Hi everyone! My name is Ana and I am very happy to be back on this forum again I have always found it very useful (with my DD#1) but up until today, I had some trouble logging in… Anyway, I write because I am very confused regarding the A time for my DD#2, who is 4 weeks old. When she was born, her weight was 2.8 kg (6.1 pounds) and when we left the hospital it was 2.6 kg (5.7 pounds) so she was a little bit under the average and therefore since the day we arrived home, I started with EASY (by the pound) and put her on a 2hr routine. The problem back then was that she always fell asleep when I was feeding her (she is bottled and breast fed), so she did not really have A time (just 5 or 10 min max, which was just diaper change and preparing for the nap). At the beginning I put her in bed the moment she yawned and normally she napped 2 hours without doing anything else than just putting her in the crib. 2 weeks after being at home, she gained weight (2,9kg, 6.3 pounds) and the midwife that comes home to check her weight (in the country I live, midwives would come home to check the mom and baby until the 8th week after the birth) told me that I should feed her every 3 hours and so I did, and since then it has been like a nightmare with the A time and therefore with the naps. She still falls asleep while eating so at first, I had a lot of trouble in discovering her sleep cues, I read on the nap forum that someone recommended to put the babies in bed after 45 min of awake time, then I read that Tracy recommended that for babies that are so young, one should work on extending the feeding time and shortening the A time. I did that, her F time takes between 30 to 40 min and after observing her, I discovered this week that after 40 min (right away finishing the feed) she starts yawning so with the first yawn I normally take her to her room and change the diaper, second yawn I close the door and curtains, third yawn she is swaddled and then I start the wind-down ritual (normally 45 to 50 minutes after each feed). I only have to hold her for 5 to 10 min, I do only shh (at this stage, which I think is “the zone”, I found that patting is a little bit disturbing and doesn’t really help her to relax). I put her in bed and she can sleep 30 min or even 40 but then she starts making a lot of noises and movements without opening her eyes, if I am lucky she won’t wake up but if I am not, she does and it takes like 45 min or even more to calm her down (for which I use shh pat).
Now she weights 3.670 kg (8.0 pounds), and according to the baby whisperer book, she should at least have 30 min of A time, but the reality is that she doesn’t even have 15 min, she starts showing sleep cues almost straight away finishing the F time. Today I tried to keep her awake for 15 minutes after her feed and she did not really sleep the catnap (it took 30 min out of the 40 min the nap should last to settle her). I don’t know what to do, my baby whisperer skills are a bit rusty, I think. I spend almost the entire days in her room with very little success. I am clueless. So, is there anyone that perhaps could give me some advice? The book says that there are some infants that cannot stay up for long stretches of time after each feed, it mentions a case of a 3-week old baby that could not stay away for long and the conclusion was that 30 min after a feed is way too much for a baby her age. My DD is 4 weeks old, how much A time should she have then?
