Bedtime battles...

[Lostinspace82]

My son is 18 weeks and in the midst of sleep regression and one of the biggest problems we have is bedtime - he's never been great at it but he's just getting worse and worse...last night it took 3 hours to settle him

It seems like the only way to make bedtime easy is for him to be utterly exhausted which means me either not letting him have an afternoon nap and then early bed around 6pm or alternatively letting him have an afternoon nap and then keeping him up till 8/9pm - either way he gets utterly exhausted and grumpy but they make him settle in minutes at bedtime

Both those things are the opposite of what you 'should' do but if I let my son sleep at the times recommended for his age eg no more than 1.5 to 2 hours awake time, I spend literally hours trying to put a wide awake baby to bed.

Anyone else find this? Any advice?

[purple84]

Hi Lostinspace, I'm sorry I don't have any helpful advice as I am in the same position DS is also 18wks and however much I try we are not in any kind of a routine, some days he sleeps most of day and others he barely sleeps but this has no correlation to his night time patterns. If I try to keep him awake he will just scream constantly until he is asleep and as he is usually such a happy baby I don't see the benefit in doing this, especially as it doesn't mean I am going to get a good nights sleep anyway.
He has also been getting worse at night lately but it doesn't matter if he naps during day or not!! Just can't win at the moment.
I know this isn't helpful but maybe like me it's just nice to know your not the only one.

[TheGreatHunt]

Do what works for him. I'd give him a mini cat nap and see what that does.