Experiences with younger babies in nursery please (under 9 months)

[ThisSillyFawn]

Our six-month-old has generally slept well overnight, not needing extra feeds. The main issue has been very early mornings, often around 5 AM. Settling for naps at home can also take up to 40 minutes as he often needs extra support like feeding, rocking, pick-up-put-down, etc. This has gotten worse since he’s been unswaddled and now rolling in the crib. We always try drowsy but awake where possible.

I’ve just returned to work and he’s finished 3 weeks at nursery. So far it feels like a complete disaster. His wake windows there average 4+ hours. He’s the youngest in a room of nine babies. I understand the staff need to balance everyone’s needs, but I worry they’re giving up on naps too easily. He’s only getting two very short naps, sometimes as little as 15 minutes. This leads to an overtired baby at night with multiple wakings and feeds, and early mornings are being reinforced because he’s being put down very early in the evening when he gets home. Any form of sleep training seems out of the question as I think besides being over tired and needing comfort, he also needs the calories as he’s not drinking as much formula in the setting as he would do at home.

I know it’s only been a short time, but I’m unsure what to do. I can’t see any other local nurseries having availability or being much different from the current one (which has been super well regarded by everyone I know locally, although most of the parents send their kids at one year). A few people have mentioned child minders to me, but I feel like this would be even more difficult for them (it’s not like they can disappear into a dark room with baby for nap time wind down and leave all the other children). A nanny would cost more than I’m bringing home in salary.

I’m genuinely worried that only getting around 11.5 hours of sleep a day at nursery might affect his development or temperament. He’s usually a sweet, easy-going boy, but he’s already becoming more fractious. I’ve read lots of threads reassuring parents that babies will settle into their own rhythm at nursery and that the carers have special magic, but that doesn’t seem to be happening here.

Returning to work was meant to be exciting and good for my mental health/well being but I’m surviving on 5 hours sleep a night (even with DH doing his fair share) and feel like I’m failing both at home and at work. Any advice, experiences, or reassurance from parents who’ve sent their little ones to nursery this young would be incredibly appreciated.

Can you do a childminder or nanny instead

I would say it is very early days and oh I do know it is so hard as you feel you are being ripped in half between your role as a mother and that of a professional person.
Has he got a nursery key worker who you could speak with and discuss your concerns?
In my experience - just two DC - nursery is much better than a childminder long term.

For us it took about 4 weeks for DS to settle into the new routine. Like you naps went haywire but he did always sleep at night but we did figure that he was getting over stimulated while trying to adjust. So we made the evenings as calm as possible and that helped. We are now 2.5 months in and he is having his normal naps and nursery and sleeps at night. I will say he never needed to be rocked to sleep always fell asleep in his cot by himself so that is a bit easier on the nursery staff.

I'm an early years worker. Having worked in many baby rooms, I can tell you what I've seen. A parent gives us details of the babies sleep routines, feeding routines etc. We stick to them wherever possible. We can sit with a child and use the parent's preferred method of sleep (rocking, patting their back, using comforter and/or dummy etc. Usually the lights are turned off and soft music is put on and this will continue until the child is asleep. It may not be the exact time but give or take 20 minutes. Some children are just too nosey as it's not their usual home routine. Some just cant settle because they're not with their primary caregiver. The child staying asleep is a whole other thing. This is usually because other children only "catnap" and may make noise when they wake up. Others may be upset and wake your child up. It's all very unpredictable in a baby room. The staff are trying their best to accommodate your baby's needs and and it will be the same with every nursery. It will take some time but your child will get used to the noises etc and will eventually sleep through it. Childminders usually have children of different ages and they need to disrupt the child's sleep for school pick ups etc. so perhaps not going to solve your problem. Hope this helps.

@SpencerGarciaGideon what about when just one baby in the room has wake windows of 2 hours? And all the older kids are awake playing, crying, being noisy, lights on etc? I know they’re trying their best, I’m trying to gauge what’s reasonable to be upset about - for example at pickup earlier this week he’d been awake for 4.5 hours after one 30 min nap and was in the noisy garden clearly no one had been trying to get him down consistently and had just gotten on with the schedule of everyone else.

to be clear I am not interested in a child minder, as my gut tells me this would be even harder for them than a staff of multiple people.

@Chocolateaddict999 thank you, how old was yours when they started? If nights weren’t now broken I wouldn’t be as concerned, but I can’t function back at work with the horrible multiple hour long night wakings :(

@SpencerGarciaGideon sums it up perfectly and gives yet another reason why child minders can be difficult.
Baby room staff are very focused on their small charges and their stage of development.

DS started at 8 months and my experience wasn’t great either tbh. Despite officially taking babies from 6 months I found out later that they very rarely took any under 1s so frankly didn’t know what they were doing and couldn’t balance his needs with the others who were all over 1 and at a 1:3 ratio. Consequently more than 1 nap never happened, even though he was always fine falling asleep without support he’d only entertain it after lunch there when the others were napping. Also he either refused or they didn’t try very hard with the bottle so just had to go on to 3 meals + 2 snacks and forget the milk. In all honesty the only thing that helped was time and once he was 1 he was absolutely fine on nursery’s routine. Night and day though with the daycare my eldest went to the in the US where 12 weeks is the typical starting age and consequently they had a proper set up and were amazing with the babies. But coming from abroad I didn’t think to ask the right questions or properly look at their set up. If I had my time over again I’d have tried to find a childminder as actually he would have been fine napping in a pushchair on the school run, he just wouldn’t when the other 8 kids in the ‘baby’ (actually young toddler) room were all doing fun activities.

I had to go back when my little girl was 5.5months and it was a hard transition but she got there. I’d hang in there a little longer and see if sleep gets more regular over the next few weeks before you worry too much about it affecting development

My kids were older, 9 and 10 months, but I just wanted to say that neither of them ever really 'got used to' sleeping at the nursery setting. They always slept a lot less there than that at home. They went part time and had much longer naps on their days with me/dad/grandparent, catching up a bit I think. It did get easier as they got older and older and needed less sleep so they weren't as overtired at pick up time but they never learned to sleep through the noise or have proper naps there I'm afraid. Also the second one started night waking lots like youre describing after previously sleeping through for a month. It took 6 months for them to sleep through again.

There will usually still be one staff member trying for as long as possible to get your child off to sleep however, after a certain time when staff members go on lunches or start going home, the effort will most likely dip. Obviously the lights can't be off all day and so it is more difficult but as a pp has said, it took time for their child. It will for yours too. I do understand the stress of sleepless nights and being out of routine as a mother also. Its just trial and error til we get it right. I really do hope things settle down for you and baby soon.

He was 6 months when he started and is the youngest in the room. He sleeps through noise though so the others in the room wouldn’t bother him. He knows nighttime is quiet sleep and day sleep is bright and loud. We did this from the start as mat leave where I live is 15 weeks so we knew he’d have to adjust to nursery. His naps in nursery now match his ones at home, his morning one is the longest and then shorter one in the afternoon.

I will say you also have to give him time for the staff to learn his cues and personality which takes time. Now that they know him they know him things are smoother but there is definitely a period of growing pains with both food and napping. Don’t worry the doubts you are having and the feeling pulled on every direction I had too. Now he goes in smiling every morning.

@Bitzee you’ve nailed it. I think because most mums take the full year of mat leave they don’t have as much experience with younger babies and he is very much along for the ride with the 12-18 month kids who comprise the rest of the room. I have also wondered about American kids who go from as early as 3 months and seem fine but I guess they must have a different set up like you say as it’s the norm.

did you feel it had any lasting negative effects?

Mine went to nursery at 6/7 months. I remember some of what you describe but can’t really remember how we resolved it. Think they just got used to it over time.

If it helps - at the time it seemed huge to me like it does to you now. Yet sitting here now I can hardly remember it. It’s blended into the general backdrop chaos of parenting. My kids are only 6 and 3 but it feels like a lifetime ago.

He’s 4 now and absolutely fine. No negative effects whatsoever and you never can be sure but I think starting young perhaps benefitted him in some way because he’s very confident and settles anywhere. But I found it a very stressful time and ultimately it did hurt my career (and sanity 🤣).

Honestly if it's taking 40 mins to get them down for a nap at home, with sleep support, I'd be suggesting they are not that tired. Many babies this age are moving to or are on 2 naps, so perhaps the wake windows are changing anyway. Mine was on 2 naps by 8m and before then only catnapped. Lengthening his time awake helped him sleep longer. I wonder if this isn't happening at nursery because it's unfamiliar- but eventually as he settles, the longer time awake should encourage longer naps there and should help push bedtime later. We found a big drop in sleep needs and increase in alertness at this age and as soon as we dropped to 2 naps he started sleeping so much better at night. It's so hard, you must be absolutely exhausted. But I will say that at this age, having a baby in childcare or even not, sleep will change so much and quickly, meaning there will be phases of bad and good sleep, night waking (to a degree) is completely normal. If he's only getting 2 short naps there tbough and the early night is leading to night waking and early mornings, could you add a 15min catnap on way home and do bed a fair bit later, to get you some more consolidated sleep? The average night length is 10-11hrs despite what sleep training culture has us believing, so yes if he's going down early this may be explaining the early mornings. Really understand about the formula issue - ours barely ate at nursery but it settled down after 5 weeks.

Could you look at a nanny short term? Maybe for six months or a year? Once he's a little bit older he'll be far more suited to a nursery than he is now.

@ThisSillyFawn I'm sending you a pm

to be clear I am not interested in a child minder, as my gut tells me this would be even harder for them than a staff of multiple people.

Nursery clearly isn’t working. You’d be daft not to at least contact some CMs and see what they say. You may be surprised.

Mine started nursery at 4 months and 5 months. Neither slept well until they dropped to one nap (at around 12 months) - both nurseries we’ve used had lunch at 1130 then the whole nursery was quiet and dark for 2 hours for afternoon naps. Prior to this, mine would have a couple of 40 minute naps per day, never more. We still managed to sleep train fine and they would sleep 13 hours at night. They both thrived at nursery but agree baby sleep is tricky in noisy environments where they all have different nap regimes. Hang on in there and it will get better.

This is pretty normal. They aren’t going to spend 40 mins rocking a baby to sleep, nor are they going to repeatedly resettle when he wakes. No nursery will (or childminder for that matter), they’ve got too much else to do. You have to accept what he does in nursery will be different to home. It’s not ideal, yes it disrupts sleep at home, but it will get better as he gets older. Being flexible with your routine and allowing more catch up sleep on non nursery days is sensible. Working on self settling at home when you can would also be sensible. It’s not going to cause any long term issues and he will adjust. It does feel difficult to let go of control but it will get easier for you too.

The nursery environment just doesn’t really work with wake windows & naps for most young babies the same way they would be at home. Too much going on, too many distractions and even the best nursery staff cannot give the same time etc as you could at home because they don’t only have your baby to look after.

If you’re not prepared to look at a different setting though there’s nothing you can do really.

Having been a baby room manager in the past I have to be honest that nurseries aren't really set up for very young babies.

9 babies is going to be busy, busy, busy - no one is going to be timing wake windows.
I'd expect them to try for a morning nap, after lunch nap and maybe an afternoon nap if possible but there's not going to be an adult available for 40 minutes of 1:1 settling a baby.

Do they have a separate sleep room? If so I'd expect an adult to be able to spend maybe 15 minutes settling a baby but if they haven't fallen asleep then they'd need to be back in the main room and try again later.

Ultimately the babies have to either adapt to the general routine or catch naps as and when.

I'm a childminder now and find it easier to be responsive to naps in a day as you can just go out for a walk if necessary and the youngest sleeps in the buggy on the way to or from playgroups - they fit in like the youngest child in a family does.

The only way you're going to get "up to 40 minutes as he often needs extra support like feeding, rocking, pick-up-put-down, etc." is with 1:1 care at home.

It’s such early days and a big adjustment, it just takes time. The best thing you can do is not alter his bed time as it’s this that is reinforcing the early wake. I know it’s rough when they get home but he needs to be in a bedtime routine and then up and tired enough to adjust to the new nap schedule at nursery.

I mean this in the kindest of ways, but very bright children are being raised in war zones so a few weeks of longer wake windows isn’t going to affect his development. In addition, changing his setting again is potentially going to cause him more upheaval and uncertainty. If you’re otherwise happy with the nursery I would wait and see, discuss your concerns with them and see what they say. 40 minutes of rocking one child to sleep is probably impossible to justify though as how could they do that for every baby & care for the others.

For context DD went for a morning from 5m and often didn’t even really drink expressed breast milk, I’d send 3 bottles sometimes & she could come home with only 2oz being drunk and no sleep. Her sleep did improve though. The best advice I’ve ever had re: children is, there just isn’t always a reason for everything. Sometimes they sleep terrible just because, sometimes they stop liking something they loved just because. You can tie yourself in knots trying to problem solve sometimes but time is often the solution.

I agree with a pp that he would get more sleep with a childminder as he could nap in the buggy on school runs and out and about and also they often have a separate nap room set up which can be dark and quiet/white noise while the others play in a separate room.

Given that you want to stick with the nursery, some things to try (you may already be): dummy, sleeping bag, comforter. Put the last two in your bed a few nights so they smell of you then send into nursery. Can they feed to sleep with the bottle? Or at least time it so he gets a bottle right before nap so he's nice and full and will hopefully sleep longer?
It all depends on their attitude tbh, and how interested they are in improving things. My daughter had several contact naps, once 3 hours long!, when she first started at nursery which I was thrilled they were happy to do. We got a lovely selfie of DD asleep on the lady's shoulder. Within a few weeks she'd got the hang of cot napping there though and was fine. I did send in a dummy despite not using one at home, and somehow she took it there, probably copying others, and that must've helped.