Parents of 4mth olds....

[2lilcherubs]

My 4 month old (19 weeks) is still cluster feeding all evening, won't settle to bed till between 11pm - 1am. I'm struggling to bring bedtime forward.
Stating to suspect maybe have to much day time sleep.

Can you share with me your routines, I know it can still vary a bit at this age so just a rough pattern of how your day goes.

Think I was still up about 11.30 at this stage and 11 up until about 7 months. Is there any reason why you need to bring bed forward? For me, I just went with it and often just got up later as I was on mat leave and had nothing I had to do in the day. The cluster feeding will lessen at some stage and then you can change the bedtime. My 1 year old goes to bed about 9/9.30 now and that works for us.

And of course when he's on solids more this will all change- you could just go with baby for now and let him/her lead the way with routines. We had a nap routine about 5 months, but bedtime was still pretty late as that's what our baby had pretty much decided

I'd like to bring it forward because I'm exhausted. Have older child up early, and can't nap in the day plus dh works away alot so I sometimes feel like I need some me time.

What time in the day did your lo stop napping?

My LO is 4 months old and right from the start we did a bedtime routine of bath, bottle and then bed everynight. We started at about 4 weeks old and the routine would start at about 11pm and take an hour to an hr and half to get him down to sleep.

Gradually over time we have bought this forward and managed it get the whole routine much shorter. We now start at 7pm and he is settled in his cot at 7.30 and falls asleep on his own accord shortly after.

I would start with getting a routine in place and then bringing it forward by 15 mins every week.

Thanks @peanut91 with my first we did a bedtime routine from around 2 weeks starting around 6/6.30pm and it worked from the off and would settle self to sleep but with this one he just won't settle no matter what. For weeks I've tried to get a routine in place and I end up spending hours with no joy. Occasionally he'll fall asleep before 11pm and sleep for a few hours but mostly any sleep before then is a light sleep and not long. I can do the same thing every night and the time he finally goes to sleep and stays asleep varies massively. It's so exhausting.

@2lilcherubs - are you including a bath everynight in your evening routine? A few people suggested to me to do a bath as late as possible and then do a final bottle after that. I found it made a huge difference as my LO could then distinguish the difference between his final bottle of the evening and all the other bottles he took.

The key though is to start with the bath as late as possible and slowly bring it forward. I found it made it worse if I started with a bath at 6pm and then didnt expect him to go down for hours later.

My lo has very dry skin so I've been advised against daily baths. I usually bath my two together.
I was doing "last" feed in the bedroom in dark with white noise but makes no difference. He will go to sleep but wake very easily and not stay asleep.

Fair dos- bummer if you have to get older children up. Last nap was 5.30 until 7 as used to struggle to get two naps in otherwise.

Hows about bath and stick a bit of 50fifty in and no shampoo or other soapy stuff

These babies are all so different aren't they! Your first sounds like an exception though, esp on the self settling. I have a 3 month old and only bath once a week. Instead I do a baby massage every night with a touch of coconut oil and a couple of drops of lavender oil. So at 8pm (although I've already started to bring this forward this week as he looks exhausted come 8pm!) I take him upstairs into our room, gentle lighting, same lullabies playing on iPad, diffuser in with lavender scent, no talking just smiles, nappy change, massage, PJs, breastfeed. Midway through the feed I switch off the light, change the music to white noise, he finishes feeding, burp then into cot that has been warmed with hot water bottle. It seems to be working so far. He wakes every 3.5ish hours for feeds, except after 5am when it's more every hour. I should say though that I go to bed at the same time as I'm so exhausted, and the cot is right next to me. He can feel me and hear my breathing which helps him to feel safe I think. Over the months ahead I will slowly move away, but he's so little I don't feel I should / don't want to get. Good luck.

My DS is almost 5 month and we have just started to get into more of a routine, we start the day at around half 7 ish, will have a bottle at half 8, porridge at 10, bottle at 12 then will sleep for roughly 2 hours, have some vegetables once he's awake, bottle at half 3 ish, then another bottle at half 6 ish the will sleep on me or in his pram till we go to bed and he will sleep till about half 4ish for a feed. We only bath once a week.