13 mo with very short sleep window

[traineeparent]

My 13mo old has such a short sleep window these days!  It drives me crazy.  It used to be the way that if she was a little overtired when I put her down a for a nap (which does happen occasionally though of course I do my best to avoid it) she used to just groan to herself and eventually go off to sleep.  But now since the sitting/crawling/pulling up milestones  - few months ago now - if I miss her window, it's all over. She just won't go to sleep and I end up taking her out in the car, which I don't want to do too often. I don't want to do PUPD.  She's transitioning to 1 nap, it's a long process - see my other post:

https://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=94867.0

I thought they were supposed to get more flexible as they got older!!! Do other people have this problem?   

[Layla]

Can you tell me what her daytime schedule looks like? Do you put her down based on cues or at set times during the day?

You're right bang in the middle of the transition & this is the toughest couple of months.

[Layla]

Ok, I've just had a chance to read through your other post. Couple of things:

Night feeds - I actually don't think she needs them at all . I am sorry, cause its much easier to feed & back to bed but this is now (I believe) a habit more than hunger feeds. Jasmine goes to bed sometimes as early as 5.30pm & still sleeps all night without feeds. I know with the transition their meal times are a little off but its not that much off that she is skipping meals (you can split lunch, etc.... & still allow her for enough calories). I used to bottle feed at 5am & back to bed. Worked great but then I realised she would just keep on waking up for the bottle. So I would do wi/wo rather than feeding her back to sleep.

Schedule - this is a tough one. They can go from having a morning nap to NOT having a mornign nap & its extremely frustrating!!! I would pick a time for morning nap (say 9:30am) regardless of when she wakes & let her sleep for 45mins. If she's playing, rolling, sitting up, whatever, let her be. I give Jasmine 30ish minutes to fall asleep in the monring. If she's not sleeping by say 10:15, I pick her up & shoot for 1 nap. If you are confortable driving around for the morning nap, then continue to do so & then shoot for the pm nap about 3.25hrs later (on a 45mins nap) & no more than 3hrs on a 30min catnap. When you put her down for the pm nap leave her!!! If she's crying, do wi/wo rather than staying there. Sounds like your presence is hindering her ability to fall asleep faster.

1 nap days - if she has not fallen asleep in the morning, go on about your day but put her down for the afternoon nap earlier. I would start with 11am. If you put her down at 12.30 - she's already overtired from not sleeping in the morning & these 1hr15min naps she is doing at the moment are OT naps. So if possible try for a nap earlier & still put her down for the night slightly earlier (about 4-4.5hrs A time before bed).

Nightwakings - so again, try not to feed her to sleep. Pick the same method as you would do for naps (be it wi/wo) & practise the same thing for night wakings. Why is it taking 3 hrs at night to settle her? What are you & dh trying at night???

Jasmine still sometimes wakes up at 5:30am (about 1ce a week) & I would LOVE nothing more than for her to go back to sleep but I let her roll around & start my day at 6am. I realise this is early for some but during the transition, I've lowered my standards for naps & wake up times, etc... I know this is all part of the transition & when she finally settles into 1 nap, things will come together. Some days she takes 2 short naps & then we do earlier bedtime & some days she'll do short am nap & long pm nap, some days she'll do 1 nap. Sometimes the 1 nap is short & sometimes its long. Its just soooo unpredicatable. All you can do is try to stay on top & not let her get overtired (ie earlier bedtime on those crappy days).

Post back
Layla

[traineeparent]

Hi there

Thanks for your reply.  I know she doesn't need the nightfeeds.  It became a habit when we had family to stay for 6 weeks. She started waking again, first it was a growth spurt. Then it was just easier to feed to get her back to sleep, took ages any other way. Bad habit I know. She is very hungry for the first feed of the night, so I think she's in the habit of eating a lot at the wrong times.

She's got major SA at the moment so I'm not keen to do WIWO just yet.   By the way do you know why it goes from PUPD to WIWO at age 1   (I wasn't keen on PUPD either).   She doesn't just roll around she screams if I leave.   

I tried all sorts of variations of waking her from her AM nap (45 mins, 30, 15 etc), it would work for 2 days then not work.  She'd just point blank refuse the PM nap.    So I'm been doing just one nap with early bedtime and it's working well, she goes down easily for the nap and much more easily at night, most nights.  Plus the NWs have decreased to only 1 which is amazing.

Really I was just wondering why her sleep window had suddenly shrunk!  She used to cope with being overtired, would groan herself to sleep.  Now she gets hyper and takes ages to settle.   I wonder if this happens to all LOs and do they suddenly remember how to handle overtiredness, or has she lost her sleep skills for good.

(When she took 3 hrs, we had taken her out of the room, got fed up and tried again later.  Now I'm determined to put an end to that so I'll stay in the room unless she's going ballistic. Even if hyper she settles faster but can still take an hour).

Thanks again.

[Layla]

Good to hear she is taking well to 1 nap. Sometimes all the cutting naps, etc.. can mess them up, so if thats working well for you then let her be on 1 nap.

Sleep window - even when they transition to 1 nap, there seems to be a "slump" of some sort around the time she would have taken her previous morning nap. It happened with Isabella too & I am sure she would still fall asleep if I had let her nap but then she wouldn't take her afternoon nap... so its just a matter of giving her some quiet time when she would otherwise nap & then move on with your day until the real nap time.

She could also seem tired but is really cranky from teething & the SA issues.

When they transiiton to 1 nap, they are more likely to get overtired because they are only given an opportunity to nap once a day. Its not like she can make up for it until its time for bed....

Pu/pd - the pu part seems to stimulate toddlers (plus they are quiet heavy by then ) so its only pd at this stage.

Night feeds - you are spot on.... its more learnt hunger than real hunger. You could try to water that feed down so its part water, part formula until its all water & then finish weaning it off with pd (or whatever you chose to do).

Good luck & let me know if you need any help
Layla

[traineeparent]

Thanks for that.  It's going so-so, some ups and downs, but at least she goes down easily for nap and bedtime now. 

Since I BF I can't water down the feeds!  I'd heard about that one. Trying to reduce the number of minutes gradually.

Thanks again