Longer and confusing NW

[Shiv52]

Sorry Hun. What I meant was pick a start to the day like 8am. And do 3.5 a time. So nap is at 11.30.  And so on. And if he's up at 7am then you resettle until 8 and then start the day so nap will be at 11.30 even if he's been awake since 7.40 or whatever.  so I guess I'm suggesting a week of set wakes up naps and bedtimes to get him back on track. If you're too accommodating.

Also in the 2-1 a 12 hour night may be unrealistic with needing to fit everything in.

How's he going with the self settling?

[JennVanessa1083]

Ok I can try that for a week. Will the set naps cause OT wakings. Set naps help with EMW? Interesting and worth a try. so sticking with the same A times of 3.5?

Could this be ok?:

WU 7:30 am
Nap 1 11-12 pm (A 3.5)
Nap 2 3:45-5:15 (A 3.75)- I have noticed at 3.5, he naps for 1.25 hrs. Maybe that's the best I'll get with him?
BT 8:30-8:45 pm

[Shiv52]

if 3.5 is not giving decent naps it may well just not be enough A time. So which nap is the short nap? You're aiming for an hour in the morning and what is your plan for the second?

[JennVanessa1083]

Yea that's what I'm starting to think since he's been on this A time for quite awhile. 

The short nap is supposed to be the am nap since he struggles with EMW a lot then long in the pm. I realized he is good with about 2.5 hours in day sleep; 3 hrs at most. So ideally if am is an hour then pm 1.5? Or maybe am 30 minutes pm 2 hrs. That should be enough right?

[Shiv52]

Ok forgive me for being slow! Pregnancy brain is totally affecting me this weather!! 

If he has such an unsettled night what is the reason for doing a short AM nap?   Is it just to ensure he is tired enough for the PM nap or is the thought that it may be  encouraging the EMW?  So long as the nap isn't within 1.5/2 hours of him getting up for the day I shouldn't think that would be a factor?  I guess I'm just wondering if you can manage to get him a decent A time would it be better to let him have him long nap in the morning so he's lovely and refreshed...presuming he will take it and either sleep longer or be resettled?..so  he'll manage another decent A time to next nap which can be shorter, even an hour, and then a good A time to bed so he'll be good and tired for bed and hopefully tired enough to sleep better at night? 

I'm just thinking he's maybe OT with the broken night and then the short nap and then the longer PM nap is allowing him to get caught up so he's UT for bed and so on.   

I honestly don't know though.  And I apologise as I'm probably confusing you. The other thing that I keep coming back to is maybe he just needs more A time as that can cause NWs too.

This is so why I made the switch to one nap at 12 months

[JennVanessa1083]

CONGRATULATIONS on the upcoming arrival Shiv! Pregnancy brain lol I remember those days when I could barely remember my own name 

The reason for the short am nap is because I thought maybe that is what is causing the EMW. Perhaps you make a good point that perhaps he is UT going to bed. For awhile I was getting OT wakings but it was because I wasn't calculating the A after the pm nap. Now that I know what he can handle I don't have it as much unless I miss the mark. He is sensitive to timing, one minute off and its game over lol

So for a full 1.5 pm nap, he can handle almost a 3.5 A to bed, 1hr-1.25 about a 3.25A to bed, less than an hour its almost a 3hrA to bed. Last night was better but he was tossing and turning all night but resettling himself with 3 NW and no long ones. Yesterday he had two short naps (1 1hr nap and the other about 35 minutes) because we were out all day, but he actually had a better night which is why I am wondering if he is not getting enough A in the day which leads to OT. I don't know I'm just throwing theories out there lol

So since he's been doing a 3.5 first A, about 3.25-3.5 second A (depending on length of am nap) for about a month or more, what would be a good jump in A?

[JennVanessa1083]

I wanted to give a quick update of last night/this morning. I extended the first A to 3.75 and got a 1.5 nap (with a quick resettle at 33 minutes). However I got two longer NW including an EMW that was only settled with finally feeding then he settled quickly.   

He is teething his top two teeth which the gums are so transparent but no cutting yet. Meds and no meds don't seem to make a difference 

Yesterday went like this:

WU 8 am
Nap1 11:45-1:15 pm (A 3.75;woke up at 33)
Nap 2 4:45-5:30 pm (A 3.5)
BT 8:45 pm (A 3.25)

He briefly woke up after about 35 minutes, then had NW at 12:15-12:45, 3:45, 6-6:45 am. Both longer wakings he was wide awake; would fuss a little (mostly when I tried to resettle) but no crying.

Not enough A time somewhere in the routine? Maybe it takes a few days to adjust? Maybe the am nap is interfering and should be short? Ugh who knows.

Any insight would be welcome with open arms! DS is a tough nut to crack.

[zissi]

Hi there,
we had short naps for a while too and I jumped to long A times, more what would be average for age and it worked straight away, long naps I mean. but my baby is LSN and we decided at 10months to go cold turkey to one nap as it wasn't possible to fit 2 in anymore. she took the change really well, A time now 5 hrs and naps for 2.5 hrs. HOWEVER our chatty long NW still hasn't resolved. its usually around the same time, 3/4 am, so I wonder if its something else, prop related or developmental. who knows. will work on the probs now... so maybe go for a brave jump in A time and see how it goes? give it a few days too to see if this makes a difference... ?

[JennVanessa1083]

Hi Franzika!

I'm sorry to hear you are still struggling with long NW...we are in this together I guess haha

Mine has them at different times but usually its after 5:30 am so by that time he has had about 9 hours of sleep and he thinks thats enough lol I nurse him since its close to wake up. Last night I withheld (as I have done before) and he would NOT go down until I nursed then he took a full feed and peacefully rolled over and went to sleep.

He did start cutting his top left tooth which I know can cause longer EMW but this has happened before so I think its routine related.

Interesting thought on making a huge leap in A. How did your LO handle it? What were his broken naps like? Mine is the ambiguous 33-37 minutes  He can deal with moderate pushes but needs time to adjust for naps to lengthen. I never tried huge leaps and I wouldn't even know how huge to go. He is I would say LSN-average. For him to be well rested, he needs around 13 hours total sleep. Is that considered LSN?

[Shiv52]

I'd say what you're aiming with that looks good especially with getting the longer nap. And I'd say yeah you'd need to give it a few days to see how it goes.

My DD3 arrived in the middle of last night 12 days early so I might be slow to check in tomorrow xx.

[JennVanessa1083]

AWWWW congrats!!! No worries on the slower response time. I'll be trying out the push in A for a few days and report back. He's finally cutting his left tooth so I know its going to be a little crazier before it gets better.

[zissi]

hi jenn,
we had usually one good nap and the second one short, also between 33 and 40 mins. when I finally increased the A time quite a bit (much more than what is considered average for this age) I got finally longer naps. so then we had nap refusal for the second and I decided to go straight to one nap. so today I cut her nap short to 1hr 40 mins and see if that will resolve our NW's. in our case too it seems like that she thinks after 8/9 hrs of night sleep that the is enough and just can't fall asleep. I remember from before that with little daytime sleep she didn't have NW's. so Im trying this now and hope for the best!!!oh and my baby is LSN too, needs 12 hrs on average and is always happy.

[JennVanessa1083]

Wow Franziska! That's sounds great and very brave to o to one nap at 10 months!

Yea for us it's hard to distinguish the nap lengths of they are OT UT or just teething pain. Today he did a 3:40 first A and slept for almost 2 hours after resettling at 42 minutes. I thought 42 minutes is UT but he fell back asleep so fast that I think it was the teething that woke him up. Now he's asleep for a nap nap 4 hours after that nap!! So we are doing this so far today

WU 8 am
Nap 1 11:40-1:40 pm (A 3:40)
Nap 2 5:35- (still sleeping) (A ~4 hrs)
BT 9 pm hopefully

Now the day is getting long so I'm thinking of shifting everything up to a 7:30 Wu since I don't want. 9 pm bedtime.

[JennVanessa1083]

Update: last night was better but still got s long NW from 4:30-5:15 where he was chatty and all over the place lol even nursing did not do anything. Eventually he put himself back to sleep.

Yesterday's routine went like this:

WU 8 am
S 11:40-1:40 pm (A 3:40)
S 5:35-6:18 pm (A ~4hrs)
BT 9:27 pm (A 3:09)

BT was late! He stirred at 1.5 hours after BT then woke up 2:12 then 4:35-5:15 

Thoughts? Is it teething or do I still need a bit of tweaking?

[Shiv52]

You seem to be headed in the right direction. Stick to it for a few days.