Sleep cues

[obi1d]

Hi

I've got both BW books but they are out on loan at the moment!  Can someone remind me of the cues I should be looking for with my lo.  I'm having trouble finding 'the window' for my 21 week old daughter and she's getting passed it each time it seems.  She is a spirited baby who resists naps and then only goes for 30 mins (45 mins or an hour if I'm lucky).  I've been feeling terrible the last couple of days like I'm letting her down and not helping her at all :cry: .  Any info would be great.

Thank you in advance

[Taylor's Mommy]

at 21 weeks your lo is about 5 months right? 
Some of the sleep cues are a distant stare liek they are 'zoning out'. 
not as coordinated in play. 
fidgety
starts to fuss and continues fussing even after a change of scenery

AND THE BIG ONE:  rubbing the eyes and pulling at the ears.  My dd does this and I know she is DEFINTELY sleepy 

At this age, it is quite common to kind of miss their sleepy cues as they have so much going on.  Often times we did best (and still do) when we kind of watched the clock along with reading her cues.  For instance if she seems happy, but has been up for 2 hours, you know that any minute now your lo will start to loose steam and get sleepy, so think about starting the windown.

HTH.  IF you have anymore questions let us know.

Andrea

[obi1d]

Andrea

Thank you!  I've been really struggling with Lara's daytime sleep so I thought I needed to go back to basics as I've lost my way a bit.  I've had her on a four hour routine and a good night routine - goes down awake and goes off no problem, was also mostly sleeping through until 2 days ago, BUT I haven't ever seemed to get the daytime naps routine right.  My HV and others always maintained that if she sleeps at night 'you can't have it all' so I let it go.  But more recently she seems to be getting over tired on such little daytime sleep so I feel like I'm letting her down by not helping her.   

One other question, if she wakes early as she did this morning ie. 5.45am, I waited and waited but she wasn't going off, I fed her in the hope that she would go down again, but then held off full proper feed until usual time of 7am, sorry rambling...my question is that if she has been awake since 5.45am should I be putting her down for a nap 2 hours after that at 7.45am?  or try and make her wait and get on to the proposed schedule of 9am?  I did actually get her off this morning at 7.45am but that's a first and I'm afraid I did use a prop as I'm so tired  :shock: and we have visitors this weekend, so I don't want to start PU/PD when I can't be consistent for Lara and continue with it over the weekend.  Anyway, do you think just base what time she wakes and then put her down 2 hours later all day? as she will next be due a feed at 11am but due a sleep at around 10.45am!  HV also suggest I try a bit of solids for her which I did yesterday - baby rice - she loved it but is it too early for her??

BTW am breast feeding 7am and 3pm and moving over to F on the rest and weaning her off me.

Thanks again,
 :oops:
Karen & Lara 13.06.05

[Deb_in_oz]

hi - as another mother of a spirited one i can suggest that you definitely watch the clock!  the less A time the better. don't worry about the timings for a 4 hour routine per se so much as firstly figuring out what A time will get her napping at least 45 min, and hope for at least 1 nap over 45 min.

i definitely accepted (around 5 months) that olivia was never going to be a huge napper, but from 4 mo she often did 1 "good" nap of 1hr 30 most days (for her it was often in the catnap slot though, but eventually her "afternoon" nap became the 1hr 30.  so i focused on trying to ensure a good 2nd nap (after lunch time) knowing it was the one that they keep taking until they are 2-4 years old

in your example of waking at 5:45 - if she will not go back to sleep (is this her not resettling herself or you also trying with shh/pat - PU/PD would just rev her up i imagine). if she won't go back to sleep and you want to try to have a reasonable day i woudl say to get her up by 6:15 and have the first feed at 6:30 at the latest if she is waking due to hunger, then just work from that point onwards so she is not overtired.  when she is a little older she might do ok with having the same set times for naps, but for now i would work on making sure her A time is consistent.  when olivia would wake early and i would wait to see if she would resettle, what i did was stay aware of the fact that she woke early (ie - take it into account)  but aim to have her nap as close as possible to usual time without holding her to it (usually ended up about 1/2 hr earlier).  becase although they are awake from that time, if they are not rolling andcrawling around, but just laying there for 20-30 min awake and calling out then they are not exactly being stimulated or getting tired from it KWIM.  don't worry that if her timings stay the same as usual you will end up with an earlier bedtime - 1) often you can stretch that last A time a little more (knowing they might just fall asleep on last feed and keep eating ....) and 2) if she goes to bed 1/2 hour early she might actually wake later than the day before as she will just add on extra sleep -BTW  this is a common reaction to earlier bedtime

i am a bit light headed / dehydrated today and waiting to eat dinner so not sure if any of that makes sense (sorry  :oops: ) or is helpful, but know i won't get back here tonight...and wanted to reply

[obi1d]

Debra thank you, that is helpful and just nice to know that someone else knows how I feel with such a lively baby!!  I know they are all different but Lara is so much more spirited that any of my friends' babies and therefore quite a handful!  However she is lovely and its all part of her character.  So I just keep watching for the 2 hour slot right?  Just unsure what to do about naps when they run into feed times.

thank you
Karen & Lara 13.06.05 :roll:

[Deb_in_oz]

is 2 hrs her current A time?  is that too much for her and that is why she has shorter naps?  at 5 months we had only just reached 1hr 30- 1hr 45 A time with Liv with her then having decent naps (physically she could stay awake happily for hours, but then she would not go down to sleep due to overtiredness)

are you doing 2 hr A time because of the "ideal" 4 hour  EASY routine? if that is why you are doing 2 hrs i would suggest you reduce her A time and see if her naps improve.  this is a real area of distinction for spirited ones - they LOOK like they can stay awake a long time, but they actually need the shortest A time of all because they get overtired, overstimulated and cannot settle in for a long sleep...

 if she is currently "A" for 2 hrs i woudl suggest reducing it by 15 min and see if that improves things (give it 3-4 days) and if necessary further reduce A time a bit more.  once she is napping better and more rested you will find you can then re-increase A time gradually (closely watching to see when she takes a long time to go down with fussing and crying = too long A time).

if your difficult napper falls asleep and her nap extends into the next "feed time" i woudl leave her to sleep - within reason. so if she finally falls asleep after you miss her window... and after 30 min she is "due" for food do not wake her - if she is hungry she will wake looking for food, otherwise just offer the food when she wakes.  if it is the catnap slot just set a latest time you will let her go that does not interfere with bedtime (thankfully with Liv she could sleep as late as 5-5:30pm or so and still go down at 7-7:30 no problem, obviously due to the fact that the total day sleep never really got to high.  a long catnap usually meant either 1 or 2 x 45min naps or pposibly a skipped nap entirely)

  HTH

[obi1d]

Hi

Thank you for your advice, I've been getting Lara down for naps in her cot since Friday - and although I have to admit she's sucking on my little finger a little to get her to 'slow down' (I'll wean her off that soon - just need to get her used to the regularity of naps first) its definitely an improvement. Lara went down at 7.15pm last night, following a day of over 2hrs of nap time and slept thru 'til 7am this morning (with a DF at 11pm).  She had been sleeping thru more often than not but started to wake at 5.45am last week, so I'm hoping things are back to 'normal' on that front! :wink:

Yes was doing 2 hrs as it was the middle ground for EASY, have reduced it to 1hr 45mins and still struggling with naps of 30 mins, 45 if I'm lucky, so will try your suggestion of 1hr 30mins tomorrow.

I am a bit confused still though, for example we started the day at 7am today and went down for first nap at about 8.45am/8.50am and woke 30 mins later (!) :shock:  so from 9.20am Lara awake thru to next feed at 11am and needed to go down at 11.10am right??  Is it literally the awake time should only be 1hr 45m to include any feeding as the usual EASY routine has Eat, Activity as separate timings.  I think I've just answered my own question as eating is an activity and I have to view it as one right??  Sorry that's not very clear is it.  Sometimes it runs into the feed itself like at 11am today so Lara would be going straight down after the feed which isn't what Tracey advises in her books.  Just a bit confused as its turning out to be EASA. 

On another note, Lara has only had a total of 1hr 40 mins nap time today as I'm struggling a bit with the 30 mins wake ups and trying to extend them and really believe the PU/PD will wind Lara up even more, what method does work with spirited babies?  I'm about to get some black out curtains which should help her.   

.....and do you ever get into a consistent routine as I'm finding it difficult to plan things between the naps at the moment?! :roll:

thank you in advance (again!!)

[Taylor's Mommy]

Hi There,

If she has woken early from a nap and after her feed has already been up for almost 2 hours, you can put her down for her next nap.  The key is to not feed them to sleep, so as long as after the feed she is going down to sleep awake, you are ok.
Black out curtains work wonders in my opinion!  From about 2 weeks on we have used them for Taylor and it has made things much easier.

Lastly, there is a thread in the EASY forum titled "support group for spirited babies" where you can talk to other moms just of spirited babies.  you might find some excellent advice there.

BTW, congratulations on a great night!!!  Doesn't it feel wonderful when they sleep through?

And lastly, it is very common with short nappers to do EASA...so don't feel bad about that.

Andrea

[Deb_in_oz]

definitely keep reducing her A time until she sleeps better.

olivia  ended up doing EASAEASY a lot of the time. 

i have never even attempted PU/PD with her and at almost 9  mo still use pat/shh to great effect when needed (i just posted to someone how i use dit this morning because she was overtired - i had to keep her up to take dd1 to care) DARK ROOM and  WHITE NOISE machine (plays ocean waves for her  ) these are the cornerstones of blocking out all that stimulation.  (spiriteds can find something to look at even in a dim room.  you can see ont he "spirited babies" thread how many stare at he light from their monitors  :roll:

and yes you can get to the point where they achieve a consistent routine.

currently olivia (until we dropped Df on FRiday_ was doing this most days:
awake 0640
E 7/7:30
A
S  9:15 - 10 (occassionally going down earlier or later and nap length occassionally exends to 1hr  - 1hr 130  )
A this is when i plan outings from when she wakes from 1st nap until 2nd naptime, usually gives me 3 hrs and enough time to get home
E solids 11/11:30,A, then bottle 12:30
A
S 1:15/1:30-2:45/3pm occasionally going down earlier and nap length occassionally longer than 1hr 30
A from 3-7pm includes bottle, solids, bath and bottle

she started getting more consistent after 5-6 mo

[obi1d]

Thank you and just an update:  Lara's had a total of 2.5 hours sleep today, albeit made up of 4 or 5 naps, but its a huge improvement and I'm now seeing the first signs of fussing to react to because I'm more aware that its 1hr 30mins or 1hr 45mins since she woke, so looking out for it!

Thanks again for your advice and help and I've found the 'support group for spirited babies' thread too which gives great insight and support knowing that other babies are like this too!! :lol: .