Author Topic: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed  (Read 6650 times)

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Offline jessmum46

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #45 on: September 29, 2014, 12:23:36 pm »
When he's up to 3h A time and 2 naps it becomes a 4h 'plus' routine with a general pattern of eat (milk), eat (solids) an hour later, nap, eat again on WU.  But some of the feeds will be more like 5h apart.  Generally with solids in the mix LO will last the time ok, but if not you could always offer a mil top up 30 mins or so before nap x

Offline rebemuri

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #46 on: September 30, 2014, 17:15:29 pm »
Katherine, I can't thank you enough for all your advice. We are in a muuuch better place now in terms of sleep.
I can't however seem to get the naps right. He will usually nap for an hour or so. Here's a common EASY routine. Will you please take a look and see if you would change anything?
E: 6:45am (wide awake since 6am, but stays quietly in his crib until 6:45)
S: 9:15-10:15am
E: 10:30am
S: 1:00-2:10pm
E: 2:20pm
S: 4:00-4:20pm (this nap has to be in his stroller, otherwise I am afraid he won't be asleep just 2 hours after he woke up)
E: 6:15pm
S: 7:00pm
E (dream feed): 10:15pm

Thanks!!
Rebeca

Offline rebemuri

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #47 on: October 04, 2014, 13:55:50 pm »
Hey, there... just checking if you had had some time to look at our routine and see why the naps are so short. It's actually getting a bit worse... 40 min naps or so. So I can't get rid of that third nap, even though DS is now 6.5 months old. Any suggestions? Thanks a lot!
Rebeca

Offline jessmum46

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #48 on: October 04, 2014, 18:00:02 pm »
Hi hun, so sorry things a bit hectic here at home, in middle of some awful regression with DS....I digress. Sorry you're struggling too :( I think you're probably well into the 3-2 and now need to work to push your A times to 3h and cut the CN out. I know its hard on a short nap day though. I used to have a rule if second nap finished after 3pm I would skip the CN and do BT after 3h A or so, often 5.45/6pm. Otherwise I'd do a short CN. How was yesterday/today?

Offline rebemuri

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #49 on: October 04, 2014, 22:07:14 pm »
Sorry to hear you are having trouble too! Confident that you'll find a way out very quickly (a lot quicker than most of us!    ;D )
Most naps are still quite short... now 20-40 min. Every once in a while he will pull off 1.5 hours, but that's rare.
Would you follow your "3pm wake up deadline rule"  :) even if the nap was only 20 min? In other words, if he sleeps 2:40-3:00pm, would you do a 6pm bedtime? (and quick question I've been wondering about: when you say bedtime do you mean time you put LO on the bed/crib, or time (s)he actually falls asleep?)
Thanks! And fully understand if it takes a while to get back to me... no worries. Take care of your issues at home FIRST so that you are well rested and ready to keep giving us the great advice that you always do!  ;D
« Last Edit: October 04, 2014, 22:11:58 pm by rebemuri »
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Offline jessmum46

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #50 on: October 06, 2014, 13:37:19 pm »
:-* thanks

Is your LO teething by any chance?  The only time we got super-short 20-25 min naps here was when LO was in pain.  Do pain meds make any difference at all?

Hmm, if it was only 20 mins 2.40-3pm, that's a tough one....I think if the morning nap had also been super short you'd have to do a third nap, but make the day 12.5-13h maximum.  If the morning nap was ok I would be tempted to be brave and just shoot for 5.30pm BT.  I did that once or twice during the 3-2 with DD.

Usually BT = time LO goes to sleep.  So if LO always takes 15 mins to drop off you'd put them down 15 mins before if you see what I mean.  Mine have usually (unless things are a bit off) gone to sleep within a few mins so I might say 6pm BT and LO may actually have gone to sleep at 6.05pm.  I don't think those few mins difference matter all that much though :)

Offline rebemuri

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #51 on: October 06, 2014, 13:50:40 pm »
Thx for the advice. My only fear with 5:30pm - even 6pm - BT is that LO usually sleeps a maximum of 11 hours at night (6:45 or 7pm to 5:45am or so). 4:30 am wake up would be reeeallly early! Or do you think he'll keep his regular wake up time?
Rebeca

Offline jessmum46

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #52 on: October 08, 2014, 15:00:58 pm »
My experience with EBT is that as long as you get LO down early enough so they aren't OT, they will often sleep to normal time or even later than usual.  The only way to know is to try really!  I am a big fan of early bedtimes and have sometimes had DD do a 13h+ night when I've used it x

Offline rebemuri

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #53 on: October 30, 2014, 09:34:12 am »
Hi, there! Things have been going pretty well lately thanks to all the advice that I have received in this forum. (Katherine, you've been a HUGE help, so big thanks to you!) Wake-up time however has been getting increasingly worse (earlier), and it is now at 4:45am! I've been trying early BT (DS asleep by 6pm or even earlier), but doesn't seem to help. He is 7.5 months old now. What would you recommend? Here is a typical EASY for us:
E: 6am (DS lays quietly in crib from 4:50AM wake up to 5:45 when he wakes me up)
S: 8:30-9:30 (I try to hold his first nap until this time. Of course he is OT by then, but I am afraid that an early nap will reinforce the early wake-up.)
E: 10am (then solids lunch at noon. DS is not a good eater. His milk intake is already quite low (4-5 oz average), and solids lunch is only an ounze or two at most.)
S: 12:30-2:00
E: 2:00
E: 5:30
S: 6pm (depending on when he last woke up from his nap and how long it was, I may or may not do a 3rd catnap from 3:45 to 4pm... just to make sure he can make it trough the night. If he does do a 3rd nap, he goes to bed at around 6:30.)
E: 10:15 dreamfeed

Ideas pleeaaasee??? Thanks!!
Rebeca

Offline jessmum46

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #54 on: October 30, 2014, 14:44:11 pm »
Ugh, we are in early wake up land too at the moment, you have my sympathy! I think you need to push your morning nap later. You are right when you say an early nap can perpetuate EWs, thing is if you are trying for a long morning nap then 8.30am IS an early nap. Bearing in mind you'd expect him to manage at least 3h A time at this age the best you can probably hope for is a 5.30am WU with a nap that early.  I would do one of two things, either push the first nap later gradually by a few mins a day, or (crash and burn strategy) push him to stay awake until at least 9.30am and stick with it for a few days. He will be fairly horribly OT to begin with but hopefully his body clock will reset fairly quickly to allow him to sleep in later, or at least be resettled at 4.45am. What do you think?

Offline rebemuri

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #55 on: October 30, 2014, 15:00:31 pm »
Sounds good, I'll try that. Will be horrible at first for sure since DS is awake since 4:50 or so... which means that by 9:30 he will be up for over 4.5 hours. Being so OT he will probably do a SUPER short nap (15-20 min), but it really does make sense. Like you say, I am almost planning for a 5:30 wake up the way I am structuring his routine these days.
I'll try it and will keep you posted! Thanks so much as always!
Rebeca

Offline jessmum46

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #56 on: October 30, 2014, 16:46:17 pm »
Good luck and holding your hand, doing something similar here with DS at the moment x

Offline rebemuri

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #57 on: November 19, 2014, 21:19:52 pm »
Hi there!! It seems that every time I get something fixed, something else gets broken! DS just turned 8 months old. Around the time I went back to work, he started to wake up hungry at night... around 3 or 4am. He has always been a picky eater (percentile 5 or so in the weight curve), so the caregiver wasn't able to get him to drink much milk or eat much food at first. He is now back on track in terms of milk intake... actually, he is having more than he ever has (still low on solid food, but he'll get there... eventually!) but he continues to wake at night. I've tried feeding him, and not feeding him. Usually, he won't go back to sleep unless I feed him, but sometimes he won't go back to sleep ANYWAY, with or without the milk. I can't really do a proper wake-to-sleep because his wake up time varies from 3 to 4am. He does take the bottle, but I wouldn't think he is hungry based on total milk intake during the day. When I do feed him, I just give him a few ounzes so that he doesn't begin to replace his morning feed with this new middle-of-the-night feed. Could it be a habit, to wake up and have his bottle? Or could he really be hungry even though he has been having enough milk lately? Here's a typical EASY:
6:15 wakes up
6:45am Bottle (always breastmilk)
9:20am Nap for 1 hour and 15 min (if he has a bad night, at times he won't even last the 3 full A hours)
10:30am Bottle
12:30pm Lunch (not much, unfortunately)
1:45pm Nap for 1 hour and 15 min
3:00pm Bottle
4:30pm Fruit
6:00pm Bottle
6:30pm Bedtime
10:30pm Dreamfeed (DF has been getting progressively more difficult, he is taking less and seems sleepy, but I am reluctant to eliminate it since DS is low on weight...)
Then he will wake up between 3am and 4am, at times he will go back to sleep fairly quickly (30-45 min), other times he will stay awake until 5:30am! He won't cry. He will just lay happily in his crib, usually quietly, other times singing and chanting.
HELP PLEASE!!!!
« Last Edit: November 19, 2014, 21:32:10 pm by rebemuri »
Rebeca

Offline jessmum46

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #58 on: November 21, 2014, 13:28:24 pm »
That's the thing with these LOs, they keep on changing!!

The timing and way he is waking suggests possibly a bit of undertired.  Your nap lengths would suggest similar (1h15 is fairly typical UT).  I would be tempted to start gently pushing out his morning A time 5-10 mins every few days until the nap lengthens.  Probably leave your other A times the same for now (BT will creep a touch later) and see how things go. 

He could well be hungry though....at 8 months it would not be unreasonable to have a night feed if solids are t fully established.  Does he eat any proteins, fats etc or still just fruit and veggies?

Offline rebemuri

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Re: 4.5 month wakes up multiple times between 9pm bedtime and 11pm dream feed
« Reply #59 on: November 24, 2014, 11:15:46 am »
He does eat (just a little bit) of proteins and everything else (puree with meat, vegetables, rice, etc.) But not a lot. Last few nights have been VERY difficult to give him the dream feed. Last night he just had 1.5 ounzes, that's it. He did wake up at around 3:30am, but fell back asleep on his own about half an hour later. I am thinking we need to cut the DF. Counter-intuitive for sure since he does not eat much or drink much milk either, but he wants none of it and doesn't seem to be very hungry til morning. I just hope I can replace the DF ounzes during the day so he does not lose weight.
 --- BTW, pushing his morning nap til later has been working GREAT. He is now sleeping a lot more during the day... so thanks a lot for that :) ---
Rebeca