Regular napping - advice needed on settling 6 mo DD

[titferbrains]

Read a great post by flapjakfairy advising regular naps to help with better sleeping at night - which I'd like to try. But I'm in a bit of a rut wiht feeding to sleep. Wondering how I can help my baby to wind down for a nap as she can stay awake for ages if being walked in buggy (tho I appreciate this may change if I did it at the same time every day) and I find that everything seems to just stimulate her, eg any light in the room, mobile with soft music etc. She has never (except when she was weeny obv) fallen asleep in bouncy chair, only twice in my arms, and I usually have to cover the front of the pram to help her go off.

I'm now in the habit of waiting till she makes her "tired" cry and then feeding her to sleep which takes about 10 min. Would love to get her going off on her own.... If I try doing regular naptimes, what sort of times should I be aiming for? She can for 3 hours after she wakes up before she needs a nap but I think she should go down earlier than this.

She's also doing A LOT of snack feeding, and her feeds are VERY distracted when in public, so have no idea how often she ought to be feeding - and would quite like to get her feeding more regularly. Obviously don't want to starve her but want to make sure she's properly hungry at feed time. Should she just be on a 4 hourly routine from the time she wakes up?

Trying not to read GF or get caught up in routine stress but I did prefer it when DD was in 3 hourly routine which she dictated by herself. She is sleeping for random long stretches so I'm sure I could help her to start sleeping thru if her days were a bit mnore organised!

[nappyaddict]

Light and music always stimulated DS. In the end I got a CD with nature sounds, waves, rain etc and that really soothed him.

I would say try to put her down for a nap after being awake for 2 hours else she will get over tired and find it hard to fall asleep.

4 hourly is a long time for a breastfed baby between feeds. I would continue to feed her on demand but where possible try and feed her somewhere quiet with little distraction. If you are at home turn off the TV. If you are out try to find a quiet corner. Would she go for being covered by a blanket or muslin or anything? Have you tried wearing some beads around your neck for her to play with when she feeds?

[titferbrains]

well I feed when she wakes up - 7am, but as she is quite excitable I give her a bit more after she's dressed - about 745. today she went to sleep about 10 and woke at 11, ready for a feed. So when wd a BF baby go 4 hourly??

She went down really quickly today so was obv v ready for a nap. Will try a bit earlier tmw. Wd be great if she slept a bit longer in the morning...

tks

[nappyaddict]

I don't think most BF babies do go 4 hourly. Breast milk is digested more easily and therefore quicker than formula milk which is why formula fed babies might last 4 hours but BF babies mostly won't. 3 hours is usually the longest a BF baby will go in between feeds.

[chandellina]

my near-7 month BF baby rarely goes 4 hours, though starting solids seems to have helped.

he is also a difficult napper but i have found if i just sit him in his bouncy chair (or in buggy if we're out) and leave him, at his natural nap times, he almost always will drift off (sometimes with a bit of a moan/scream).

his first nap is about 3 hours after he gets up, and the second one (sometimes dropped completely) is about 3-4 hours after waking from that one.

each nap is usually no more than 45 minutes.

[titferbrains]

woah. revelation. I clearly need to stop bloody reading. Baby Whisp and one maternity nurse I met talked about going 4 hourly, assumed this was normal. What yr saying about digestions makes sense tho nappy. Will assume 3 hourly but will maybe try to feed then put her down awake in the mornings.

She has started new thing of making horrible straining sounds/face during feeds, I think she does it to get rid of wind or something. Not sure why she'd be uncomfortable pooing as she's on ly on 2 bottles per 24 hrs - a total of around 9/10 oz tops. God why do we bother trying to understand babies. it's a bloody nightmare.

[nappyaddict]

Just asked some of my friends who breastfed longer than me and they all said their babies fed 2-3 hourly until they were about 8 months. So basically if your DD wants to go 4 hours between feeds that's ok but it's also ok if she can't yet.

[titferbrains]

feeling a bit terrible I think I haven't been feeding her often enough then!! I haven't been looking at times of feeds recently (bliss!) but have been sort of letting her go for quite long stretches and then feeding to sleep (so only for 8-10 min) if she whinges. Occasionally these have turned into feeds which is fine. THink I will focus more on feeding more often during day for now. Maybe it will help with nights. Think yr right about wanting/ability to go for 4 hrs. /she certainly can occasionally go for long stretches like this but never in the afternoon.

[nappyaddict]

I always think if you feed them as often as you can in the day then they will have enough in them to help them do longer stretches at night. It probably doesn't work for every baby but I think it does for quite a few.

When you say you have been letting her go long stretches is she crying or whinging during this time? If not it could just be that she is a very efficient feeder and gets enough milk to last a long time. There's a baby at playgroup and from 1 week old he was going 4 hours between feeds and the MW said he was probably just a very efficient feeder. At first the mum tried to wake him to feed more often but then he would hardly take anything so he was obviously still too full.