Adjust EASY for short naps? 12 weeks

[jkitiara]

Hello all! My LO is now almost 12 weeks. A few weeks ago, we got on an EASY schedule (approx 2 hrs awake, 2 hours sleep) and it has been working great for us, resulting in a very happy baby except...all naps take place in my arms!

Obviously this is not sustainable. When I put him down in his bassinet he only sleeps for 20 min. In my mom's group last week, the other moms said their babies mostly do the same, so they just take 5-6 20-40 min nap. I tried this for about half a day. But the third wake up, I had the Grumpiest baby ever.

I've tried shh/pat a few times. Once or twice his eyes got so heavy and it seemed like he was so close to going back to sleep! The rest of the time it seems to do nothing. From what I've read on the boards here, I just have to keep at it.

So here's my question--LO sleeps for 20 min, then I do shh/pat for about 40 (I do not think I can physically do more!) and if it doesn't work what I've been doing is putting him back to sleep in my arms for an hour. Should I not be doing that as it teaches him he can sleep in my arms as long as he fusses long enough?

And if I should just get him up at that point, it means we're way off our EASY schedule. He's not ready to eat yet. Should I shorten the cycles and feed a little less (we are 75% formula) in anticipation of this?

Won't he be insanely cranky all day? Do I just have to steel myself to deal with that for a few days or weeks?

Thanks! LO is textbook, but with a fat dose of touchy and a little spirited.

ETA: Night sleep is pretty good already--sleeps 8:30pm-3am in bassinet, eats, then 3:30-6:30 (though that second stretch has a lot of wakes and wiggles, he rarely wakes fully).

[Scottishmummy]

Hi there!

I smiled at your description of your baby's personality...would you say the touchy and spirited dudes are around sleep and stimulation? If so, then v like my DS was.

As your friends confirm, short naps at this age are really common.  Sometimes there are things you can do to extend them though...

With your routine, 2 hrs awake is a little on the long side of average for a 12wo.  Typically LOs at this age can only do around 1.5hrs A time and 20 min naps can be OT or OS.  Have you tried putting him down any earlier for the nap?

Also are you doing any wind down routine before the nap? If the 20 min nap is OS, then some quiet time before the nap and a wind down nap routine can help.

How does your LO get to sleep in the bassinet? Do you sh-pat to sleep or does he fall asleep in your arms and then transfer? Getting him to sleep with sh-pat or to self settle might help get a longer nap.

However, sometimes you just get short naps at this age and it's a developmental thing and, as you say, it knocks the EASY routine off...I breastfed mine but I tried to feed as close to normal time as possible...so on short nap days sometimes our days were EAS. AEAS and sometimes the feed was so close to nap that the activity was just burping!

Also- a lot of people don't do all the naps in th bassinet if the baby only does short naps there...so you could try a bassinet nap but do the next in your arms to give an opportunity to catch up on some sleep with a longer nap?  My DD slept best in the sling.  Around this age, I think Imdid first nap in cot, 2nd in sling, 3rd in cot, 4th in sling. Gradually she started sleeping better in the cot so we just shifted more naps there as she was ready for them.

It is a juggle at this stage and does take some flexibility and adapting the day to suit what baby does.  Even the textbook babies don't always follow the book!

[jkitiara]

Thank you for the encouragement! I'm so frustrated. I did see on the A charts on this site that his activity times were a little long. So we shortened to usually 90 min or so, but it hasn't seemed to change anything.

Hearing that you let your LO sleep in the sling sometimes makes me feel better. I think I am overly paranoid that I am teaching him bad habits by letting him sleep in my arms. I think he's too young for me to get too worked up about it yet.

I try to put him down in the bassinet at least partially awake. Sometimes it works, but more often he pops wide awake and starts crying when I lay him down. Then I pick him up and try again, getting progressively sleepier each time. For bedtime, I can set him down pretty much wide awake and he'll settle himself. Not so for naps.

Shh/pat techniques only seem to annoy him most of the time, like the noise and activity riles him up. I did almost get it to work once. Maybe I need to do it longer before giving up, but I just can't handle hunching over a crib shushing for more than 5 minutes or so. I guess I don't have the patience.

And once I just laid my haid on his belly, put his dummy back in, and covered his eyes and he settled to sleep again. That's the one and only time he's ever slept more than 30 min on his own. It gave me hope, but that was 3 days ago and I've never managed to do it again since.

[meish47]

I'm in the same boat with my 7 week old! We got EASY on track but she stopped wanting to nap in her bassinet. She sleeps great on my chest! I'm trying something similar to you, kind of a pu/pd routine where we try drowsy but awake (she cries, I pick up, we try again in a few). This morning the second try worked pretty well but this afternoon, no dice. I think it's most important that she gets a good nap in so after the 3rd wake up I held her the rest of the time. I'm also hoping I'm not reinforcing bad habits by letting her sleep on me but hopefully she'll start getting better about associating the bassinet with sleep. Let us know how it goes for you over the next few days!

[Scottishmummy]

It takes time for babies to learn to go to sleep themselves ..like any new skill! As you found some babies fine the pat too stimulating. I did sh-hold or sh-hand on for both of mine instead which worked better. 
It sounds like you're doing a sort of PU/PD ..again some find it too stimulating before 4mo but at 12wks it sounds like it's working ..and every little one is different so although I'd say 7wks might be a bit young for PU/PD..if it's working, it's working, but if you find LO is getting worked up, maybe try a sh-pat or adapted version instead.

Sounds like you're doing great so don't worry about catch up naps on you..enjoy the cuddles!

Xxx