more nap questions

[jennc123]

well still working on this nap thing...its so frustrating!!!!  she fakes me out, she will fall asleep in my arms and when i put her down she sleeps for 5 minutes, then I hear her playing in her crib after that, aren't babies supposed to like sleeping?  some days she will nap great and others she won't nap at all.  I just read that at her age she should be napping 2 times per day at at least 1 1/2-2 hours and 11 hours at night, not this kid, I feel like this won't ever end!

[jennc123]

so here is another one, what if she wants play during her naptime, she has been talking, babbling and playing with her feet when she is supposed to be sleeping?

[Arwyn's mom]

My little one wants to play and such during nap time too. If it has gone on past 15 minutes, I go in there and pick her up and tell her it is time to nap. I will pat and shush to let her know it is sleep time as this is our usual routine. Normally, this will make her cry when she realizes that it is nap time. I hate it but... Once she is crying, I do pu/pd or pat/shush until she is asleep. It depends on what kind of cry I get.

This is a frustrating process :cry: but now Arwyn is more willing to go down for a nap and it is relatively easier to extend her naps during the day. It only takes me about 10 minutes to extend her naps now. Comparatively, I used to pu/pd and pat/shush for over 25 minutes at least. I have been working on extending her naps for about 3 weeks.

The first time I tried to extend her nap, I did pu/pd for 1 hour! This was after 2 weeks of little or no naps and disrupted night sleeps. I was truly desperate for her to have longer naps as she was so overtired that I had a cranky baby most of the late afternoon and evening. Also, she was waking up every 1.5 - 2 hours or so during the night.  :shock:

You also asked about putting your lo down earlier to sleep longer. This worked for us. When Arwyn was about 11 weeks, we started to try some BW techniques and that included putting her down earlier. We changed her bedtime from 11 pm to 8 pm. She went down and did not wake up until her normal wake time around 1 - 2 am. So, in my opinion, I just gave my lo 3 more hours of sleep so I stuck with it. She now goes to bed at 8 pm on a regular basis.

I found it tough to stick to EASY when we are working out "blips" -- such as naps. Some days, our routine does not remotely resemble EASY and we just take the next day as a new day. I do have little meltdowns... we had one Friday where I thought I was missing out on her infancy. As a result, I let her stay up from her naps to play with her. Her resulting meltdown was through the night -- she reverted back to waking up every 1.5 hours. I decided then, that extending her naps during the day were so worth the effort!  :!:

Roll with the punches... some just hit harder than others.  :wink:

Hope this helps! Keep us posted!

[Aarismom]

I'm all for earlier bedtimes. We went from putting ours down at 9 pm and struggling with naps to putting her down between 6 and 7 pm. Now she sleeps 12-13 hours at night with no feedings, and still takes 1-2.5 hour naps 2x a day, and occasionally a cat nap before bedtime for a total of 16-17 hours of sleep a day. And boy is she thriving. Occasionally we have "blips" as well, she might wake up once a night and start crying, but it usually doesn't take much to get her back to sleep. And of course the normal struggle with growth spurts.

Although I can't wait until she starts waking because she wants to "practice" new things...*sigh*. Now we're dealing with the "I'm gonna sit here and talk to myself, and when mommy and daddy check on me I'm gonna pretend I'm asleep" routine.

*HUGS*
Sonya =P

[Erin M]

Jenny-
My LO is almost the same age as yours (she was born March 6th) - and I have a couple of thoughts.

I would bet the night wakings are due to overtiredness.  I know when Katie doesn't sleep well during the day, she wakes at night for pretty much no reason at all. 

I know you mentioned awake time.  I find that I get short naps when Katie's awake time isn't long enough.  Currently, we do best with just over 2 hours awake time (we do 4 hour EASY for the most part, sometimes a bit closer to 3.5 hours).  Often though I find she doesn't take 2 long naps in a day.  If I get a long one in the morning, I almost never get a long one in the afternoon and vice versa.  (And try as I might, I can only get her to catnap if she's taken two short naps during the day, but that seems to suit her just fine.)  Also, sometimes she looks quite tired after about an hour and a half in the morning, but if I put her to bed right away, she doesn't sleep long.  Usually I'll bring her to her room and play with her quietly for at least a half hour more and that usually helps her to nap longer.  (Sometimes it backfires and she gets overtired.)

Earlier bedtime is definitely a good option.  We start getting ready for bed around 7 and she's usually asleep by 7:45 at the latest.  She sleeps until around 7 - 7:30 every morning. 

Good luck, hope some of this helps.
-Erin

[jennc123]

well things are going a lot better, I have just been very persistent with her and a schedule. it goes something like this:

7-7:30 am- wake and breastfeed
8amish-cereal with fruit
9-9:30am-1st nap (hopefully for 1 1/2 hours to 2)
11- Breastfeed
12-lunch with solids
1 or 1:30- 2nd nap (hopefully)
3pm- breastfeed
5pm- catnap (this rarely happens)
6:30-bath, massage, book
7pm-breastfeed
bedtime- between 7-8pm, whenever i get her down
10:30- dreamfeed (bottle)

she has been sleeping thru the night the lat few night and getting up between 6:30 and 7am, I can hear her and I just let her play in her crib. till 7.  her morning nap goes very well but the afternoon nap is still hit or miss and the catnap just dosen't happen :cry: ...but its getting better.  I don't have to rock her as much anymore unless she is completely out of sorts and can't make the transition herself.  I have been doing the pu/pd method with shushing and its seems to be working...slowly.

[jennc123]

well as I type this she seems to have regressed back towards 45 minute naps ..i just can't believe this, and last night she woke up at 3am hungry, which she hasn't done in a long time and wouldn't go back to sleep till 5am! and then slept till 8am.  could she be hitting her 6 month growth spurt early?  I wonder is she is getting enough milk, she is horrible at the breast lately, wantys to play rather than nurse sorry to post so often but I really feel I have gotten the most help from everyone here and I don't really have any friends where i live that have babies.  when i pick her up and tall her its time to sleep again and put her back down on her tummy she rolls over and wants to play, with her feet, the mobile etc.....should I remove the mobile?

[jennc123]

just curious, if anyone sees this but if naps are bad during the day does it mess up the "routine" to put them to bed earlier like say 6ish or 7ish when i start to notice her rubbing her eyes and yawning about this time instead of keeping her on her 7:30 bedtime?

[Matthew's Mommy]

If you are having a wonky nap day, then a bed time between 6-7 pm is fine.  Anything later and you may have a very fatigued baby on your hands!