Hoping for some advice/guidance here as I am becoming quite frustrated with bedtime the past few nights
A week ago I weaned my DD off BF before bed, which was her last nursing. I was worried it would take awhile for her to stop nursing, but she surprisingly reached for her sippy of milk and was content to have that and not nurse after a couple nights, so I just went with it. Ever since she dropped to one nap around 9/10 months she would fall asleep within 5-10 minutes of nursing at bedtime and then take 40 minutes to finish and burp before I could lay her in her crib. I tried starting earlier in hopes that I could put her down awake, but whether I nursed her at 7 or 7:30 she would still fall asleep during it. Now that she just has the sippy though she can't seem to relax and is taking over an hour to fall asleep. Our routine this week has been bath around 6:45, read stories with Daddy if he's home, then around 7:15 I take her into our room, which is where the rocking chair is, and rock with her while she drinks her milk and looks through a book. Her new thing the past 3 nights though is climbing off my lap and onto our bed and crawling all around it laying on all the pillows; she will not let me just sit calmly and rock her. Once she finishes her milk I try to rock her and sing a little before I take her into her room, but then once I lay her down in her crib and start to leave the room she stands and cries. I let her go for a few minutes to see if she will lay down (she does this for a few minutes at naptime too but settles quickly), but then I end up going in after 5 minutes since she is hysterical. As soon as I'm in there she is calm. I pick her up to lay her head on my shoulder but she only stays there for a split second then leans to lay back down in the crib. This is great, however she then proceeds to practice every word and sound she knows, stand up and walk from one side of the crib to the other, and reach for me to pick her up only to lean and want to be put right back down. I did this pu/pd that she initiates about 20 times tonight before she finally settled to go to sleep. If I try to leave the room she cries immediately, and I have to be standing right next to the crib so no kneeling or sitting down while she works out her energy. Last night I laid her down at 7:25 and it took her til 8:40 to fall asleep. Tonight I laid her down at 7:05 and she still didn't fall asleep til 8:25. I was hoping starting earlier would have her asleep by 8 but apparently not. Thankfully she does sleep all night. Normally she wakes up around 6:45/7, but I've now been having to wake her in the morning no later than 7/7:15 because she also hasn't been taking very long naps (1 hour - 1hr 15 min max and wakes up crying because she's still tired but won't fall back to sleep). Her nap is at 12:30, and needs to stay at that time because she will be going to daycare in August and that's when nap is there. Since she used to fall asleep by 7:30, 8 at the very latest, and wake up at 6:45, that A time worked out well for the 12:30 nap. But now that she isn't falling asleep til 8:30 or later and I have to wake her, I'm thinking that she isn't quite tired enough to take a long nap at that time. The problem though is that if I wake her earlier then she is getting less night sleep plus taking a short nap, so OT is bound to set in soon if it hasn't already.
Yikes, this is a long post! Sorry! Just not sure how to get her falling asleep on her own again and taking longer naps. She is lacking on sleep so much right now
