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12week old fighting sleep afternoons and night on 4hr EASY

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Northlondonmum:

--- Quote from: becj86 on September 20, 2017, 09:14:54 am ---Ok, so my general impressions are:
1. She's sleeping some pretty long naps (presuming she sleeps from S to the next E). If that is the case, she probably needs to be woken after max. 3hr, I would tend to go with 2-2.5hr just so she can tell the difference between night and day.
2. She's up at around 6am each day, so BT should be about 6pm - as in asleep for the night at 6pm. That's likely why she's upset at that hour, she's OT and needs to be in bed for the night. (Or you need to treat that 5am-ish feed as a NF and put her straight back in bed and not start your day til closer to 7/8am - then you can have a 7-8pm BT.)
3. Husband coming home... not sure if chicken or egg wrt the unsettledness. I know DS would literally shake with excitement when DH came home/we went to pick him up and it would take 2hr to get him to settle and he was always OT so I would have him asleep when DH arrived home so I had maximum chance of him calming again before going to bed or I'd wait til he woke from his nap, go and pick DH up and he'd have a full A time with DH. DHs can be very overstimulating just by being there because they're relatively novel so when they get kiddo all excited, its just too much and LO won't settle. There's a time and place for that and its on the weekend, during the day not at night time just before BT.

--- End quote ---


Thank you. I've tried to treat morning awakening as dream feed. She's slowly now starting to awaken at seven.

I get my husband to try and do the sleep routine so it's not too stimulating and they get time together.

I'm trying for each nap not to be more than 1.5 hours but she seems to take that quota in the morning.

I'm also trying activity before feed or resettling or watching what she does as it's not always crying.

Night sleep tends to be around 8. Every time I've tried earlier she awAkes. That would mean her first so called nap must be her night sleep and she's sleeping the 8-9 til 5 then again til 9

Her morning naps are around 10-11 and 12-1 and afternoons 30 mins only. 20 or 10 mins evenings.

The problem I find is she's not happy to just continue and needs a feed before more activity so the three hour easy turns to two and half!!

Northlondonmum:
So having amended on your guys advice, what else do you think I can do or am doing wrong?

Thanks sooo much. Been sooo helpful and such a lifeline ☺️☺️☺️

becj86:
Can you write out in EAS what her last day has been so its a bit clearer in my head? From what you've written I think you might be waking her after 1.5hr asleep. She's probably OT with that and ideally you wouldn't wake unless the nap is more than 2hr. Its nicest for LO and easiest for you to sneak in at 2hr and just wake/pick her up as she's stirring between sleep cycles, but wake by 2.5hr if she's not stirred.
1.5hr is probably the time she needs to be awake between waking and falling asleep again during the day. This time will increase to around 2hr by 4 months, so that's about 15min increase per week - doing that gradually can help reduce the short nap troubles we often see around 4 months :)

An 11hr night from 8pm til 7am is reasonable and her noght sleep seems pretty solid from what you've said - presume you're happy in that department?


--- Quote from: Northlondonmum on September 28, 2017, 18:09:28 pm ---The problem I find is she's not happy to just continue and needs a feed before more activity so the three hour easy turns to two and half!!

--- End quote ---
That's ok. It doesn't have to be 3hr on the dot by any means, EAS is just about her having the predictable sequence of events which builds trust that her basic needs are being met and will continue to be.

Northlondonmum:
Today;

E 500
A 530
S 600

E 700
A 730
S 800

E 1000
A 1015  bath
S 1100

E 1230. I went in and she stirred on me going in so I said hello
A 100
S 230 two bursts of ten mins. One in arms. Fighting.

E 300
A 3.30
S 5.00
Resettled 5.20 by rocking continuously. She was awake til feed.

A 6.00
E 6.30
A 7.00. Wind down  massage
Cluster feed 8.00 two ounces.
8.20 S

Yes I'm ecstatic she goes through til 5 and odd days 7!!

Just it's heartbreaking to see her cry and fight sleep in the day as she's so alert and full of energy.
I can't wait for when she can stay awake longer as she's desperate to but gets tired by 1.15 mins and shattered by 1.30 hours

becj86:
So I've seen the other thread you started and realised she's nearly 4 months old! Wow!

When she wakes at 5am, you don't need to do A time. You just feed her, change nappy if necessary and put her down to go back to sleep. No interacting - its sleep time, not play time. Don't make being awake attractive.

If you increase that A time after she wakes for the day (7am this morning), she will be OT but she will also be encouraged to sleep later in the morning. Its only an hour at the moment and should be much closer to 2hr by now so that's likely why she wants to play instead of going back to sleep when she wakes for a feed in the night.


--- Quote from: Northlondonmum on September 28, 2017, 19:24:06 pm ---E 1230. I went in and she stirred on me going in so I said hello
A 100
S 230 two bursts of ten mins. One in arms. Fighting.
--- End quote ---
This is likely because she's overtired. You've jumped from 1hr A times to 2hr.
--- Quote from: Northlondonmum on September 28, 2017, 19:24:06 pm ---E 300
A 3.30
S 5.00
Resettled 5.20 by rocking continuously. She was awake til feed
--- End quote ---
Again, very OT with 2hr A time after 2x10min nap.

The alertness and likely happy, giggly reactions to everything you're seeing in the afternoon is probably a sign that she's OT.

So my thoughts re: making things more consistent are:
Try to have a consistent 1.5hr A time through the day (shift the routine to start when she wakes), like this:
7 wake, feed
8:30 nap
10:30 wake, feed (fine if this is 10 but based on how she goes at the moment, probably 2hr is realistic)
12 nap
1:30 wake, feed
3 nap
4:30 wake, feed (now is the time for dad to come home and play ;) )
6 ~30min catnap (this can be a nap on dad while he goes for a walk or something...)
8pm asleep in bed

Now I suspect she will wake at 30min into some of these naps initially but you shiuld be able to resettle if you stay with her from 20min into the nap and just shush/pat or whatever you do to setttle her through that stirring. Don't wait for her to wake and cry - she'll likely get quite worked up and not resettle that way. I also think her nights might take a hit initially because she'll be sleeping better during that day and I think at the moment, she's crashing and sleeping such a long stretch because she's exhausted by the end of the day.

Give this 1.5hr A time 3-4 days and then we can reassess. She may by then be ready for 1:45 A times.

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