Can we possibly be ready for the 3-2 transition?!

[ecwinters]

Hi
My DS is 7.5 months and for the last 2 months we have been doing this:

6:30am-get up (he often wakes earlier than this, but will usually doze/chat/go back to sleep)
7:00am-milk
8:00am-solids
9:00am-9:40am-sleep (the reason we cap this nap is because his nap length for this sleep used to vary so much that it threw the rest of the day out and I wanted a bit more predictability.  Also, if he did 1 hour 20 mins then I never got a decent 2nd nap.)

10:30am-milk
11:30am-solids
12:30pm-1:50-sleep

2:30pm-milk
4:30pm onwards - catnap in stroller of up to about 30 minutes
5:00pm-solids
6:00pm-milk
6:30pm-bed and asleep
Approx 9:30-10:30pm - he will wake and I'll feed him (he doesn't always wake here, but I'll feed at the first wake up if after 3 hours of sleep time). 
Any wake ups after that I'll resettle him and he normally goes back down very quickly.  Nights have been getting better recently with sometimes only 1 other brief wake up.

I know he SHOULD be ready for the 3-2.  He's showing some of the signs, for example recently he has been harder to get down for the catnap.  I would also like to get rid of the catnap because I really have to do it in the stroller/car and it's getting very cold and dark here in England in November!  Also, he will be starting at nursery in January for 2 days per week and they won't be able to take him out for the catnap.  If he does 2 rubbish naps I can put him down in his cot for a 3rd nap but if he does a good 2nd nap then the only way I can get a short catnap at a reasonable time is by taking him out.

However, there are a few problems.  The 1st one is that his first nap is really unpredictable.  I have tried all sorts of A times!  We've never quite made it to 3 hours A time from getting up time, but like I said before he often wakes before I get him up anyway so if you add the time awake in the cot then it's 3 hours or more in total.  He doesn't seem to always do a longer nap on a longer A time though - it seems to be more random.  About a month ago I set the first nap at 9:00 because it was beginning to be far too stressful playing around with A times - and decided to cap it at 40 minutes (1 sleep cycle for him).  This worked well as most of the time he would do 40 minutes so at least I could then work on getting a good 2nd nap (which we do mostly get now).  Sometimes I'll have to wake him up though, which he HATES!  And then sometimes he'll only do 30 minutes which confuses me because this is an OT sleep yes?

The 2nd problem is that I don't think he needs 3 hours of daytime sleep.  So, if he does a good 1st nap (1 hour 20 minutes) it's pretty much impossible getting the same length from him for the 2nd nap.  He mostly gets between 2-2.5 hours sleep during the day which I know doesn't sound much but that's all I have been able to get out of him since he was about 4-5 months old.  So I'm not sure how to make the day long enough with less than 3 hours of naps.

The 3rd problem (!) is that he really does seem to like a short A time in the morning and then a short A time to bed.  However, I don't know how much of this is habitual.  If he's had 2 rubbish naps, then I can let him do up to an hour for his 3rd nap - and he can then be ready for bed in only 1 hour and 30 minutes which seems a very short amount of time.  But on the other hand, he can manage a 3 hour A time after a 30 minute 1st nap!  I have read lots about how A times can be shorter in the morning and since I decided to cap the 1st nap I've not tried to stretch his morning A past 2.5 hours after getting up time as it didn't seem worth it. His morning A has always been about 1/2 an hour shorter than the other ones.

I know that to get him to the 3-2 will be tricky but I know we have to do it some time!  Today, he decided to sleep for longer in the morning so instead of waking him after 40 minutes I let him have just over an hour.  The day went like this:

Get up-6:30 (he woke about 5:30am but resettled after about 20 minutes and woke just before 6:30)
7:00-milk
8:00-Solids
Sleep: 8:55- 10:00 (woke him up)

Awake-10:00
10:30-milk
12:00-solids
Sleep: 13:00-14:25

Awake-14:25
14:30-milk
16:45-solids
17:45-milk
18:05/10-asleep (was really overtired and crying)

So, we made it through with 2 naps, but the last A time was a struggle towards the end.  I have read about the 2-3-4 schedule and wondered if I could try something like 2.5 - 3 - 3.5 but it seems like 3.5 hours is too much for DS at the end of the day.  DH reckons he might get used to it, but I'm not sure - does this seem likely?

I just wondered if anyone had any suggestions?  I'm not sure where to go from here as unless I can pretty much guarantee a good 1st nap there's no way we can do the 3-2, is that correct?  If I stretch that first A time, I think I'd only get a 30 minute nap as sometimes he's so tired after 2.5 hours that he crashes out straight away and wake after 30 minutes crying.  Or, does this all mean we're not ready for the 3-2?

Any suggestions would be really welcome and I'm sorry for such a long post!
Thanks.

[trimbler]

Hey there, my DS also seemed to like shorter A times, especially the first one and before BT, but didn't seem to need lots of daytime sleep. So we tended to find it helpful to keep naps for as long as possible, so he could make up his total A time in more chunks, so to speak. I do think you'll need to push out the first nap eventually, 3h worked well for us until he eventually dropped the morning nap (we did short am, long pm naps). You're probably right that it will be easier to do the 3-2 with a longer morning nap, but I have heard of others who've capped the first nap and kept it short and still managed the 3-2. As I said I'd probably try to keep the CN as long as possible - for us we did actually manage cot naps, but it could take a long time to get off for them and they were a bit hit and miss, and sometimes would only last 10mins, but still, they could then manage a short A time after that to BT. Even if the nap didn't happen at all, at least it's potentially calm time, unless they're screaming I know what you mean about going out in the cold and dark for the CN, that was us last year with DD's 4th nap actually DS quite enjoyed going out for a walk in the dark with us, but that's besides the point! I wouldn't worry about January, I'm sure he'll be down to 2 naps by then. I did hear some advice once about offering these borderline naps until they refuse it for about a week consistently, I guess I pretty much did that and it kind of worked for us, but during the transition it would sometimes take half an hour of waiting to see if he'd get off, for a 10min nap and then straight into BT routine, or other days he wouldn't take it at all and be OT by the end of the BT routine (slow feeder, not an elaborate routine!) so it's messy

Tbh I'd try something similar to today, but offer a CN 2.5-3h after the second nap, or sooner if it wasn't so long. Gently push out the first nap too if he lets you, but you can go slowly with this. If he doesn't take the CN, just go straight to dinner, BT routine, milk and bed as quick as you can What do you think?

[ecwinters]

Thanks that makes sense.  He was really OT last night - woke up about 9 pm screaming (although he's teething so that could be it too!?).  3.5 hours in the evening is obviously too much for him at the moment.  The only time I think he could possibly do that much is in the middle of the day.

Today, he did 40 minutes for nap 1, then only 50 minutes for nap 2 and I couldn't resettle him.  So, I had to give him another 40 minutes in the afternoon to get him through to bedtime.  Another problem with the catnap is that it's difficult to fit around tea time.  When we had 3 naps plus a catnap and were dropping the catnap, I did all sorts of lengths to get him through to bedtime - by the end I was giving him a 10 minute nap then doing bath, feed, bed in 45 minutes! But that was before he was eating food, also he knows what order things happen in now and knows it's tea followed by quiet play then bath etc.  I took him out once after tea for a very short catnap and he had a meltdown!  So I can only push the catnap out so far as I don't want to make tea too late.  If he gets too hungry then he won't go to sleep anyway.   

But this does mean I can't really push the first nap out as I'll lose time in my day!  I have thought about doing a longer day, but it wouldn't solve the tea problem.  Also, although we struggle with a 12 hour night - he does it but normally wakes after about 11 or 11.5 hours even if he does go back to sleep eventually - putting him down later doesn't seem to make him wake up later so I'm not sure if it would work.  It's a bit confusing!

Would you wait until he's refusing the catnap more frequently, and then start pushing the first nap out to aim for something like this:
WU-6:30
Nap 1-9:30-10:30 (capped unless he wakes after 40)
Nap 2-1:30-2:50
Bed-6:00/6:30  (and then we'd struggle through a 12/12.5 hour night, which we did last night!)

I think even if he woke early from the first nap, he could probably make it to 1:30pm for nap 2.  I'm still not sure about the 3/3.5 A to bed time though but don't see how to change it.  I suppose by the time he's 9 months he'll be able to manage that though, do you think? I still think I need to cap that first nap as, although I'd love him to get over 2.5 hours sleep in the day, I really don't think he'd do it regularly enough for it to work.

Thanks for your help!

[trimbler]

Well, did I mention that my DS would pretty much only ever do 1h first nap, if I stretched his A any further he'd do an OT 30mins And on the rare occasion when he did sleep more than 1h, his second nap was rubbish Of course I realise they're not the same baby, but perhaps they might have similar sleeping rhythms... We'll see! Oh yes, and he also did his longest stretch of A time in the middle of the day

Have you considered offering tea before the third nap? That's what we did, it would have been something like:

06.30 WU and milk
07.30 breakfast
09.30-10.30 nap 1
10.30 milk
11.30 lunch
1.30/1.45 -?? Nap 2 (I can't pretend this was predictable )
3ish? Milk
3.30/4ish (depending on nap) tea
Some time after that(!) CN
Any time between 6-8(?) BT (with milk during the BT routine)

Yeah sorry I went for realistic, rather than an actual routine to aim for I remember on some days 'tea' was more like 3pm, but he didn't know any better Of course on days where you get better naps, the day will get later and you may want to experiment with skipping the CN, or he may refuse anyway. I'd have thought he could manage on two naps by 9mo - I thought my DS never would (!) but he suddenly surprised me

[ecwinters]

So sorry for the slow reply - I can read posts on my phone but it's hard to reply and I never seem to get a chance to sit down with the computer!

Wow - they do seem to have similar sleeping patterns.  I have had the odd 1 hour 20 minute morning nap but never got a good 2nd nap after that.  And 1 hour is usually a long morning nap here too!

The routine you posted looks very similar to what we'd be aiming for with a 1 hour 1st nap and a longer 2nd.  If your DS didn't nap for the whole hour, would you still put him down for nap 2 at the same time?  We started doing set nap times here about a month ago and it's worked really well.  I do vary them slightly but DS seems to now know when it's nap time and this helps him to settle. 

I've managed to get a catnap out of him the last few days after about 2 hours 50 minutes of A time.  I think I'd try until 3 hours A time and then give up and do bed time!  he hates being woken from his catnap though - always cries and is miserable.  I can't wait to stop it really now! 

I did try moving tea a few times but it seemed to confuse DS!  I've started giving him an afternoon snack as I was worried that the time between lunch and tea was really long, even with milk in the middle.  But I think that as his A time stretches I might have to. 

The only time his A time is really 3 hours is between nap 1 and nap 2.  Even if he has a really good 2nd nap, he will often still take that catnap before 3 hours is up.  When did your DS start to be awake for 3 hours in the morning.  DS really can only manage about 2.5 hours at the moment. 

Seeing as they may have similar sleeping patterns - did you go for a 12 hour night?  I find DS wants to go to bed at 6:30pm even if he's had lots of daytime sleep.  Anything later than that and I feel I am keeping him up!  He wakes any time between 5:30-6:45 (of course we do have the odd EWU sometimes) but will oftern doze or resettle so I'm reluctant to start only offering him an 11 hour night. 

Thanks so much for your help!

[trimbler]

Oh dear I'm afraid I can't remember exactly what times he did at exactly which ages, but perhaps that's a good thing as it's unlikely to be exactly the same as yours anyway Let's just see what I can remember... I know that he was almost at 3h first A by 8mo, but doing a bit more in between, I think. I'm pretty sure he finally dropped the CN around 8mo after probably a week of failed CNs, including one I tried to APOP - then I really knew he didn't need it any more! Have you tried the CN after an even shorter A? If he'll go down for it more UT, he may be happier when you wake him. Don't worry about trying to get a long A in there, IMO it's better if he's UT for the CN. Having said that, if he ends up OT for it, you don't have to worry too much as it's supposed to be short anyway How long do you let him have for the CN?

I do think you'd find it easier in the long run to do dinner before the CN rather than afterwards, it seems he's already a bit OT and then you have a lot to fit in before BT. Perhaps the afternoon snack could turn into dinner as he gets used to eating then?

I don't remember exactly what my DS was doing with nights at this age, but we never 'went for' 12h nights, I've always kept BT a bit flexible depending on how the day went, that worked for us at this age. We found that anything between 11-13h nights could work, he even did less as we approached the 2-1 but not I think during the 3-2.

[ecwinters]

Thanks for another reply!  The last few days have been a bit funny for sleep - he only did about an hour for the 2nd nap at the weekend on both days and today it was only 35 minutes!!  I never know if 35 minutes is OT or UT - he woke crying but he was impossible to resettle.  Was pretty tired though so I put him back down again after an A time of less than 2.5 hours and I had to wake him up after an hour so he'd go down OK at 6:30pm. 

Yes, I always try the catnap after a shorter A time.  That's the reason I do it in the buggy as he'll just sit and look at things until he drifts off.  However, on Sunday he didn't go down until after 3 hours A time so it's getting pretty tight.  I give him as long as I can give him and still get him to bed at around 6:30pm so it varies depending on when he goes down.

He doesn't like his bedtime being moved very much - whatever I do with the catnap he seems to always be ready to go to sleep at 6:30pm!  If I keep him up later - even 15 minutes - he starts rubbing his eyes at 6:30pm!!  Then his nights tend to be worse too.  Nights aren't great here - although MUCH better than before - and I'm wondering if once we transition to 2 naps this might help?  We were getting about 6-8 wake ups per night about a month ago.  Now it's 2-3 with a habitual one 3 hours in which we are trying W2S to stop!  It did work for a bit but has come back again.  My husband needs to do it though as he's braver than me!

My DH and I came up with this last night as a possible routine to aim for:

6:30-get up
7:00-feed
8:00-breakfast
9:30-nap 1
10:30-awake (wake up if necessary)
11:00-feed
12:00-lunch
13:30-nap 2
14:50-awake (hopefully!)
15:00-feed
16:30-tea
17:15-bath time
17:30-feed
18:00-bedtime (will eventually push to 18:30)

Does this seem reasonable for 9 months?  Our aim is to get him there by Christmas (he'll be 8 months old on the 23rd of this month).  Of course if he does a short 2nd nap then we'd have to squeeze a catnap in there somewhere but I imagine that is quite common?

Thanks very much again!

[trimbler]

It could well work, no promises of course but you've been observing him really well and come up with it on the basis of those observations, so that's a great starting point In my mind he'd ideally sleep a little longer in the afternoon, are you planning on waking after 1h 20, or is that just when you'd expect him to wake? Do you have an idea of his ideal total A time (or overall sleep needs)? Just something to bear in mind, I don't think I have enough to go on from the days you've posted. So really you'll be gently pushing the first A to make both naps come later, you may even find that he ends up with a longer pm nap even though you'll be keeping the middle A at 3h, as he'll be more tired from the first A time stretch. Expect the CN to get harder to come by, and don't worry about that, some days he'll take it and others he won't, it may be a bit messy but before long he'll be down to 2 and more settled again, hopefully

[ecwinters]

Hello!
I can count the number of times he's slept longer than 1 hour 20 during the day on 1 finger!  So, this is really all I can hope for. 

I don't really know what his sleep needs are to be honest. I suspect that he's always OT - today he only did 30 minutes - then 1 hour - then 30 minutes - went down at 6:30pm as normal but has already woken 3 times (and it's only 9:30pm!)  I think this indicates OT yes?  If he has a good sleep day then he gets about 2.5 hours but rarely more.  Night is nominally 12 hours but he rarely sleeps all night.  He probably only actually sleeps for 10.5-11 hours in actual fact. 

I think the hardest part is going to be stretching the first A. He really doesn't want to be awake for longer than 2.5 hours in the morning. 

I know some routines say to do a short morning A time, which I think would suit DS, but they always assume that the baby is going to do 2 lovely long sleeps and so (possibly) handle a long A time to bedtime. 

It took me 3 hours to get the catnap today but he'd have never made it to bedtime without it! 

Thanks 

[trimbler]

Oh it's hard isn't it? yes he does sound OT to me. I do wonder though whether he might surprise you and start taking longer naps once those A times get a bit longer... Even if he does a 30min OT nap, he might resettle, no? Or has he just never resettled? Have you considered w2s for naps? Never tried myself but I know some mums have had great success with it especially during nap transitions... How's it going at night? I think you need to keep it up for a good few nights before trying without. I also wonder whether he struggles to stretch that first A time due to the poor night time sleep? I know you said he doesn't like BT moved, but have you tried EBT at all? Usually BT does have to move a bit during nap transitions... How long an A did he do after his CN today, before BT? Could it have been any shorter? Are you still trying to fit dinner into that A time as well as two milk feeds? I just feel like you may need to try EBT at some point to help him catch up on his lost sleep at night and be more refreshed in the morning and ready to extend that A time?

[ecwinters]

Yes I think the problem is that he gets up tired from the nights and then can't do a long A time.  Today, I tried putting him down at 8:45 (15 minutes earlier than I normally do) - he did 35 minutes    I can very rarely resettle a nap.  The 2nd nap I have more success with but I've only managed to resettle the 1st once about twice!

The wake to sleep at night has been impossible for the last couple of nights as he's been waking up before the 3 hour habitual wake up anyway and has been so restless that we didn't feel it would work.  He has then skipped the 3 hour habitual wake up (so I suppose doing his own W2S!) but woken up shortly afterwards.  Last night he did these early evening wake ups and then was awake for about an hour between midnight and 1 am.  We just kept on trying to resettle him and eventually he went down. 

I get what you mean about the EBT.  I tried it tonight even though it meant skipping the catnap - there was no way I could have done a catnap and an EBT.  He did a rubbish 1st nap (35 mins) but a decent 2nd one (1.5 hours) ending at 2pm.  So I did a really low key afternoon and had him in bed and asleep by 5:45pm.  No crying, but he was rubbing his eyes a lot as I was giving him his bedtime feed and was asleep very quickly once I put him in his cot.  He woke up at 8pm and I resettled him by ten past...not sure if this is an OT wake up or not?  One thing I've noticed recently is that before he wakes up he's breathing really heavily (but still looks sound asleep) and then will suddenly wake and cry out.  I am now waiting for the next wake up!

The last night we had which was decent (about a week or so ago), his daytime sleep was like this:
Wake up (actually woke up here) - 6:40
Nap 1 - 9:05-9:55 (I woke him up as this was when I was trying to cap the first nap but he would have done longer)
Nap 2 - 12:45-14:05
Catnap - 16:50-17:10/15
Bed and asleep - 18:15
Then he only woke once around 11pm for a feed and didn't wake up until 6:15am the next morning.  If only he'd do that every night!  But it's interesting that he got 2 hours and 40 minutes day time sleep which is VERY rare and had woken up at a reasonable time - so starting the day well.  I think somehow I've got to get him waking up at a more reasonable time and giving him a bit more sleep during the day.  Those A times aren't very long though - under 3 hours.  I have a feeling that when he's well rested, his A times are a bit shorter (if that makes any sense at all!?).

He is definitely teething at the moment so I've been giving Calpol, but I don't want to put all of this down to teeth really. It's been like this for about 2 months now on and off.   Sorry for the long post - one day I will figure out this baby!  I don't want to give up and just accept that he's a rubbish sleeper because he's a lovely happy boy when he's not OT (actually he's pretty much happy all the time but just looks exhausted!). 

I am now waiting to see what the rest of the night will be like! 
Thanks for all your help.

[trimbler]

Will be interesting to see how the night goes well done for being brave with the EBT yes it could have been an OT WU with the long A to BT, but he still could go on to catch up on some sleep, let's hope so Interesting looking at that good night that he only had an hour after his CN - that's shorter than some of the other days you've posted where you've been trying to fit more into that gap. When did he have dinner then? Or was that before you'd started giving him solids at dinner time? It's hard isn't it, when you know he's had a good routine going one day and then try to recreate exactly the same conditions...problem is, by the time that happens, he may well have moved on they change so quickly at this age that you might want to think more about coping strategies with whatever he throws at you, rather than trying to pin down the perfect routine, iyswim? That's where I liked to fix my morning timings and then just have a plan for what to do if they short nap, or refuse CN, or whatever it might be - having a plan somehow makes things seem more manageable, for me anyway

[ecwinters]

Well he woke again at about 9:30pm so I fed him (I still give him 1 night feed at the first wake up which seems at a reasonable time!).  And then he slept through!!!  I woke up at about 6:15 to see/hear him playing with his feet and chatting to himself so I assume that he'd only woken about then.  I sleep with the monitor right next to me so I usually hear every little sound!

He seemed much better rested this morning.  Still only took a 35/40 minute nap for the first nap, but is still sleeping now (2pm) having gone down at 12:30pm.  He did wake briefly at one point (probably between sleep cycles) but just sucked his thumb and went back down.  Depending on when he wakes I might try skipping the catnap again, although I guess there's a limit to how many early bed times are effective. 

The 3 hour 45 minute A time to bed was probably the longest I'd ever go for but he managed it so would try it again on a day when he's had good naps.  It's useful to know he can do it.  Do you think he'd ever get used to a slightly longer A time to bedtime?  It would be very useful if so.

That day I posted I did do tea after the catnap - I think we just went through it all very fast!  I think as long as I know that the routine I'm trying works on a good day, I don't mind if it all changes. 

Thanks!

[trimbler]

Hey that's a great night he may well have been OT with that longer A to bed, those early evening NWs would be typical of OT, but I'm so glad he made it through the rest of the night to a decent time He 'll gradually get used to longer A times although best not to push it. I seem to remember a few 5.30pm BTs at this stage, perhaps even one at 5.15 when the naps had been particularly bad previously. It's good to know that you can use EBT as a tool to help him catch up, and eventually you'll probably find yourself doing that more than having the CN and before you realise, you'll be there

[ecwinters]

Thanks.  We did EBT again tonight - at 5:45 again. He woke up exactly 2 hours later and took half an hour to resettle but went back down eventually.  So I guess it was OT again?  His A time would have been about 3 hours and 40 minutes.

I think he would have been happy to go down at 5:30pm so may try that next time.  How many EBTs in a row can you do?  Or doesn't it matter?  I just don't want him to start waking up at 5:30am and thinking it's morning!

Thanks!