how to move to two naps with early waker

[thitz]

Hi there,

My 5.5 month old seems to be ready for two naps.  I'm having a more and more difficult time getting him to settle and he's been doing two hour wake times since about 3 months.  His morning nap seems to be decreasing and he screams the house down if I try to get a catnap in the crib.  Also he's getting quite difficult to settle.  Only catnaps if in car or stroller at end of day.  Consequently he's a disaster from about 4:00pm till bedtime.  Also getting 5/5:30am wake ups again with a 6:30pm bedtime.  Here's our current routine.  ANY routine suggestions to get to a two nap day?  We're also just recently on solids three times a day.  This has reduced his night waking considerably.

5:30 wake
6:00 bf
7:00 solids (brkfst)
7:45 Nap 1 (it keeps getting shorter)
9ish bf
10:30 solids (lunch)
10:45/11 Nap 2 (can't make it 11 if nap 1 short)
1:00 bf
3/4:00 try to get a catnap but almost always fail
5:00 bf
5:30 solids
6:30 bed

Thanks Tarri

[KellyC]

Hi Tarri

I seem to be following you around 

Zander reacted the same at about the same age when he was ready to drop the catnap.  Do you start your day at 5.30 when he wakes?  I'd work on feeding him as soon as he wakes (not waiting until 6) and treating it as a night feed and then re-settling him so you're not enforcing that super early start to the day.  He's going to be very tired in the afternoon if he won't take the catnap so he needs to learn that 5.30 is still night time so his naps fall later in the day.  Is his room really, really dark so he's not seeing any daylight at that time of morning?

Easier said than done (I think most of us have been there  ) so let us know how it goes.

Kelly x

[thitz]

Hi Kelly,

It's still pitch black outside at that time of day here.  He used to sleep till 6:30am when he had loads of night wakings/feeds.  So when he first started waking at 5ish I did go in and feed him like a night feed but he knew it was morning.  I could tell cause he woke up kinda making happy sounds instead of his nighttime grumpy feed me cry.  So the last two days I've been treating it like morning.  I tried waiting to see if he'll sleep again but the happy sounds slowly turn to upset sounds.

This morning he woke at 5:15am but I did hold him off till almost 6am for his first feed.  Then I gave him breakfast at 7:30 and he was starting to breakdown.  But still I kept him up till 8am and then he went down for nap1 without barely a peep.  So far he's still asleep at almost 10am.  I also turned his white noise of at 30mins into the nap as kind of a wake to sleep thing.

I'm wondering if I should do an even earlier bedtime.  Cause lets say I can extend him to 12:30 for nap 2 that will probably put me at 2:30pm wake so four hours till bed which seems too long.  Maybe I should try a 6pm bed?

Tarri

[KellyC]

An earlier bedtime might be something else to try but I would still try to convince him that 5 o'clock isn't a reasonable time to get mummy out of bed