Vp]

Thanks again for the support. I will keep you posted of any improvements or changes with her behaviour just for the sake of this thread, I believe there are many mothers with the same issue!

Regarding her daytime naps, just wanted to let you know that since sunday my LO has been taking a 2h nap in the morning! I believe it is to compensate the weak sleep from 4 am onwards. But the afternoon nap has also been quite good, 2h with a break after the 1st 45 min when I put the dummy back. I don t know if this is good or bad, in the sense that it steals hours of sleep from the night but I want her to get some rest. Increasing her A time was the key! she is now with 2h and I will try to push it slowly.

x

[Shiv52]

That is awesome. Some LO at this age have 2 naps of 1.5 and a CN of 45 minutes. Others seems to be prefer two longer naps of 2 hours. 4-4.5 hours of day time sleep at this age is totally fine. Hurray for fab naps!!!

[Vp]

Just an update of the last days: I have an activity time of 2 h and naps have been varying between 1h to 2h ocasionally. The NW persist and she wakes every night at 4 am to the dot! I tried to feed her at this time but she gets to sleep for more 40 min and wakes up again so, although she takes the feed, I am assuming she is not really hungry as the feed is exactly doing what the paci does, I.e. she goes back to sleep for one cycle and then wakes up moaning again. This lasts until I go pick her up to start the day. So, again I am clueless why is she waking up... can it be that she slept all she needed by 4 am?! she goes to bed bw 7 and 7.30 pm.

[Skadiver13]

Hi Hun, it sounds like she needs more pushing on the A time. Can you post your current EASY?

[Shiv52]

I agree with needing to push that A time a bit. More A time in the day will help the night sleep over all x

[Vp]

Well, a new update: My LO is still waking up at 4 o´clock every night no matter what.

I didn't post our routine before because this last week we have been trying to wean her off the swaddle for nap time (we are still not ready for night as well as I am so afraid of the consequences!) and naps are a bit crazy. However, i must say it is going better than i thought But regarding the night waking at 4am nothing changed Our nurse advised me to put a spoon of cereals in her 11pm bottle of EBM to see if she would sleep better but didn't help and, in fact, at 7am she wasn't very hungry so after a 3 day trial i gave up the cereals. She simply isn't hungry at that time. Today, after waking at 4am she fell asleep again around 6h and slept till 7h30. Is there anything like baby insomnia? i am getting a bit crazy. Next month she will go to daycare and i can imagine she will be extremely tired by then as they push activity times quite a lot. If she does start sleeping better then i know it was something to do with her daytime routine. Fingers crossed!

[Shiv52]

Have you tried wake to sleep?  If the waking has become habitual sometimes waking them a half hour before they normally always wake helps get them out of the habit.  Not fully awake but enough just to rouse her a little and then go straight back to sleep.  May be worth a try.

What A time are you at?  The A times just a lot at this age so it could be you need a bump. 

[Vp]

Hi!
I read about W2S and have been considering doing it this weekend. But i am a bit scared of trying to be honest

Our A times are now between 2-2h30. But i see it depends very much on the quality of the daytime naps and, for the morning nap, it really depends on how the night went.

Last night for instance she woke at 4am and I went there at 4.30, changed her nappy and gave her a quick feed (i usually don't feed her but yesterday she did look hungry). Around 5am she feel asleep until 7h40! Quite good as usually she only goes into a light sleep from the moment she wakes until 7am when i go and pick her up. So, what i want to say is because she slept quite well after her habitual NW, her awake time this morning was 2h25 which is pretty good for her at this time of the day. I will keep on trying to extend her A and see what happens.