No sleep in the day!

[beckycook1]

Hello

My 10 week old baby sleeps quite well in the evenings and at night. She generally goes down at 7-11.30, then has a feed, then sleeps until 3 and then has a feed and then sleeps until 7ish. She takes a bit of time to settle at 7 but then settles herself throughout the night with no crying or fuss. However, in the day she will not sleep and spends most of the day crying as she is so tired. I try to follow EASY and as soon as I see a yawn I put her down to nap but she just lies there beady eyed contended for a while, the starts thrashing about and then starts crying. I try to just shh and pat but she will not be consoled even if I pick her up. She then ends up getting so tired that the only thing that will send her to sleep is rocking her with white noise playing in the background. She then won't sleep much more than 20-30 mins and wakes up screaming. Even if she naps in her cot or anywhere else (other than me holding her) she wakes up after about 30 mins screaming and is really difficult to console. She will nap in her sling sometimes if we go for a walk but will never sleep in the pram. She will sleep in her carseat but wakes up as soon as the car door bangs. She sometimes cries all day and I know its sleep related but cannot get her to sleep! She does suffer from reflux and was on infant gaviscon but it constipated her. Could it be pain causing her to not want to sleep and causing her to wake up? She doesn't sleep flat. Her cot is elevated at one end and she sometimes sleeps propped up in a breast feeding cushion in the day.

Sorry for the length of this! Any help would be appreciated!

[Bella89]

Hi there and welcome!

Sorry to hear you're having a hard time with naps. It can be tricky, especially at the beginning when they still have other things to figure out:)

I don't have much experience with reflux, but I believe it doesn't choose when it strikes. What I mean is that if she sleeps that well at night it doesn't seem to be a cause of the day sleep. Do you burp her after feeding? Sometimes LOs don't need burping at night but they do daytime.

Hello
 She generally goes down at 7-11.30, then has a feed, then sleeps until 3 and then has a feed and then sleeps until 7ish. She takes a bit of time to settle at 7 but then settles herself throughout the night with no crying or fuss.

Is this her night? Just checking to make sure:)
Could you write your day in an EASY format? It would help a lot.I.e:
7:00 WU
7:10 E
7:10-8:40 A
8:40 trying to put her down...
I wonder if it's her OT or UT causing that.

Also, is it possible that the room is too bright? Just trying to find out the difference between day and night for her.

Wdyt?

[beckycook1]

Hi
Good point about the reflux. She does sleep really well at night so maybe this isn't the problem. Those timings do refer to night! I do burp her. She burps well during the day.
It is really difficult to give you timings as they vary so much. I try to follow the EASY half hour feed, 45 min activity and then sleep but it doesn't always work as she gets grumpy and yawns a lot before 45 mins activity time is up and will not sleep for more than 30 minutes. When she wakes back up after a short nap she screams inconsolably and I usually end up feeding her again (by this point it is usually 2 to 2 and a half hours from her last feed). If we are out and about and she sleeps in the sling then she can go 3 hours between feeds so I know she can but don't know how else to stop the screaming. We start the day with a bit of a similar routine
7am wake up
7.10 feed
7.40-8.30-activity (play mat, bouncer, chatting)
8.30-sleep (this is the easiest time to get her to nap)
9.15-wakes up screaming. I try to get her back to sleep but she screams. I've tried shh and pat, picking her up etc. but the only thing that stops her screaming is feeding her.

After this routine goes out of the window until 6pm when we do a bath, massage and then bed at 7.

I could try putting her down to sleep in a darker room? Sometimes we are out and about and she happily sleeps in bright sunlight with absolute chaos around in if she is in the sling but yet will not sleep in a dark quiet room at home. Ha ha!

Thanks for your help.

[MommyN]

Just a point about the reflux. (I did a lot of research when I suspected it in DS2) Some reflux babies are so exhausted from crying and not sleeping during the day that they "crash" at night and sleep pretty well. Is she on any meds now? DS2 literally became a whole new child once we started rantadine (zantac).

[Bella89]

Estelle might have a better insight about reflux. I honestly have no idea. Could you have her checked up? But if she burps ok.. It doesn't seem to be an issue to me.

Becky is she FF or BF?

[beckycook1]

She is BF. I don't know how much it is connected to reflux and how much I just need some better techniques to get her to nap. Here is our day so far
7.30: wake up and feed (she may have been awake happily in her cot a little while before this)
8.15-9.00-activity (bouncer chair, nappy change, get dressed)
9.00-9.45-sleep (she woke up screaming at 9.45) We were out so couldn't resettle her easily.
10.00-feed. She wouldn't stop screaming without the feed
10.30-11.00-play
11.00-sleep in sling
12.00 wake up, play
12.30: feed (again, wouldn't stop screaming until I fed her)
1.30: yawning lots so needed a nap and is now asleep

I really want to get her on EASY but she screams for food at any old time!

[Bella89]

She is BF. I don't know how much it is connected to reflux and how much I just need some better techniques to get her to nap.

I am trying to figure out if it's the real hunger or not. With FF you know she ate 5 or 10oz, but with breast it's more tricky than that. What do you think? Does she eat enough at 1 feed? Also, my friend is going through lots of spit up and reflux story right now. Somehow the doctor said that formula is most likely to stay down than breast milk as it is heavier. That makes sense. But I doubt it's the case here, isn't it?

I have 2 ideas:
1. Is it possible that she is tired earlier than you put her down? I.E. If she woke up 7ish, can she be OT and that is causing her problems with short naps?
2. I think she might have problems moving from 1 sleep cycle to another. She had 1x45 nap and 1x1h. That's short, but still better than no sleep:)

Please, look at the link below on average A times. Maybe you already have:
Average A times- BOOKMARK ME!

What do you think?

[beckycook1]

I think she is over tired but when I first try and put her down she just won't go to sleep without help. At night she settles herself and I can put her down awake and she goes to sleep but in the day she lies there for a while and then starts to cry. I can make her sleep by putting her in the sling or by rocking her but I would like her to be able to sleep in her cot as she then gets a better sleep and doesn't get disturbed. So there are 2 problems

1. Getting her to sleep in the first place
2. Getting her to stay asleep past 1 cycle

[Bella89]

I think she is over tired but when I first try and put her down she just won't go to sleep without help.

But does she sleep with you helping her? What does work with her?
She is still little, so I would give her some time. While working on teaching her of course. My 1yo son still needs some help with falling asleep, hugs, song. It's all helping in some way... What do you think?

[beckycook1]

Hi
She will sleep if I help her. She will sleep brilliantly in the sling. She'll sleep for 2 hours in the sling and even sleeps past when I would expect to feed her. She will fall asleep if I rock her but wakes up very quickly and easily unless I'm still standing and rocking her which isn't really possible for an hour or so!
I've been trying really hard to time putting her down with when she should be tired but not over tired. I take her up to our room where the light is dim but not as dark as night time. I rock her until she is sleepy and then put her down and stroke her nose. She falls asleep but then wakes up 20 mins later screaming and it is very difficult to get her to stop crying.

[lily_layne]

I haven't read the whole thread properly but this caught my eye.

She will sleep brilliantly in the sling.

If the sling is working, I'd use it! She's still so little that it likely won't become a prop and in the event it does, she'll still be young enough to be fairly easily to learn otherwise. Many mamas on here will tell you that in the early days, sometimes you just have to roll with what works.

[Bella89]

I agree. Sadly, we expect our LO to know how to sleep and self settle by themselves right away, but It doesn't go that well with most of us.
First 3mo especially are difficult. Sometimes it's good to go with whatever, even if it makes us sane for a little while.
I don't really have a gold advice here. Seems like she knows how to sleep, just needs some help.

[beckycook1]

Thanks. I will def keep using the sling. At what age do you think it is good to try and get them to nap in the cot?

[Bella89]

I would say any age, but it depends on a baby. There are LOs that nap only in a cot, and there are moms that use other placed to get them to nap at all.
Give him a week and you will see:)

[michaeljacknnugg]

Just chiming in, I have a similar napper who is three months today. I've decided that for now I will use the sling for as many naps as possible, until we establish a routine and I feel like trying to get him to sleep elsewhere. No idea when that will be, tbh!

In the sling his naps have started to suddenly lengthen and I have a much, much happier baby. And I don't need to check on him or resettle, I just get on with my day.

I'm just going to go with it and enjoy him for now, it is going so quickly and he won't be little for long.