on the nap thing...maybe it would help if he had a consistent nap schedule. i think in your first post you said that when he is with dad, he gets a morning nap, but with you he doesn't. is there a reason for that? do you have a naptime routine? i think that it might help to set a certain time and do a certain routine before nap no matter who is watching him. if he is sick though, that would probly throw off his naps anyway. it does for my daughter anyway.
as for the bedtime, i don't think the exact time you put him down is the most important thing, as long is it is reasonably early and again at a consistent time with a beditme routine preceding it. our daughter was going to bed at 8pm. but last weekend we changed the clocks foward for daylight savings time. so now she is going to bed at 9pm. this may seem late to some people, but i think i like it better because now we can go out at night and not have to rush home. also, i'm not a morning person either! so she now sleeps in til 8/8:30 which is awesome in my book!
about the patting thing, maybe since you are just starting out it would be ok to pat him til he is totally asleep. at least you will be making progress in that you are cutting out the night feedings. if he does well with that, and starts going back to sleep every time with just the patting, then maybe you can slowly start decreasing the amount of time you are patting him. (baby steps!
)
my daughter is the highly spirited type, so i have found that on the rare occasion we do have night wakings, sometimes the patting angers her more than calms her. on those times, i just lay her down and say "ok, it is time to go to sleep. here is your baba (her little blankie). mommy will stand outside your room for a minute." then i wait outside her door for a bit. sometimes she will let out a scream, then go right to sleep as if my presence was what was keeping her from sleeping. she is easily stimulated, so i think sometimes when i try to comfort her, it actually makes it worse. but then there are times if i stand outside her door, she freaks out more. so in that case i go back in (because i am not advocating letting her cry it out!) if she is totally freaking out, i have to admit that i don't always stick to the plan.
sometimes i pick her up and hold her til she goes back to sleep or at least calms down. sometimes i will sing to her. sometimes i will lay next to her crib and just talk softly to her til she goes to sleep. it is just depends on the situation and how badly it is escalating. but like i said, her night wakings are
very rare. however, if they were frequent, i think i would feel more obligated to stick to a "plan" just to get things in order. but that's just me.
maybe you can just set a goal of no more night feedings. then that will give you a little more freedom in terms of comforting him at night when he wakes. then when you feel he is doing well without eating at night, you can move onto being a little stricter with how long you comfort, pat or whatever. by the way, i'm not trying to tell you what to do, i'm just sort of throwing out examples and speaking hypothetically. i hope that's ok!
