8.5m old up all night! Help!

[Adelheid]

Ok, I've actually already posted this but since I hadn't gotten a reply, I deleted and am re-writting it.... mostly because it feels good to vent!

My 8.5mo old  is having CRAZY sleep!
He does two naps a day with a decent 3hr A time. Bedtime is 6:30pm... thats when the fun begins!

For at least two weeks now, he's been consistently waking up multiple times a night; often staying awake for an hour. Then, come 5am and he's ready to start the day!

Last night, he was awake from 2-4am at which point my husband gave up trying to sleep through it and started his day- which is nuts. Who starts a workday at 4am!? My LO wanted to sleep and would snooze in my arms until I put him in his crib. Every time, he'd wait a few minutes, flip over and start crying for me.

He does have a cold, but it just started and doesn't explain two weeks worth of wakings. In the last four weeks he's gotten three more teeth. -I assume one more is coming, as he has an uneven number of teeth right now. Could teething cause this much disruption?

Two weeks ago he started crawling too, but I haven't found him practicing in his bed.

This is madness. Sooooo tired. I really need advice!

[jessmum46]

Do you think he could need more A time?  3h seems short to me for 8.5 months - DD handled that at 5.5-6m and DS fairly similar.  Teeth and colds can definitely upset sleep but if LO is UT as well that won't help with settling.  I'd probably give the A time a bit of a push and see if it helps

Is he an independent sleeper?

[Adelheid]

No. I don't think he is an independent sleeper I thought so for a long time because he'd fall asleep so quickly but honestly, I don't think so. Right now he wants me to hold him all night. This can last two hours.
If he gets up at 6, I'd usually put him down for a nap at 9:30 & 11:30. -11:30 is a bit on the early side but we have to pick up his siblings at 2pm. On the weekends his midday nap is a bit later.
His A time before bed is usually 4-4.5hrs. But the other A times are shorter

[Adelheid]

I wrote that last post at 3am.  Since then, I've been wondering if I need a complete overhaul of his EASY schedule?

When he wakes up at 6 than this is what I've been doing:

6am WU/Bottle
7am Solids
9:00 S
10am Bottle
11:30 Solids
Noon S
2pm Bottle
4pm Solids
6:30 Bottle and Bed

On three days, when we are on the go because of preschool, I have to get him to finish his nap before 1:30pm.
I'd really like to get him on one nap. But, is it too early? He'll be 9 months in a week.

Also, I have been reducing the daytime bottles to 6oz. since I feel like they were hindering him from eating a lot. Before bedtime, however, he chugs 10oz. Is there a better order of doing bottles & naps?

I am willing to change up everything as we were up again for two hours last night.
 
I did look up the sample routines for 9mo olds. It seems they only sleep 2-2.5hrs during the day. One of the routines said that the mom woke up the baby after one hour on the first nap. Should I do the same? Often, he will sleep 1.5-2hrs.

This morning his, nap is happening right now at 10am. Theoretically his next nap should then happen at 2, right? But because of the preschool pick up it won't happen before 2:45. And it won't be longer than 45min. In that case, I should let him take a long nap this morning. Right? Sorry if this is confusing. He tends to take one long nap and one a catnap (30-45min).

[jessmum46]

I'd really like to get him on one nap. But, is it too early? He'll be 9 months in a week.

I do think it's probably too early, yes.  Average age to be fully on one nap is 15 months, some do it sooner but I think pushing him to it right now would probably not help your situation.

No. I don't think he is an independent sleeper

How does he fall asleep?  If he isn't an independent sleeper that would honestly be the first thing I would tackle.  Routine advice can only really go so far - even if the routine is 'perfect' (if such a thing exists), you may still end up with lots of wakings and so it can be really difficult to work out what is needed.

This morning his, nap is happening right now at 10am. Theoretically his next nap should then happen at 2, right?

I'm not sure I understand this.  If he sleeps 1.5-2h on this nap he will be up at 11.30/12 and so I wouldn't be trying for another nap before 3pm earliest (i.e. a proper 3h-3h30 or so A time after he wakes).  A long morning nap and short pm nap sounds just perfect for this age and sounds like it would fit your routine with preschool too?  I would go with working on finding a good A time to get a morning nap of at least 1.5h, then put him down for a second shorter nap when you get home.  I would think that would be plenty of sleep and should mean he isn't too OT for bedtime. 

Is there a better order of doing bottles & naps?

I believe many bottle feeding LOs drop to 3 bottles around this age (I breastfed so not lots of experience here) - bottles at WU and bedtime and then one somewhere in the middle of the day.  Assuming you go for a long morning nap and short afternoon you could go for something like:

Wu 6ish and bottle
Breakfast an hour later
Nap 9.30/10-11.30/12
Bottle on waking, lunch an hour later OR lunch on waking, bottle 30 mins or so before pm nap
Nap 3ish for 45 mins
Dinner
BT routine and bottle

Does that help?

[Adelheid]

Hey that routine works well! It happened to work out that very way yesterday. 10am nap (1.45h) and 3pm nap (30min).

Last night my LO was only awake for 30 min which is waaaay better than two hours. But our day has started at 5am instead. Do you think 6:30 bed time is too early? His siblings are down at 6pm, so 6:30 seemed to be "late". However, 5am mornings is too early!

If I kept his naps in the order you suggested, one long, one short, could this help his night time sleep? I guess this is all theoretically speaking. Still, its good to have words of hope!

Thank you for your help!

[jessmum46]

I wouldn't change bedtime on a one-off day - if anything I would say the 10.5h night was a result of (probably accumulated) OT - at least that's what it seems to be here.  I do think though that not all kids will do 12h nights - we have had to keep DSs bedtime closer to 7pm from being very small to regularly get a post-6am WU x