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!

[ecwinters]

Just a quick update - last night was not as good as the previous night! After waking after 2 hours, he then woke up after another hour and again about 11:30pm.  He then slept through, although was quite restless - I know he woke briefly at least a couple of times but resettled himself quickly.  He woke quite early - about 5:30am I think - but went back to sleep eventually on his own. 

Today we had to do a catnap after a first nap of 35 minutes and a 2nd nap of 1 hour, 15 minutes.  I gave him 20-25 minutes in the buggy and then he was in bed an hour after the catnap ended.  Took him 10 minutes to drift off to sleep (6:15pm).  HOWEVER...he's just woken up (8:45pm) so he must still be OT!  It seems like whatever I do he has these early night wakings. I know that babies naturally wake up a lot during the night so is it possible he just does 'normal' wake ups but struggles to resettle himself?  Or is there something else going on?

I feel if I could crack the first nap we would be be progressing but it seems to be either 30 minutes or 35 minutes!  I know that everyone says push the A time (we are on 2.5 hours) but is it possible that he would do better on a shorter A time?  I'm reluctant to push the A time if I'm already getting an OT nap.  I know a lot of routines have a short (2 hour) morning A time but I also know that people say these make early morning wakings worse.  And of course if I try an earlier AM nap then we'd be back in 3 nap territory because there's no way he will do 2 naps long enough to fill the day

Sorry for another long post.

[ecwinters]

Sorry again!  Just one other quick thought...
Is it possible that he 'waits' for his evening feed?

I give him a feed any time (when he wakes) after 3 hours.  So far tonight he's woken at 8:45pm so DH resettled him and he's just woken again (9:10pm!).  If I feed him, he'll go back down for a while - he doesn't then usually wake until gone 11pm.  I'm unsure as to whether he really needs a feed at night.  He's 20lb and he eats well (solids) and has 4 milk feeds during the day too.  Could he be waking up and crying because he knows he's going to get milk at some point?

Just wondered?

[trimbler]

Hmm not sure about how many EBTs you can do - what time did he wake after the last one? I'd personally try to use EBT to catch up on OT when you feel he needs it, he might not be quite ready to stretch without the CN regularly yet, that 2h post BT nw was most likely OT. But you could try 5.30 and see how it goes... I think just try to stay flexible depending on how naps have been, keep offering the CN if you think that might be better on a given day - I used to do something like offer it but if still not asleep after 30mins then go straight into BT routine. I think he may be closer to the transition than you think

[ecwinters]

OK thanks.  Today we had a long 'catnap'!  It was 50 minutes or so and then he went to sleep an hour and a half afterwards - still did a 2 hour wake up!!  DH thinks it's habitual or something.  Basically he does early night wakings every night - no matter what's happened with naps.  Last night he did 4 between 8pm and 11pm and then slept through. It's so weird.

I'm still sure that sorting out nap 1 will help...somehow!  I put him down 15 minutes earlier today and got a 30 minute nap.  He went to sleep fine and didn't seem OT but you just never can tell with DS - his only tired cue is rubbing eyes and he normally only does this when I start putting him down anyway!  It seems to make little difference what I do.  The A time was 2 hours and 15 minutes but he'd been awake for at least 10-15 minutes in the cot before I got him up, plus I know he was awake at 5am (but he then went back to sleep!). But I have to count A time in the morning from when I get him up or it gets too confusing.  I'm not sure if I should try putting him down even earlier - it seems like going back about 2 months!

He's 8 months old tomorrow so really should be doing more than 2 hours first thing I think?

[trimbler]

Sorry I didn't see your second post before my last reply, for some reason! Tbh I'm not sure about the waiting to feed thing, does he take much milk do you think? He sounds like he's probably having enough opportunities to eat during the day... Any way you could reduce the length of time he feeds at night, if you do this gradually he may be able to make up for it during the day... He's bf isn't he? Sorry can't remember! I could ask a bf mod to pop over if you want to investigate this further - how many times are you feeding him at night usually?

Ok so I really would agree that he'll need more than 2h before his first nap, a 30min nap can be UT but he may show tired signs when you pd because he's so used to the routine, his body is telling him it's time for sleep. What was his A time the last time you got a longer am nap? I really wouldn't have thought he'd need less than 2.5h, can you stick to that for a few days and see what happens? Getting him down even earlier is more likely to end up with EWs I'd think.

Those evening NWs are usually OT here, or discomfort. It can take a while to get over it though so it may be that if he's having these wakings every night then he's just struggling to catch up on lost sleep, do you have a feel for how much sleep he's getting on average over 24h, and how much he was getting when he last had a better 24h period?

[ecwinters]

Ah I didn't know a 30 minute nap could be UT too?
Today he did 35 minutes!!! With 2.5 A time.  He woke up crying and miserable but that could mean anything!!

The last couple of nights have been MUCH better for evening wake ups - only one (at 10:30pm) last night which isn't really an early wake up - and then he slept through.  Same the night before.  I've been doing extremely short A times after the catnap to bedtime which seems to work, so he still has been getting to bed 'early' i.e. more than 12 hours before his getting up time which seems to suit him.  He's been resettling in the mornings too quite a bit. 

Tonight though I did an EBT and skipped the catnap as he woke from 2nd nap at 2:20pm.  In bed and asleep at 5:45pm.  He was OK until 8:20pm when he woke up and we've resettled him a couple of times.  So, that's probably OT again!  I think at least I can explain the NWs now (thanks!) and sometimes I just can't do much about them - I suppose I could have done a short catnap today but then bedtime would have been later which he doesn't much like either!  It's just this first nap that I'd like to fix now.  But it's always been rubbish - apart from a period of about 2 weeks when he started to sleep for about an hour - no idea why!  His A time in the morning (from getting up) has never been more than 2 hours and 40 minutes.  I've had longer naps on 2 hours 40 and 2.5 hours - but we decided to leave the A time at 2.5 when we decided to cap the first nap.  I never wake him from the first nap now, but he never goes over 35 minutes at the moment anyway.  I suppose at some point I'm going to have to push to 2 hours and 45 minutes and see what happens for a bit.  But the more I push out the morning, the less time I'll have for the catnap so I'm not sure what's best. 

I think at the moment he's getting about 13.5 hours in a 24 hour period. Between 2-2.5 hours in the day and then about 11-11.5 at night.  He's always in bed for at least 12 hours but it depends on how much he wakes up!

[trimbler]

Sorry not much time but looks like you're working out some patterns, which is great We sometimes had 10min CNs and then not much time at all till BT, you can always try that if you think best on a given day... With pushing out the morning nap - which I still think is worth a try - if it's long, then great, he may not need the CN; if short, you could still aim for the second nap around the same time as usual, which would mean a shorter second A but when you consider both 1st and 2nd A times together, he'll probably be tired enough for a decent pm nap. So I wouldn't worry about that

[ecwinters]

Yes we used to do 10 min catnaps when he was dropping the 4th nap - he doesn't really like them but they might be necessary soon!

OK that sounds a good idea about the timings of the naps.  I think I'll try pushing nap 1 to 9:15 (2 hours and 45 mins A time) but then if he does only 30 minutes I can keep nap 2 at the usual time of 12:30. 

It's a bit unrepresentative at the moment as DS has a bad cold and is sleeping lots - but he's done a longer morning nap both today and yesterday.  In fact today's was 1 hour and 40 minutes (I woke him in the end but didn't really want to!) so we've had 2 nap days and EBT.  Tonight he was asleep at 5:30pm which is the earliest I've ever put him down!  When he's better I'll start pushing that first nap to 9:15 and I'll see what happens.  If I get a 30 minute nap would you just keep it there for a while and see what happens?  How quickly would you push to 9:30?  What about if I still got a 30 minute nap at 9:30?  Would that mean I'd need to push it even later or could be doing a longer morning nap be one of these things that might always be hit and miss?

Thanks very much.

[trimbler]

Aw poor thing hope he's better soon But on the plus side, we can hope that these long naps are training him in better sleep habits I'd just keep the A times as they are until the naps start to shorten again, and I'd let him sleep for up to 2h. When they start to shorten, take it as a sign that he's starting to get better and push to 9:15 the next day (or take it more gently if you feel more comfortable with 9:10, say, you don't have to use 15min increments), see what happens, don't worry about the next move until then The good news is that it does sound he'll be ready to drop that 3rd nap completely by the new year, if not before

[ecwinters]

Thanks!  He's still doing a longer first nap so we're having lovely 2 nap days!  Night have been really good but the last 2 nights we've had that 3 hour wake up after bedtime creeping in again!  Which always means he's more unsettled for the rest of the night.  But at least I know that it's probably OT and I can put him down earlier tomorrow to try and sort it.  5:30pm bedtimes have worked really well the couple of times I was brave enough to try it! 

Once he starts doing a short nap again in the morning I'll stretch his A time a bit and see how we go.

Thanks for your help!

[trimbler]

Sounds like you have it all worked out

[ecwinters]

Just jumping back on here...it was lovely while it lasted!

Now I seem to have a new problem in that if I get a good first nap, I can't repeat that with the second nap.  I haven't had to push the first nap out as all the EBTs have resulted in DS being ready to start the day at around 6 am (which is OK - but I don't want it to get any earlier!).

We've been getting a longer nap at 9:00, sometimes until about 10:15 which I think is probably a result of the increased A time (nearer 3 hours now and sometimes more as I often wake at around 6 to find him awake too!).  So that's great.  However, I can't seem to get a decent second nap, meaning that the A time to bed is still too long - or we have to do a tiny catnap which doesn't seem to help the OT from building up.  Even if I cap nap 1 at 1 hour, I can't seem to get a decent 2nd nap. 

I've tried a 3 hour A, but get a 40 minute nap.  (3 hours works fine after a short (35-40) minute first nap though).
3 hours and 10/15 minutes A time gets me about an hour long nap, which is about as good as I've managed at the moment.  Today, I pushed it out to 3 hours and 25 minutes and got a 30 minute nap!!  I'm not expecting 3 hours 20 minutes to work miracles (although it's possible!) but assuming it doesn't, I'm stuck with days like this (at best):

Wake up: 6:00
nap 1: 9:00-10:00
nap 2: 1:15-2:15
Then I do EBT at 5:30/5:45

He usually refuses the catnap and even if he does, and I give him 15 minutes about 5:00 and have him in bed by 6:00, he still does OT evening wake ups.   He only really takes the catnap if he's woken before 2:00, or (like today) done a really rubbish nap. 

I honestly don't think DS needs 2 long naps (for him, 1 hour and 20 minutes - we never get more than this) but I can't seem to space the sleep out to get him through to bedtime without the OT.  I'm not sure if this is as good as it's going to get, or if I should cap nap 1 at 40 minutes again, and put him down for nap 2 at 1:00?  Not sure that gets me anywhere though as he'd still wake at 2:20 at the best!  There may not be a good answer, apart from sitting it out, but I just thought I'd ask.  I suppose as he gets older (he'll be 9 months on the 23rd) he'll gradually cope better with the A time to bed?  I don't like putting DS to bed at 5:30 all the time as I don't really think I can expect 12.5 hours of night sleep (even if you take off the wake ups) - but maybe it's the only option?

Sorry to ramble on - I'd be grateful if anyone has any comments please, even to say that there's no good answer!

Thanks!

[trimbler]

Tbh I wouldn't worry about long nights, if he does them then great! Actually we've just been through a phase where DD has been doing 12.5h nights on days when I'm home, DH can't get her to bed early enough for that when I'm working but she needs it when she can. We've even had phases, more with DS, of regular 13h nights, especially when naps were bad. Why not stick with the routine you posted above for a few days, then try pushing the second A again? When you get the 30jin naps, can you resettle at all? Don't be afraid of EBT if it seems to work for him

[ecwinters]

OK great - we've been just doing the EBT and its OK at the moment.  Yesterday I got nearly an hour for the 2nd nap with 3 hours 20 A time, but today, only 45 minutes.  I am going to keep slowly pushing out the middle A time like you said - if nothing else, it shortens the A time to bedtime!

After the 30 minute nap the other day he woke and then lay happily sucking his thumb for half an hour!  No noise at all - if I hadn't had a visual monitor I wouldn't have known he was awake.  I can rarely resettle him - he sometimes does it himself, but usually if he lies there for a while but doesn't go back to sleep then there's no point in trying to persuade him!

[trimbler]

Haha I only have the audio monitor and have sometimes wondered whether they've actually been awake quietly for a long time before making a noise, based on their tiredness levels afterwards - but then again I almost prefer not to know sometimes

There's always a middle ground - you don't have to do a first nap of 1h or 40mins, you could do anything in between, I actually got to the point with DS where I just couldn't get a decent pm nap without slowly trimming the am nap, so I think I started out capping at 1h 10mins, then 1h, then 55mins... And so on! Sometimes it only takes a little change. Really glad the EBT is working for you though

[ecwinters]

Sorry to come back onto this but....

Things have taken a turn for the worse - he's crawling around his cot every night, sitting up and waking multiple times!  Also, he's not settling at bed time - he's been in bed for 45 minutes and he's still babbling and crawling.  I keep going in and resettling him but it doesn't work.

The only thing I can think of is that he's now UT?  Today he work before 6 (but not exactly sure when) and we got him up at 6.
Nap 1: 9:00-10:10 (I woke him)
Nap 2: 1:35-2:45

So there's a good chunk of day time sleep there (especially for him! - he wasn't getting more than that when he was 6 months and he's now over 9 months).

Put him down at 6pm and he's still awake - no crying but showing no signs of going to sleep!!!

Not quite sure if it's developmental or something we could fix by cutting his day time sleep, or putting him down later?  Is it better to cut day sleep or make the night shorter?  Maybe he'd have been happier if I'd put him to bed at 6:15pm?  Sorry for another question!  Thanks.

[trimbler]

Hey there, sorry to hear things are tricky, I did see your other thread but haven't been around so much recently so left you in Liz's capable hands. Just read through it now to get a bit more info, I agree he could well be a bit UT, how does he seem during the day? Each LO is different in the sort of routine that suits them best, I seem to remember that your DS reminded me a lot of my own, so I'll just say what we did with him - which was to concentrate on lengthening that pm nap as much as we could (to 2h), by a combination of shortening the first nap and lengthening the 2nd A time. Then after a nice long pm nap, he could manage a longer A time to BT without getting OT, whilst at the same time building up enough total A time so that he could rest well at night without too much playing around. Does that make sense? I can't quite remember what his routine was exactly at this age, but on a good day it would have been something like...

Up 6:30
Nap 9:30-10:40 (capped to 1h10 if he wasn't already awake, just like you, reducing as he got older)
Nap 2-4 (a bit earlier if the first nap was shorter)
BT 7:30 (at the latest)

He tended to prefer nights on the shorter side with a good nap, although on the other hand he could sometimes pull 13h nights if he'd had really bad naps. Take that routine above with a pinch of salt though, he didn't really stabilise until around 11mo.

Does that help at all? I wonder if he could stretch the second A time (I know it's already longer than what I posted above, but different LO...) for a longer second nap, or do you think the second nap was a bit OT?

Oh and as a general rule, developmental stuff will improve after a while, but if these nights go on and on, it's probably time for a routine tweak. No harm in trying one now if you think he might need it though.

[ecwinters]

Hello again - thanks so much for replying.

Would an OT nap be 1 hour 10 minutes? - I've always thought that was a good nap (for DS that is!!!) 

I don't think DS has done a 2 hour nap since he was a newborn!  I'm fairly sure I wouldn't get one out of him but you never know!  I've been capping day time sleep at about 2.5 hours but you are saying your DS had more than that, yes?  Was that because he had a longer day than 12 hours? Today, we had:

Wake up (actually woke him!) - 6:15 which is a bit later than normal, but he was playing around at 4:30am after an otherwise very good night and then he resettled about 5am.
Nap 1: 9:05 - 10:10 (woke up at the usual time)
Nap 2: 1:40 - 3:00 (tried for a bit longer A time and he settled much better, with only a couple of minutes of attempted crawling! I woke him up from this nap too as I wanted to try bedtime at 6:15pm).
Put him in his cot at 6:05pm and he was asleep by 6:15pm.

He woke up at 9:00pm - have no idea if this is UT/OT/or just habit but he ALWAYS does this 3 hour ish wake up - I gave him his one feed and he's now asleep again. 

He seems to have stretched his A time to bed recently, so we don't have to do an EBT any more.  The last couple of nights I've given him 3 hours and 15 minutes to bed time after 2 decent naps and there's been less playing around before he goes to sleep and also more sleeping at night too!  I think I will keep to 12 hour days and see how I go, but might stretch them a little if he still seems UT.  I would be happy to have longer days and shorter nights if it meant more sleep but I know that whatever time I put DS down he will still wake at the same time the next morning! 

He doesn't seem OT at all at the moment.  He doesn't like being woken up but is fine after a cuddle.  It's very hard to tell because he's a very happy, high energy baby, but normally the warning signs are TOO much hyperactivity or shrieking and he's been fine recently (apart from the usual attention demanding yells at people in the supermarket!).  But playing around in the early hours sounds more UT than OT I think?  When he's OT he normally wakes and cries and wants to go back to sleep.

Sorry for the long post! 

[trimbler]

1h10 could be OT or UT, hard to tell without seeing how LO is afterwards or knowing what they usually need - sorry that's not much help is it! I didn't actually think it was OT, just wanted to check with you in case he had been tired afterwards. You never know, with a combination of capping first nap further and/or stretching second A time, he may do a longer second nap - he did 1h20 yesterday, right, but you woke him, so who knows how long he may have gone... But if you think he 's doing best on 12h nights then I'd carry on doing what you're doing, it seems to have worked well yesterday - how was last night? I agree sounds more UT than OT, and we just dealt with that as I said, by getting the pm nap longer (DS was also a short napper for ages) and then stretching out the last A, so yes, longer than 12h day but overall sleep was enough. Your DS does remind me of mine at that age - he would also go very hyper when OT which is why I really tried to avoid it, we ended up hanging onto naps for longer than most, just because A times on the shorter side seemed to help prevent some of that hyper-ness which he couldn't switch off from. But he wasn't HSN, just had more naps so more A times, so even though they were short they still added up to something fairly normal, iyswim?

About that WU 3h after BT - could very well be habit, but it's probably also just the time he naturally transitions out of the deepest sleep at the beginning of his night, I often hear a little stir at that time even when DD doesn't actually wake, but I think it's pretty normal. If you wanted, you could start trying to resettle without the feed, or start slowly bringing the feed earlier, if he'll take it whilst pretty much asleep? That's how we weaned the df with both, they tend to eat less when it's offered earlier and gradually make up for that by increasing food intake (milk and solids) during the day, until they no longer need it. I felt that this also had the effect of w2s (kind of) if that makes sense? But if he's not ready to drop it just yet, I probably wouldn't worry about it too much unless it becomes a problem - just carry on doing what you're doing until you feel he is ready.

[ecwinters]

Thanks for replying yet again!

I've had about a week of DS playing around before the 2nd nap and then only doing about an hour.  But today, he woke up from nap 1 after 55 minutes (he just wasn't tired!).  I then gave him nearly 3.5 hours A time and he did a 1.5 hour nap!  Which is the longest I ever get from him.  So, maybe it's time to start capping that 1st nap at 1 hour. 

Having said that, tonight he's already woken twice - after 2 hours, then 3 hours, which can't be OT so must just be habitual I think.  After the 1.5 hour nap, he was in bed after 3 hours and 15 minutes A time and asleep pretty quickly. 

The 12 hour nights are working well - we've actually had a few nights with only 1 or 2 wake ups (1 for the feed and 1 other resettle, which is amazing!).  He's not been waking early either so that's good. 

The other night, DH tried resettling DS when he woke at the 3 hour mark and he went back to sleep for another 2 hours - when I fed him.  So at least he will go back to sleep OK without the feed but I'm not sure I'm ready to try the whole night without yet. 

Thanks so much!

[trimbler]

Great work on that second nap, sounds like a plan It's possible he may have still been a bit tired afterwards due to the longer A time beforehand, even though he had a good nap - so then he may have needed a tiny bit less A before BT as a nw 2h after BT could be OT... Just something to consider, see how it goes and if you can repeat that second nap success!

[ecwinters]

Just been talking to DH after DS has already woken twice (he went down at 6:10pm and it's only 8:30pm!)...do you know if waking up in the early evening can be anything other than OT?

Yesterday he did 2 naps - 9:00-10:10 and 1:40-3:00 (I woke him up from both of these).  However, last night was AMAZING - he went down at about 6:10 (like today) and didn't wake until about 11pm.  In fact DH even crept in at around 10pm to check if he was OK - that's how unusual it was!  Then he slept through until about 5:30am when he was awake dozing and chatting but as his normal getting up time is 6am ish this isn't too bad. 

Today, we had the exact same naps and nothing abnormal in terms of activity - just the usual stuff.  But, as I said, he's already woken up crying twice - back down straight away - but still something must be making him wake up.  He was tired when I put him down tonight - rubbing eyes etc. so I could have pulled bed time earlier I suppose.  But as last night was so good, I tried to replicate it!  Anyway, I would have thought 3 hours and 10 minutes A time after decent naps was OK.  He'll be 10 months old at the weekend so I would have thought 2.5 hours day time sleep and aiming for 11.5-12 hours at night was OK?  But, maybe he is just OT by the end of the day.  He's VERY sensitive in general so I guess may be very sensitive to getting OT as well by the end of the day. 

I just wondered if there are any other possible reasons? There seems to be no pattern to it really. He will pretty much always wake after 3 hours but might do other evening wake ups too before and after, but they are not necessarily linked to him having slept more/less during the day and to his A time before bed. 

Sorry to bring this up again!  I know eventually it will sort itself out, but he's been doing this since he was about 6 months old.  It's makes me sad that I can't fix it for him. 

Thanks

[trimbler]

Well it does sound like progress, I think? I mean, those naps were pretty good Those evening NWs could have been OT or discomfort, most likely - any teething going on? I wouldn't rule out OT though, it may be that although yesterday's naps were good, he just needs a little more sleep overall for a sustainable routine? My DD actually still seems to do best on around 15h sleep overall, even now at 19mo (although I can't believe that won't change soon!) - there's quite a big range between HSN and LSN LOs.

I personally wouldn't have woken him up from the pm nap but let him sleep longer, anything up to 2h. He may then manage the 3h 10mins (or whatever you feel he needs) better without getting OT by BT. Or was there a reason we decided to cap the afternoon nap too? It's hard to know whether there might be a pattern without seeing the routine day to day. OT can accumulate so what may have worked one day may not be sustainable every day. On the other hand he may have had a good napping day where he caught up on previous OT, but trying to do the same thing the next day would have given him too much daytime sleep, or resulted in UT naps or something, iyswim?

[ecwinters]

Yes I think you're right - he's probably still OT by bedtime despite the better naps.  He always seems to be teething but at the moment no red cheeks and he's just had 2 top teeth come through over Christmas, so it's probably not that. 

I'll let him sleep for the 2nd nap then - although the last 2 days he's woken up on his own before 3pm anyway!  Tonight I gave him only 3 hours A time after the 2nd nap and he's done a 3 hour wake up for a feed but we skipped the 2 hour one, which is a positive sign! 

His daytime sleep is usually between 2 hours 15 - 2 hours 30 and nights are between 12 - 12.5 hours in bed, but with wake ups and things this is a bit less.  Some nights he is awake for periods in the middle of the night as well - think it's developmental as he's usually babbling to himself (he's a massive talker already) but I will try and bump up his overall sleep a bit and see how we get one!

Thanks!

[trimbler]

It's often so hard to know what to put these things down to, isn't it? I think many LOs do just get really tired with teething, and if you do manage to get him sleeping a bit more with EBT or a longer pm nap then it may not even need to be for long before he's caught up on sleep and ready to stretch A times a bit again, so just keep an eye out for that. If you do EBT, then at least even if he wakes earlier than you'd like in the morning, he will hopefully be more refreshed. It may be that, like my DD in fact, he likes/needs a relatively short A to BT, to avoid OT. My DS on the other hand seemed to need a nice long A to BT - you know your own LO best