First time mom with a series of sleep and easy questions... Thank you for any advice.
I've a 13 week old baby. She started easy at about 9 weeks. Her schedule is this... 7am, 10am, 1pm, 4pm eat shower sleep, 7pm always have to wake her up to feed or sometimes feels like a dream feed, 1030pm dream feed. On a good night she wakes up once until 7am. On a bad night she wakes up at 2am and then again at 5am. Her nap ranges used to be from 40 min to 1h 40 min in the day. I'm using the shh Pat method on her. At about 11 plus week, she went all cranky due to constipation and growth spurt. At the same time I read that the 4th nap should be a cat nap, so I changed to 4pm eat 430 activity 5pm to 6pm sleep, then bath. 7pm feed and sleep. After the 11 plus week, things seem to turn for the worse. Her naps are all 40 min and very hard to resettle for the next 40 min. She refuse to do the catnap no matter how I coax her, so I reverted back to the original schedule. She wakes up consistently at 2am and 5am every night. At 5am I try to latch her or give a pacifier to her. Sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't and by 6am she is wide awake to start her day.
I have a few questions hoping somebody can help:
A) is she going through the 3 to 4 month sleep regression? She seems to tick some of the characteristics. However, it doesn't seem like I can extend her awake time so soon as she gets overtired once it is past 1h15min. Do I try to start on the 4 to 3 naps transition?
B) sometimes I am able to Pat her to sleep on her back - will need to Pat for 20 min. However she doesn't sleep long only about 30 min and will jerk periodically at the 10min, 20 min, etc. How do I deal with the jerks and extend her nap? I also realise that she likes the bicycle motion on her legs and sometimes this motion helps her to fall asleep. Will this be another sleep prop?
C) in the event I can't Pat her to sleep, I carry and shh Pat her till drowsy. Always manage to put her down drowsy on her side but usually not successful on the back. On the side she can sleep through 1 cycle thereafter will want to move or roll over flat and will cry when she realise that there is a cushion at the back. What should I do to extend her nap when lying on side? How do I put her down drowsy on her back, seems like she need some weight on her to be able to dose off.
D) should I change back the last nap to a cat nap? We tried it for a week and it doesn't seem to improve her night sleep or make her sleep longer. Furthermore She is very cranky when I try to put her down to nap and will cry hysterically. She also wakes up at 2am and 5am.
E) are her night wakings habitual? She seem to wake up every 3 hourly even at night. Both times she seem hungry though. However she has slept for 5 to 6 hours at night before so I don't know why now it has regressed to 3hourly. Anything I can do to make her sleep longer at night? We have increased her daily intake of milk. Should I start her day at 6am instead though I rather she can sleep another hour more. How do I make her sleep the additional 1 more hour?
F) the shh Pat method sometimes when she cries in her cot and I carry her up to shh Pat and unsuccessfully put her down too many times she will become over stimulated and cry inconsolably. Is there anything that I am doing wrongly? How do I advance the shh Pat method to self settling? I see some progress she used to reject the cot totally at about 7 to 8 weeks now she can be put down she via the shh Pat method and at good times I can Pat her to sleep. However I don't know how to progress from here.
G) swaddle - I'm using a hands up swaddle. Some are looser and some are tighter. Is it true that swaddle should be tighter and will be easier to sleep?
Thank you in advance.
