Help me with 6 month old sleep routine

[sharond101]

I have a beautiful baby daughter and toddler son. Daughter is 6 months old and has gotten into a routine leaving me sleep deprived and exhausted. She is exclusively breast fed and I have just started weaning (night feeds increased to 3/4 and so I thought it was time). She has been waking around 5am and won't settle back to sleep. This feels too early for me although we have to be up by 7.30am to get to nursery for toddler. So usually she wakes at 5am and has a breastfeed. She has been getting some porridge around 7.45 then naps from 8.30-10 whilst in her pram. She has a lttle fruit and a breastfeed. Naps around 12 again for 90mins to 2 hours then some solids and breastfeeds again. She usually has a quick 30 minute nap around 4/4.30 and feeds around 5. Bedtime is when she gets grumpy, usually 7.30/8 although if she has a longer nap at 4 this can be later. SHe is up at 3am for a feed. Any advice? Maybe easier to read in this format,

5am wake and bf
7.45 porridge
8.30-10 nap
10 bf and fruit
12 -1.30 nap
1.30 soup/solids
2pm bf
4-4.30 nap
5pm bf
7pm bf
7.30/8 bedtime
3am bf

[milkingmachine1]

OP, I have a 6 month old with a similar routine. I just try very hard to get her to go back to sleep in the morning. Sometimes she does and sometimes she doesn't. But i don't let her get up for the day at 5am! I give her a breastfeed and a cuddle, if she won't fall back to sleep I put her back in her cot and she's usually quite happy just chatting away to herself and sometimes will fall back to sleep.
One thing I have noticed is she doesn't like being awake for more than 2hrs at a time. Maybe you could try shorter awake times and an earlier bedtime. After all sleep begets sleep.
Good luck with it. Sleep deprivation is awful.

[SparklyTinselTits]

Sounds crazy...but I think the pp could be right about an earlier bedtime! I had the same problem with my 6mo....she decided that 4:30am was time to start the day! So I re-jigged her nap routine, and now we try to make sure her last nap is over by 4/4:30pm, and then she's super tired at 7pm bathtime, has a bottle and is out for the count by about 7:20pm. Whereas before, we didn't really have a solid nap routine, and she was going to bed at 8/8:30pm. With the slightly earlier bedtime, she usually wakes once at 3am for a bottle, which I more like a dream feed to be honest, she not really properly awake, then she sleeps until 6/6:30am...which I can handle a bit better than 4am

[lenibose]

I was going to say the opposite. I would drop the last nap and then bring bedtime forward. I would then do a feed at 10/11, whenever you go to bed and then not feed till 6:30/7. Because she can do an 8 hour stint. I suspect cutting that last nap would make falling asleep easier as well. For the first few days she might still awake at 5 by habit but if you can feed/shush/rock and get back to sleep, hopefully you might get a longer stretch?

[MiniLop]

Definitely don't drop the last nap, 6 month olds still need 3 naps per day. My 8 (nearly 9) month old is only just starting to drop his 3rd nap naturally. I agree with PPs, bedtime should be earlier - 7ish? And no more than 2 hours awake time. If she wakes up from her nap after only 30-40 minutes, or early in the morning, leave her in her cot and she may fall back to sleep (my DS did at this age). Obviously not if she's upset though. DS used to just have a chat with himself for a bit then go back to sleep! Good luck

[SparklyTinselTits]

MiniLop my DD does that...so funny listening to her chat away as if she's a special guest on a talk show promoting her new album

[sharond101]

Thanks, do you think she is sleeping too much in the day?

[milkingmachine1]

I think you need to look at the whole 24hr period, have a look at this, you might find it helpful;

www.babycenter.com/0_baby-sleep-basics-6-to-9-months_7657.bc