NO LONGER NAPPING FOR MORE THAN 45 MINS!!!

[gillythekid]

My 12 week old son decided at 9 weeks that he no longer wanted his 2 1/2 hour midday nap. He now naps no longer than one sleep cycle of 45 mins and is a right cranky pants come 4pm and screams from overtiredness for what seems like an eternity. Do I persevere with trying to coax him back to sleep? (not even working in the magic pram!) Any suggestions would be most appreciated.

Blimey, nightmare - I can imagine how grumpy he gets...

My DS2 is 7 months, and generally naps well during the day, but gets very easily knocked off track by a cold, teething etc and takes a little while to get back into his good sleeping pattern afterwards. Anything like those that could account for the sudden change?

My DS1 was always a shocking sleeper, and I eventually got into the habit of putting him down at the same time every day, twice a day - 9.30 and 12.30, iirc - and went through a little routine with him. I tried quite hard to get hime to sleep - resettling him several times - but if he didn't, I didn't force the issue. Eventually he started to have regular naps at those times - so maybe persevering with something similar will help, but it may take a bit of time.

He's at the age where both of mine sort of came out of themselves - you know, emerged from that newborn feed-sleep-feed-sleep thing and started being a lot more interested in the world, so it may be just that everything is too exciting at the moment. But definitely worth persevering, as sleep is good for babies and mummies! DS1 is now 2.7, and I am dreading him dropping the daytime nap - I still find it such a respite.

Good luck, hope you find a solution, it's v tough when they won't sleep.

Think he may be teething as the drool has started to flow! Great advice Mog, thanks.

Dd didn't have a long sleep in the day until she was 4 months.
I tried everything to encourage a longer lunchtime sleep (resettling, offering a little more milk if she woke, left her to cry for a while) but she wasn't having any of it! In the end, she had 4 naps a day, all for 45mins - I think the timings were 9.00, 12.00, 2.30 and 4.30. The 4.30 one was often a catnap when we were in the car or in the pushchair (her, not me!). That way she still got the sleep, it was just broken up over more naps.
Then she just started sleeping longer of her own accord, although to begin with it was the morning nap that lengthened.
Ds (now 6 months) has been much better at having a longer lunchtime sleep although every now and then he does seem to go through stages of waking up early (and nothing will resettle him). He does manage to sort it out after a couple of days though.
Hope you ds works it out - I hated the 45 minute naps - not long enough to do anything!
HTH

Put him down at 1pm today and resettled for 25 mins. We both slept for 45 mins, he woke me up so I put him on my chest with a dummy in and he went back to sleep! Just managed to put him back in his crib and he's still sleeping! Might manage 2 hours! Hopefully back on track.
Thanks for shared experiences and helpful advice!

I have a 4.5 month old daughter, who has never slept well, I started off sleeping with her on my chest, then finally took the plunge and put her in her cot at about 10 weeks, she now falls asleep at 7pm without much fuss, and generally only wakes once or twice. I only feed her if its past 1am as I don't think she's properly hungry until then, she'll settle back to sleep after 10 minutes or so of me patting and shhh'ing her. However, I'm really at my wits end with the daytime naps, she'll only sleep in the pram and I have to rock her to sleep, then she wakes after 30 mins no matter how tired she is. If I don't catch her at the right time, she won't go back to sleep. I've tried putting her in her cot for naps but she screams (the longest was for 1.25 hours, very difficult to listen to!) so now I don't know what to do...I can't keep pushing her around in the pram, and she won't fall asleep any other way! Any ideas or similar experiences??

Heidz - they do like to keep us on our toes! I've never understood why they can settle in their cot at one time but not another...

I'm not really sure what you could do. Is there a mobile in the cot? If so, you could try playing it when rocking her to sleep in the pram so she associates that with falling asleep , then try her in the cot again (after a couple of days) with the mobile playing. (or any other calming music).

Both of mine sleep with muslins which they both chew on the corners of. Has dd got anything that she takes to bed with her? You could try introducing something in the pram during the day and then the cot at night and again, try her in the cot with it after it's established. I prefer muslins to any kind of teddy becasue they are easily washed and exchangeable.

Is she definitely tired at the times that you try to settle her in the day? I find that for both of mine there is a peak time for naps - too early or too late and they won't settle nearly as easily, if at all. Maybe try differing the nap time by 15 minutes earlier or later.

Otherwise I would just keep trying the cot every few days. She might suddenly decide she is happy to sleep there in the day. It amazes me how they can change their minds so quickly about things!

Good Luck!

GTK - sounds like he might have sorted himself out. Phew! Those longer naps are a godsend. You have reminded me that I have often used DS's dummy to help him resettle...

My LO is 3.5 months and she is the same, only has 45mins and no more, almost like clockwork! I hope she'll sleep longer as she gets older!

It happens, I had one that did that too. somedays he would do two short( 45 min to the minute) naps at separate times, but most days just one. a bit of chill out in the pram seemed to be usefull if he was horrid late afternoon.

DD did this - I read Baby Whisperer which was quite helpful in a staying-sane sense and learning about their sleep patterns although none of the techniques worked for getting her to sleep longer.

What worked was her getting older. She just began sleeping longer. Of course, you never knew when this would happen so you couldn't plan to do anything. I would just spring to attention after 40 minutes, waiting for the cry, then at about 55 mins, tentatively begin pegging washing out/close eyes, etc.

bump

Well he settled himself in the basket this morning and has been an angel today, only for me to take him to the doc's and have them stick needles in him! He's now asleep in the pram but I expect for no longer than 45 mins, enough time for a boiled egg on toast!
Had a really crap week after a promising start..he seems to be teething already so that may explain the unsettled nature, poor bunny.
Good to hear everyone's feedback, sooo invaluable!

I know BW does get flak on here but it's been working out very well for my LO and me, and based on those principles I have found that 45min naps usually mean undertiredness. It certainly did for us, with the short naps disappearing once I kept my LO up just a little bit longer (at 12 weeks the 'usual' awake time would be around 1.25h, though this will obviously depend on the child).

If your son has been waking up cranky, though, (just to confuse matters) it could mean that he's overtired, in which case the remedy would be to try putting him down a little earlier and see what happens

Incidentally, re. the teething - saliva production apparently increases dramatically round about the 3month point and because babies don't quite know yet how to deal with the excessive saliva, they just let it all drool out - doesn't necessarily mean that they are starting to teethe.

HTH!

gilly haven't read all the posts but when ds was about that age I used to put him in the pram- keep an eye on the clock and at around 40 mins used to go back and start rocking it back and forth so he'd kind of sleep through the 45 mins thing. It took, I reckon, about a week or so of perseverence to do it and from then on in he slept for nearly 2.5hours every day save for the odd glitch and as he was used to sleeping in his pram I could be at a friends, out in town etc and he'd just sleep or he'd sleep in there at home. I didn't actually move him til 7 months to his cot at lunchtime. If you have that time, see if it's a method which might work for you. It's v.frustrating but I think some might be able to do it with a bit of encouragement and it has a nice payout for the fact that they are so nicely rested after it (and so are you !).

Sorry, haven't read all posts so this maybe has been suggested.

We went through similar daytime nap hell at that age (we're still going through nighttime sleep hell but that's a different story!). What worked for us is swaddling, and repeatedly saying 'ssshhhh' while patting LO like the sound of a ticking clock. It was a baby whisperer method - and was the only thing in the book that actually worked for us!

Anyway, it took about a week or so, but eventually the time shushing and patting got less and less until eventually LO just needed swaddled, dummy in and he would settle himself to sleep during the day.

Oh, and the swaddling seemed to stop him from waking up when twitching after the 45 minute sleep cycle, but if he did wake up we would just go back in and shush/pat again to sleep.