Please Help-Bedtime Issues Worsening-ENW and NW

[JennVanessa1083]

With the snacking, I was told because he's teething it's common. So I should stop? So you think he's hungry and that's why he's waking up?

He self settles with shh pat; not sure if that counts. How do I go about encouraging self-settling?

Are you saying an A of 2.5 is ok?

[Shiv52]

I think it's common to need to odd extra feed but before that I think we blamed a GS  and I think it's been going on a while hasn't it? 

If you're needing to ssh pat until sleeping then it could be there is a prop issue. The idea is to beable to pop them and down and let them work it out. So you can either ssh pat a little until a bit drowsy then let him do the rest and gradually stop your patting sooner and sooner. Or put him down after your nap routine and leave him to it and only intervene if he gets into a pickle.

I think A time wise 2.5 wasn't enough for him and was giving you OT naps. But if you think the teething is knocking him and he's OT you are better cutting back a bit but I do think I'd be pushing one A time a day at the least.

What's your gut telling you?

[Shiv52]

I would also make sure if you think he's looking a feed for comfort with teething it is a good bit before a nap otherwise all those milk hormones will be making him sleepy and stopping him from self settling himself.

[JennVanessa1083]

Thank you for the sound advice!

Sorry I attacked you with questions. I didn't intend for it to sound so defensive.

I feel as though my gut is telling me he had accumulated OT from teething and routine upsets. Last night he slept almost 12 hours!! He probably would have kept sleeping but it was 8:15 and I'm trying to be consistent. However, I went by cues at he fell asleep around 2:22 A and short napped 33 minutes but woke up happy according to my hubby. So now I'm like maybe it's a UT nap. My gut keeps telling me he can use a push somewhere but not sure where. I'm thinking the Am. My other thought is consistency to set his clock more. Lastly, it's the Cn and A time afterwards that messes me up. Last night was better in the sense we didn't get any long waking a and I managed to pat him to sleep rather than rocking.

He settles well if I get the A right. Before I started shh pat, I would just sing to him as he settled but then around 4 months I started shh pat since he was having trouble self settling. I do think you are right in terms of it becoming a prop so I can work on gradually patting less so he can learn to self settle without me. I know he's capable because he has done it before.

With the feeding, I try to keep the top up away from the nap but I can definitely work on pushing it closer to the original feed and hopefully no longer doing a top up. I can definitely see how the milk hormones can be helping him sleep.

He's also less than two weeks away from 6 months so he will be starting solids. Hopefully starting solids will help in a small way?