how to get longer naps???? baby still tired on waking

[CharlotteBronteSaurus]

until the last few days 3mo dd2 was rocked to sleep and then slept on me, or slept in the sling. she would usually have a couple of 30-45 min naps, but at least one good one of 1-2hours.

i have to stop the rocking and slinging as my back is giving in (she is a 99th centiler ). she has started to go down in her moses basket after being cuddled to almost alseep, and then goes to sleep either straight away, or after 5-10 minutes mild complaint. BUT she is now waking after 30-45minutes, and won't be resettled. I wouldn't mind, but she is still clearly tired and grumpy after her micro-naps, and gets more so as the day goes on.

this in turn is affecting her night-time sleep. she used to mostly have 3 hour stretches with a 4-5 hour stretch at the start of the night. we now get a 3 hour stretch at 8pm, then waking 1-2 hourly (near 1 mostly ).

anyone know anything i can do other than grit my teeth and wait for her to grow out of it?

[Chil1234]

Have you tried changing the environment around? Too light, too dark, too much noise, not enough noise, too warm, too cold.... etc. Moses baskets can start to get cramped after a while (especially for larger babies) and bumping the sides can wake them up. My baby DS used to sleep best with a bit of noise going on... Good luck

[Prisca]

I'm afraid I don't have any advice - I'm seeking help for exactly the same issue with my 2 mo. He'll settle in his cot, though we usually have to let him cry quite a bit (:-() and have one good nap a day; rest of the day he wakes after 45 mins max, grizzling and yawning and still clearly tired.

My first son was like this too; I remember he grew out of the 45 minute naps when he went to 2 naps a day. He started sleeping for 1.5-2 hrs then.

You're not alone - that always helps to know! But I'm looking for advice too - it's really making me stressed and anxious as I'm finding I can't spend as much time with my first son, who's now 2.5.

[CharlotteBronteSaurus]

thanks for the answers.
we are certainly tinkering with the environment, but it's hard to achieve either dark or quiet in this house
and Prisca it is nice to know i'm not alone, although i'm sorry to hear you're struggling.

[narmada]

charlotte oh you are so not alone, and you are doing bloody marvellously if you can get your DD to finally fall to sleep in her basket. have nothing constructive to advise....if i did, i wouldn't be there with you, but just wanted to give hot tea and sympathy.

[CharlotteBronteSaurus]

ah, narmada, we meet again . cheers for the boost - dare i ask how DS is?

[BaggedandTagged]

How long are you trying to resettle before giving up? DS started doing this (cutting lunchtime nap short) around the same age, and it would sometimes take me 30 mins to resettle him (meaning 2 hr nap took closer to 3hrs with two lots of settling) but it was worth it in terms of him not being grizzly all afternoon.

I also found that holding his arms down by his sides helps him fall asleep- otherwise he is waving his hands around rubbing his eyes and cant actually fall back to sleep- or you could swaddle- I find this also helps him nap better

[CharlotteBronteSaurus]

we do swaddle and it does work well for us

resettling - I only give it 10 mins to be honest because she gets quite cross, and i don't like letting her cry for much longer than that.

although she slept for a little over an hour this morning. mainly because i was desperate for her not to, so i could get to sainsbury's before taking dd1 to a party. we never did make it...

[narmada]

Ah Charlotte, DS worse than ever on the nap front, thanks for asking. I am spending hours every day jiggling him around. I am getting so, so unbelievably frustrated I just want to scream. Nothing seems to make a difference - swaddling, white noise, nothing.

[narmada]

also Charlotte my DD was a resolute 45 minute a time napper until she was about 8 months I think. She just had about 5 of them a day. Don't know whether that's helpful or not to you...

[happygilmore]

My DD was a 45min napper until 6months+, I tried everything! Only thing that occasionaly worked was starting to try to get her to stay asleep longer before she woke up, if that makes sense. So if she was in her pram I would start rocking her from about 30mins, and it sometimes worked. Or pop her dummy back in, or keep playing wave music which she goes to sleep to.

She's 8 months now and has two naps a day, and is in a much more settled routine, with the lunchtime nap generally a longer one, although not always. It's a process, I think!

[Mumcah]

I accepted that DS would not entertain a longer than 45 minute nap so he just had 4 short naps instead. He is now 8 months and usually has a longer one now.
Very annoying when they're still obviously knackered though!

[agirlcalledvicky]

We were exactly the same at your DD age, I think its really common. DS used to wake after 30 mins exactly and was obviously still really tired. I used to be able to settle him back to sleep but that took about 30 mins so we settled on two short naps and one longer nap with a resettling from me. Now he's 6 months old we seem to have settled into one short nap in the morning and one long one in the afternoon which suits us fine. I found lengthening the gap between naps, darkening the room and leaving the radio on low helped us. But to be honest probably time and plugging away made the biggest difference. It drove me demented at the time though....

[PINKYKP]

my ds is now 5 mths old and had same prob- i had let him nap on me as a newbie and then he would not nap anywhere else!! i found that a completely blacked out room, a small blanket in his fist, gentle ssh ssh noise ( bit like the sound of your blood flow in the womb) and a gentle pat on tummy like that of a heart beat calms him and now works so well only takes 20 seconds or so!!! also you could try gently rubbing their feet- whenever my ds is aggitated i rub his feet and it calms him straight down. He still sometimes wakes after 45 mins but i just repeat ssch ssh and gentle pat until he sleeps - can take about 15 mins sometimes but will ensure he is happier when he wakes and feeds better, if i convince him to go back to sleep he is so much happier for rest of day - secret is to get to baby before he really cries- after 30 mins monitor is stuck to my ear and when i hear him stirring and beginning to grizzle i race in and pat him back to sleep - past few days i have not had to so maybe he is learning!!