Wake from sleep during the day

[tara72]

I've read in other places that you shouldn't wake a sleeping baby, because a baby will sleep as long as their body needs to sleep. it seems to me that waking from sleep fits into the EASY routine, correct? are you supposed to wake a baby if he/she is sleeping too long?

for example, my 8-week-old slept for 4 hours from about 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. last night, then woke every 3 hours during the night, and she's been not sleeping well since she last woke at 6:30 this morning. is that partially because we let her sleep too long before it was technically nightime?  we had a smilar experience the night before.

what about in the morning? if baby went to sleep at, say, 5 a.m., do we wake her at 7 a.m. to start the day?

my baby takes generally one-hour naps during the day, and I wonder if we are letting her sleep too long during other parts of the day.

[Karin3]

I don't remember what page it is on, but somewhere Tracy said that she's never seen a baby sleep through the night if they take a nap during the day that's longer than 3 hrs.  I wouldn't let the baby sleep more than 15 mins into a feed because you definitely want to get as many calories into them as possible during the day.  Mimi was older than your lo when we started BW, but I usually wake Mimi up at 7:30am if she isn't already up for the day.  Occasionally we'll sleep in until 8 am.  I think when we first started though, I would get her up at 7am every morning.

What does your day usually look like?  I'm just wondering because you also mentioned 1 hr naps... 

[samijoe]

Hi there,

I started BW with my dd when she was the same age as your lo.  Waking a baby up helps to solidfy the routine....and at this age, you definitely want to wake them for their feed (15mins past is ok).  The only way to get lo's to sleep thru the night better, is to fill them up with food during their day.

If you do have to feed at 5am, put lo back to bed and get up at 7am.  Doing this day in and day out for a period of two wks or so, should establish a wake up time.  Then, you follow on from there.

Do you have any sort of routine with times at the moment??  Showing us this info can sometimes help us, help you more!

sami

[tara72]

thanks for the replies so far! sorry I didn't include what our semi-typical day is. I'll do that now, but I have to sheepishly admit that while I like EASY and wish I could be on it...I don't really understand HOW to do it. I mean, I read the book 2-3 times before she was born, and then when she got here, I just did not understand how to make the routine work and follow her cues at the same time. I must admit...it is very frustrating for me.

with that being said, here's what our day sometimes looks like (but not the last two days...):

around 7 AM-wake (feed 2 oz. breastmilk in bottle and 1-2 oz. formula)
Activity
8 AM-sleep (this is usually a longer nap, about 2 hours or so)
10 AM-wake (feed 2 oz. breastmilk in bottle and 1-2 oz. formula)
Activity
11 AM-sleep
12AM-wake (feed 2 oz. breastmilk in bottle and 1-2 oz. formula)
Activity
1 PM-sleep
2 PM-wake (feed 2 oz. breastmilk in bottle and 1-2 oz. formula)
Activity
3 PM-sleep
4 or 4:30 PM-wake (feed 1 or so oz. breastmilk and 2-3 oz. formula, since I don't get as much milk later in the day)
Activity
5:30-sleep
6:30-wake (feed 1 or so oz. breastmilk and 2-3 oz. formula, since I don't get as much milk later in the day)
Activity/simple night routine (change diaper, change into PJ's, wash face of give bath, read story)
7 or 7:30 PM-sleep

between 7 PM and 7 AM:
-will sleep for about 3-4 hours at night if she had a good day and will nurse for about 10 minutes then have 2 oz. of forumla.
-if she had a rough evening/day, she will often sleep for 6-9(!!) hours then nurse for about 10 minutes before having 2 oz. formula.

she has rocky times where she won't sleep well, even though she shows the signs of sleepiness. when she yawns or starts the stare, we wrap her up and walk her around or rock her for a few minutes. then we put her down when she is nodding off and she falls asleep in her crib. but there are days when in the afternoon, she sleeps for about 30 minutes, then when it is time for her next nap, she won't go to sleep. but then when she goes to sleep at 7 and she'll sleep for long periods.

so to be honest, I am confused about EASY. but trying to take it one step at a time....although not very well!

[chell]

Hi there, I am going to pop this one over to the  EASY board, so that you can get some specialist help there. 

[tylersmommy]

In all honesty, I think your routine looks great! Waking from naps is a part of EASY...like a pp said, you want to move those long chunks of sleep into nighttime. So every 3 hrs (or sooner, depending on cues), your LO should eat, even if that means waking from a nap. It starts to look a lot more consistent (and more like a routine) as your LO gets older. With both of my kids, we were all over the place until 8-10 wks. Naps were pretty erratic before then, and sometimes they'd skip an entire nap. Ugh. But if you persist, it all works itself out.

You'll find that as you stick to a consistent bedtime and AM wakeup time, your LO's day will fall into place a bit easier.

[tara72]

thank you for moving the post, and thank you, Melissa, for your advice! we are just starting to try to get a consistent start to the day (between 7-8) and a consistent bedtime (between 7-8). so we'll see if this helps. I guess I won't worry too much about the naps...except that she is having more and more 45 minute naps! I've been reading on here that that is a common thing, but I'm confused as how to overcome it, so I will try to figure out more help in that area on another board.

so thanks!

 --tara

[tylersmommy]

45 min naps usually start around that age, and you're right...very common! You'll find PLENTY of people in the same boat (myself included!)