Am I being really stupid or is this a sign I just need to give up?

[Fifilala]

Hi there,

I posted recently with a request for help with napping for my daughter who was a prem baby. She is approaching 7 months old since birth but is yet to 'actually' be 6 months.

She was an amazing sleeper and napper from very early on, in fact, until I started easy.
I must point out that I'm a BW fan and devotee as it saved my sanity with our first daughter.
The problem I'm having is that my daughter simply won't nap longer than 45 minutes at the absolute max. However, before we started easy, she'd often nap for 2 to 3 hours.

Not one single day since we started easy at around 3 months have I veered from textbook shush pat and then later, pick up put down. I've missed so many family and social events and my house looks like a bomb site, as well as my first daughter often being totally neglected and getting frustrated as I'm spending so much of my day doing pick up put down.
My partner works away overnight between 3 and 5 days out of every 7 so a lot of the time I'm doing this on my own with zero support.

I totally understand that things take time to take effect, but almost 4 solid months of textbook baby whispering and still I can't get daughter number 2 to nap longer than 45 mins.

If she was happy on short naps then I'd just hold my hands up and think we had a cat napper. However, she's miserable, grumpy and screams relentlessly most of the time as she's so tired. For instance, today she woke at 4.30am as she had a full nappy. She didn't go back to sleep and it's now 9pm and in that time I've only managed to get her to nap for 40 mins in total since 4.30am. That's not naps of 40 mins, that's all he naptimes adding up to 40 mins!!! That means she's done over 17 hours with only 40 minutes sleep. We're all totally exhausted. The rest of the time, she's just screamed non stop.
There are no medical issues although she has been a poorly baby. She's had bronchiolitis, tonsillitis and scarlet fever since she was born, as well as at least 3 very heavy colds. She does have a degree of developmental delay but this is due to her prematurity.

Previous posters have advised stretching her awake time as previously I was trying to put her down after 2 hours as I was trying for a 4 hour easy. However, that's not helped either. I've managed to get her up to 3 hours but the napping is still as dreadful, if not worse. I also am so confused as to how long she should sleep if she's up for 3 hours as surely after 1 hour's sleep then it's feed time again on a 4 hour easy?

On occasions I've tried pick up put down for two solid hours but with no luck at all and then it's feed time again.

I'm so disheartened and just feel like giving up after almost 4 months of dedicated effort. I'm at my wits' end and am feeling like the first sign of madness is doing the same thing over and over and that's what I'm doing.
Surely after 4 months I'd see SOME sort of improvement?

I must add though that she's a fairly decent night sleeper, goes to sleep by 7.30 and often sleeps til 6am. We don't dream feed as this has disturbed her and she's not enjoyed it when we have tried it and she never wakes for food during the night.

Please help. I'm about to give up!

For those who want to know what I'm aiming for and  hiw I'm keeping her up and when I'm doing naps, here's my schedule. I've only extended the awake time in the last week or so! Before this we were on 2 to 2.5 hours awake time. We always also do wind down and she sleeps in her cot in her room; she's never once been put down anywhere other than her cot.

Wakes up 6am (ish)
E 6am (bottle)
A until 9am, including some solids during this time, usually an hour after her milk
S 9 til 10.30

E 10.30
A until 1.30, including some solids during this time, usually an hour after her milk
S 1.30 til 3

E 3 (bottle)
A until 4.45
S catnap of between 20 and 45 mins (she's virtually comatose with tiredness most days by this time! She always wakes up happy from this nap though, unlike the others where she just screams!)

E 5.30 some solids at dinner time with her sister
A including bath time until 7pm
E bottle at 7pm
S asleep by 7.30 (this sleep is always guaranteed as she's exhausted)

[jessmum46]

Huge hugs, it can be so disheartening when you feel you are doing everything 'right' and yet LO can't or won't go to sleep.  I know how frustrated you must feel

Firstly, how many weeks premature was she?  That can (as I'm sure you already know) have a bearing on what sort of routine might suit her.  Does she have any medical issues that might cause her discomfort e.g. Reflux (very common in prem babies) and if so, is she medicated for them?

When she does settle to sleep is she settling independently?

Your routine looks reasonably good overall for a six month old although I wonder if she can handle 3h A time whether you'd be better skipping the CN altogether, doing two naps and sticking to a 12h day?  I know for my LO anything much longer than 12-12.5h days always causes short nights and overtiredness.  It's pretty usual once on 3h A time to have dropped that third nap and moved BT much earlier to compensate otherwise you end up with too much total A time in the day. 

When she does only have a short nap do you move her next nap time earlier (ie shorten the next A time) or are you for the most part trying to stick to the scheduled times for naps?  Sorry so many questions, just helps to get a better idea of what's happening

Just one other thing (and only because I can see a lot of my anxious self in the early months in what you posted) - given naps are not going well anyway, I really think if you can face it that a day out where you just go with the flow and do something for YOU would be a good thing although I also skipped many many things in the name of naps, looking back I don't really think I achieved anything by doing so and in retrospect very much wish I'd relaxed a bit more.  Not saying abandon your attempts altogether, but rather put yourself and you time first just for one day, get out and do something fun with older LO and let younger LO just crash whenever and wherever.  The turning point for me in my sleep anxiety was when we took a family holiday to Australia (24h flight and huge time difference!) and I actually realised that although I'd felt physically sick at the thought of it, a couple of days of naps on the go and just accepting what happened actually didn't mess things up as much as I feared.

Hugs, and look forward to hearing from you again x

[Fifilala]

Hi jessmum,

Just wanted to say a huge thank you for your advice. We've dropped the catnap and this week have managed a full 6 days of long naps both morning and afternoon with absolutely zero screaming and only a couple of moments of pu/pd needed on a couple of occasions.
To say this advice has saved my sanity doesn't really cover it!
We're still terribly early waking (how does 4am EVERY day grab you!) but I can cope now that the napping in the day is so much better.
Even if our new schedule only lasts for a couple of weeks before the next big upset or change, this little oasis of calm has given us all the breathing (and sleeping) space we needed.
I'm sure you must have wings and a halo because you're now considered an angel in our house!

Thanks so much.
Xxx

[jessmum46]

Aww so glad that something has helped things get back on track, do let us know if we can help out with the early wakings too x