Author Topic: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !  (Read 2695 times)

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Offline Jojo290615

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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #15 on: January 09, 2016, 08:24:37 am »
Hi
Thank you so much for your reply :)
Actually the day I wrote to you I had a bit of a breakthrough :)
For the morning nap .. I went in as usual and waited to transition lo through to next cycle... He woke up as he normally does .. And it seemed that this time he was actually stimulated by my presence... And the nap didn't go very well. So for the next nap I didn't go in to him and he slept for 1:30!!! Yayy !
And the next day he did the same for both naps..!
Yesterday I did the same and he woke up after 30 mins !... But I let him be and he fussed a bit for about 15 mins .. Then he fell asleep by himself. So success there too ! The afternoon nap he woke up but didn't manage to get back by himself. I went in after 15 mins and helped him out and he fell asleep, and it only took a few minutes :) and yesterday he also slept through the 1:30 for his morning nap .  so there is great improvement !
Is this the right thing to do .. Let him try and get back by himself and then help him out when he starts to fuss louder ? Because even if I start settling him before he wakes up after 30 mins ... He will still wake up most of the time ..and the wake to sleep doesn't work with him.

He has also been waking up at 5:00 instead of 3:30/4:00 !so that's also an improvement ..  It's still early but if he goes to bed at 6:00pm that's 11 hours , so I can't ask much more of him bless him :)
I don't think he wakes up because he needs to poo because he will do it sometimes 10 mins after. But what I have been doing is that when he wakes at 5:00 , then poos.. I go in change him .. Keep it very low key, turn the light off and put him back down in his bed. He is not upset so i leave him for a little while until he gets fussier and fussier. Then I say good morning and so on :) ... Is this right ? Or is there anything else I could do?
I don't really know how I could change his milk feeds ... His last bottle is at 22:00 for his dream feed. And yes I am giving him breakfast and lunch as solids. And since solids he has been pooing 3 times a day !! Whereas before it was only once:) but he has always been an early morning pooer hehe
So when he wakes at 5:00 , I put him down for his nap minimum 8:30 until 10:00... Don't feel I can push it forward more if he is awake at 5:00.. Bit afraid he will get overtired ..
What do you think ?

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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #16 on: January 09, 2016, 11:32:22 am »
Sounds like you are doing brilliantly!
The day of observation (during W2S) I mentioned in my previous post is pretty much what you have done, it is to discover if LO self settles or not and you have worked out that he does - great!
Really, it sounds like everything is going very well and you are handling it all wonderfully :) Go Mummy!

The afternoon nap he woke up but didn't manage to get back by himself. I went in after 15 mins and helped him out and he fell asleep, and it only took a few minutes
Not sure what A times you are working with right now but this could be an indication that he may need a few mins more A before that nap. He has now shown he can self settle and transition from one cycle to another so where there comes a time when he is tired and trying to get back to sleep, and where you helping him a little does lead to sleep then this might be just a touch UT for the nap.

So when he wakes at 5:00 , I put him down for his nap minimum 8:30 until 10:00... Don't feel I can push it forward more if he is awake at 5:00.. Bit afraid he will get overtired ..
What do you think ?
As I say, you are doing great!  If you wanted to try to move the day on by an hour to result in more of a 6am WU with 7pm BT then you can approach it like the daylight savings clock change which many of us going through each year. Move everything 15 mins, including meals, for 1-2 days then move everything again another 15 mins. Over the course of a week you should reach the new routine. I found it helpful to write the whole plan down or I would forget where we were up to.  This is purely optional of course, you might be happy with the 5am WU as you are getting Y time from 6pm each day and perhaps you can go to bed early yourself to make up for the early morning.

You only posted a couple of weeks ago - just look at how far you and your DS have come!  :D


Offline Jojo290615

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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #17 on: January 26, 2016, 05:22:32 am »
Hi !
Just wanted to give you a quick update :)
Things are going really good ... Lo now wakes around 5:30... Naps at 9:00 and then again 14:00 both naps last 1,5 hours yay !!

There are some odd occasions where he will wake during his nap and not go back.. Or wake in the night .. But i don't expect him to be perfect :)

There is one issue we are having at the moment .. But I guess it's just a phase.. The dreaded rolling over in sleep phase :( he is very close to crawling .. And at the moment gets very grumpy and frustrated that he can't !:(

Any miracles to fix this. ? Lol !
He sleeps in a sleepyhead grand and our house is warm so doesn't wear a sleeping bag.some suggest tucking it in at the bottom of the mattress ..
I'm just a bit concerned that with this that it will undo some of the self settling as I go into him when he gets stuck and upset and settle him back to sleep in his crib. Whereas in to now he was doing great by himself... And sometimes gets really upset so we pick him up to comfort him.
« Last Edit: January 26, 2016, 05:25:16 am by Jojo290615 »

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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #18 on: January 26, 2016, 19:16:47 pm »
Wow, it really does sound like you are all doing marvellously :)

Ah, crawling and rolling, yes these are often sleep disturbances.  Fortunately it's just a phase and will pass, eventually.
No miracle cure I'm afraid but the more time you can let him spend on the floor during his A time the better. Some LOs get heaps of floor time anyway but some are in 'things' which prevent them moving for much of the day, between bouncer seats, car seats, the shopping trolley, the high chair, sling and stroller they can end up with little floor time. It's something to just consider. The more time he spends on the floor during A time the more practise he gets so he'll either learn that skill a bit sooner (stops disturbing sleep, yay!) or he will feel he's had enough practise during A and not need to keep on doing it during S time (yay!).  Even so, sometimes they dream these skills which is part of the learning process and end up putting their dreams into action so you can't always stop this stuff.

Good news, even if you help him lots during the times he needs you (now with the rolling or when he is ill, teething etc, there are no end of these things coming!), the chances are he will return to independent sleep just as soon as he is able to.  LO who are independent sleepers generally only ask for help when it's needed and just go right back to their self settling routine when the phase is over. If not, it will likely only need a little nudge in the right direction for the self settling to return.  Your mind will always be half on the 'prop' alert which will naturally lead to you doing as much as needed and not getting carried away with it, and do remember the more you respond to his call for attention the greater the trust, greater the confidence and the less he ends up needing you.
So, just keep on supporting him through his tricky times and you'll be fine :)

Are you sticking with the 5.30am start then?


Offline Jojo290615

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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #19 on: January 27, 2016, 20:13:08 pm »
Ah thanks for reassuring me :)

I calculated today roughly in general, lo gets around 5 or 6 hours of floor time a day :) and at least 70 percent of that time he wants to be on his tummy he he. He is no longer interested in being on his back. So we alternate between sitting and tummy time. Then he will climb and jump on me when he gets fed up :) also peek a boo never gets old ! Hehe

I feel so sorry for him .. He gets so frustrated so I also spend a lot of time on the floor encouraging him, with toys ... Remote controls seem to really motivate him:)

Yes we are sticking with the 5:30 wake up for the mo . I usually leave him in bed for a little while anyway, he is happy to chat away for a bit . So I feed him around 6:00. This was before he started rolling over in his bed though.
Right now we kind of look forward to our time in the evenings, so we will look into bringing the routine forward when this phase is over, he is also teething again.

Thanks again for everything  ! :)
« Last Edit: January 27, 2016, 20:15:12 pm by Jojo290615 »

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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #20 on: January 27, 2016, 21:57:56 pm »
You're very welcome :)

it's lovely to hear things are going so well - even through the tricky times.


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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #21 on: February 08, 2016, 05:57:18 am »
Hi there ! :)
Just a quick update and need of some more advice :)

So my lo is now crawling :) well a belly crawl but he is a lot less frustrated during the day. For the night we put him a light sleeping bag and tuck in the tail into the mattress, he now sleeps through again Yayyy. He can still roll over as he does in the morning when he is awake but it just stops him from doing it automatically in his sleep. We do the same for his naps and it's working really well :)

I would love some advice on how to stop his early morning poo :) if that's possible... He sometimes wakes up at 5:00 and poos immediately after. So I'm wondering if the need to poo is waking him up :( If I knew he hadn't pooed I would leave him in his crib for a little while so he knows it's not wake up time yet..

Here is a recap of lo routine

5:30 should be wake up time
6:00 220ml bottle of välling
7:00 breakfast ( porridge, fruit)
9:00 -10:30 nap time
10:30: 240ml of milk
12:00 lunch ( BLW... Veggies .. Omelette etc)
14:00-15:30 nap
15:30 240 ml of milk
18:30 220 ml bottle of välling
18:45 Sleep
22:00 dreamfeed milk 240 ml

Välling is a swedish drink we give babies when they are over 6 months .. Not sure if it exists elsewhere .. It's like a watery porridge or thicker milk. It fills them up more for the night.

I was wondering if he needs the dreamfeed still .. He drinks the whole bottle but maybe this is making him poo that early because he should be sleeping until at least 5:30.

Should I think about dropping the dreamfeed ? Is it something I phase out gradually by giving him less ? Or just stop ?
I was also thinking of adding an extra meal of solids at around 16:30

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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #22 on: February 08, 2016, 09:16:23 am »
Unfortunately phases of pooing at an inconvenient time can just happen.  Yes you could try to move the feeds a bit but it might not change his poo time. It may be that he wakes due to routine and then poos or it might be as you said that he wakes because he needs to poo. No way to know really.

I guess he is around 8 months now, a great time to drop the DF.
Some people prefer to go cold turkey on such things, just stop and if LO wakes then shush/pat (or adapted) back to sleep.  I never choose cold turkey where I have another option so I would personally prefer a gradual wean over a short period of time, say a week.  If you GW then reduce the DF by about 30ml (1oz) each night until you get down to 30ml (1oz) and at that point stop offering and if LO wakes shush/pat to resettle.  Some people also like to move the time when they GW, so bringing the feed 30 mins earlier each night, I didn't do this but it brings the feed closer to the BT feed over a period of nights until it comes too close to BT to give.
Make sure that day time milk feeds and solids offerings are increased so he can shift those calories to the day time in either milk or solids.

I'm not familiar with the thicker milk, I've heard of night time milk  or hungry baby milk which I think is thickened but never used it.  Is it possible that the poo at 5am began when you introduced this type of milk?  It might be worth trying a couple of weeks without that milk but in giving regular formula instead and see if it changes his toilet habits??


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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #23 on: February 08, 2016, 13:17:04 pm »
Thanks for your reply :)

I also don't like the idea of suddenly stopping the DF .. So from tonight I'll gradually bring it down. I can compensate the calories at lunch and dinner by giving him some milk after his solids. I'm sure he will be pleased, he loves his milk :)

Unfortunately he has always been a morning pooer:) ( never thought I would be discussing poo this much haha) so I'm hoping that it's because of the dream feed.


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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #24 on: February 08, 2016, 21:00:44 pm »
Hope it goes smoothly for you - I'm sure it will, when I've done a bit of gradual weaning like that it's always me that is nervous about it and DS hasn't batted an eye.


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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #25 on: February 21, 2016, 09:21:35 am »
Hi
Just a little update :) we have successfully dropped the 10oclock night feed ! I have added an extra meal at 5pm. We are baby led weaning but I'll always finish his diner of with a bowl of porridge so I'm sure this will fill him up:) then he has his bottle at 6:30pm.

We have a bit of a sleep regression at the moment .. My lb is 8 months next week and has entered Leap 6 of the wonder weeks. I follow this quite a lot as the readings have always been very accurate with my lo.

So right now I can there is so much going on for him .. Just learnt to crawl and getting faster :) and I can tell he is all the place right now. ( physically and mentally)
So he has started waking up after 45mins nap and as soon as he wakes he is active ! And for his afternoon nap we have quite a few tears and fighting his nap :( and only wants to fall asleep in our arms :( we try as much as possible to settle him in his crib but he cries so much sometimes we just have to go with it and let him fall asleep in our arms.
I guess this has some repercussions on his night sleep. Which is a bit hit and miss right now. Sometimes he will wake up crying on his tummy but will settle right away once we flip him over again. But last night for example , he wouldn't settle and would only settle in our arms. I am convinced that it has nothing to do with hunger as it was happening while he was still have his dream feed.

Is there something else in our routine that I could tweak or is this just a phase and the only thing is to ride it out ?
He is currently on 3,5 hours awake time and 2 naps a day. One at 9:00 and the other at 14:00

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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #26 on: February 22, 2016, 10:13:03 am »
Hi there, great to hear things have been going pretty well :)

His current disturbance can of course be all developmental, I didn't follow the WW but I hear they are very useful and often accurate.  You could just hold firm and ride it out, see if this passes when the WW has passed.
Looking just at the nap issue alone (rather than the WW) it could be that he is ready for another A increase.  He seems to like the higher end of A times so I'd increase to 3hr 45 for a couple of days, see how it goes and possibly increase to 4hr if it's needed, it may be only the first A time you need to increase because once the A time gets longer and you get a good nap it can become tricky to fit in 2 full naps in the day so the second nap might need to be shorter and therefore have a shorter A time before and after.
That afternoon nap refusal is a tricky one, if he is doing a full A time after his short 45 min morning nap he might be OT for the afternoon nap and finding it hard to relax (crying and wanting to be in arms) but if you have been reducing the second A time to account for the short nap then he might actually be UT instead.

I think you tend to go for earlier wake up and earlier BT in your routine so I've jotted down times based on that. Your day might look something like this if the first A time needs to increase as far as 4hrs
WU 5.30
A 4hr
S 9.30 - 11 (full nap)
A 3hr 30
S 2.30 - 3.30 (45-60 min, shorter nap)
A 3hr 15
BT 6.30/6.45

It's just an example. Some LOs will accept a shorter last A time if they have not had a full afternoon nap so BT can stay the same.  The real routine will depend on how well he responds to an extra 15 mins first A time and if the afternoon nap has been OT or UT.  Hope that makes sense.


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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #27 on: February 22, 2016, 14:41:32 pm »
Hi
Thanks for the reply ! :)

Actually since I wrote the morning nap is going quite good so it could have been just a one off.. Because I think he already has almost 4 hours awake time. I hear him awake around 5:10.. But I let him be as long as he isn't crying.

But the afternoon nap is a bit hit and miss. So I think I will try to increase his awake time to 14:30 and then just let him have an hour.

If I increase bedtime to 7pm, will he wake up a bit later ? I have tried it but he seems to still wake up between 5:00 and 5:30am. Or is maybe something that he will gradually do ?




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Re: 6 month baby .. Night waknings and short naps !
« Reply #28 on: February 22, 2016, 18:45:45 pm »
If I increase bedtime to 7pm, will he wake up a bit later ? I have tried it but he seems to still wake up between 5:00 and 5:30am. Or is maybe something that he will gradually do ?
Mine always woke early no matter what and I was basically stuck with 5am 5.30am WUs (sometimes 4.30 which drove me insane!) BUT it is possible to move them on if you are really determined to do so. When I went through it I really didn't have the courage to see it through, I'm positive that if I ever had the opportunity to go it again I'd be more confident.  When mine was older I did push it, I think it was when clocks were going back and I couldn't face returning to 5.30WUs (I think by then I had finally got him to 6/6.30 but it had taken for ever).  I discovered with mine I had to really make BT much later and hold firm whilst the OT built and forced him to shift his body clock, he certainly had a strong body clock which woke him in the morning even if he was put to bed later...so I had to go quite a lot later to make it happen.

If you do want to move WU time I would suggest starting out like a clock change (not sure where you are or if you have them), moving 15 mins each day, it is important to move E times not just sleep times. So first E is 15 mins later and everything you do in the day is 15 min later. Next day another 15 min later. After 4 days you've moved an hour.
Mine didn't respond well to this tbh, he needed to be taken beyond an hour for WU time to move.
I would suggest letting this recent wobble pass before starting out so you know what your routine is before you start moving it, don’t know about you but I always had to write this stuff down so I knew what I was supposed to be doing at what time each day.