don't know where to start?

[snowangel]

My 14 week old DS is currently battling bedtime sleep after napping for about 1.5h total all day - bigs tears, jolting all the time, generally not happy. PLEASE can anyone offer some suggestions as to what I can do to get his naps in some sort of better routine - or any routine?! At the moment, I just feel like I can't do anything right, and I hate seeing my lo so upset and unable to sleep. He's seems so easily overstimulated and overtired - I guess he's a spirited/touchy baby.

On a good day I kinda manage to look for his sleepy signals - but I have to watch him constantly or I miss them. First nap of the day is perfect, signals are easy to read, goes off usually with little prompting in his own bed, but as the day wears on I usually have to resort to putting him in his swing or vibrating rocker or taking him for a walk to get him to sleep. I'm guessing that these would definitely be classed as props and that I'm harbouring bad napping habits? He has a 45 min nap, followed by a usually 3 naps which can be anywhere from 30min to 2.5h. Should he be having all his naps in his cot or Moses basket? Should I not be using the swing, etc (and if not HOOOW do I get him to sleep otherwise)? 

And on a BAD day, like today, any slight changes or new people around throw him completely off and his naps go to pieces which then turns into full-on meltdown at bedtime. I don't know if its the changes to the routine (what little routine there is!) or that I just am not paying 100% attention to his signals and so miss them. I'd be happy enough barring people from the house and living a hermit like existance but that's not too popular with DH or the people that want to see him like my MIL or my friends. I just don't know what to do  :cry:   Any advice greatly appreciated.

BTW, I'm still swaddling him (trying - mostly unsuccessfully to wean him off that), use a paci (he'll suck for hours on his own fists, but they DO NOT soothe him, just keep him more alert weirdly!) and endlessly shush/pat him (which I don't think works anymore).

Help, help, help! SOOOOoooo confused. (And tired - hence the rambling!)

[mommytsa]

It sounds like you're in a really rough spot, and I totally understand.  I have a spirited little guy myself who's only 4 weeks older than yours, and we went through the same thing with him as we tried to implement EASY and wean from the pacifier.  At that age we were on a 3-3.5 hour EASY, so right around an hour or 1.5 of awake time, I'd go put him down.  We're still swaddling, though we took away the paci 3 weeks ago since he refused to sleep without it and woke up every 30 min for it.  That's when we started pu/pd, which was very hard for a week and a half, but totally worth it.

For us, what seemed helpful was to begin putting him down before he really seemed tired.  We really had to watch the clock more and if people wanted to visit, I just said, look, he's tired and he needs to go to sleep now, and put him to bed.  It was difficult, especially during pu/pd because he would proceed to scream for 30-45 minutes (on a good day), but figuring out his schedule and just announcing that it was bedtime worked.  I'd notice that after I had him swaddled and was rocking him or singing to him, that's when he'd make his first tired sign, but if I waited until he yawned or whatever, he'd just never do it, and end up overtired.  You may just have to pre-empt your lo and "know" when naptime is coming.

I know this doesn't make much sense, but hopefully you'll be able to get something useful out of it.

[mommytsa]

Just wanted to check in and see how it was going.  Any luck yet?