I am trying to work on my baby’s naps, which are currently a bit of a struggle. He is 4 and a half months and exclusively breastfed.
He sleeps well at night, but during the day he needs an unbelievable amount of input to fall asleep and stay asleep.
He will fairly reliably fall asleep and stay asleep in the baby bjorn on a walk outside (he won’t if we are inside). This is fine for one nap a day, but he’s too heavy for me to carry on a walk for all of his naps.
He will fall asleep in the pram but not for long - usually wakes within half an hour. Will sometimes but not always doze off again. As soon as the pram stops moving he wakes.
He will feed to sleep and then nap in my arms, but needs almost constant input - either needs the nipple in his mouth or to be relatched. He will sleep for up to a couple of hours this way but with regular short wakings while I relatch him. If I don’t relatch him he wakes fully.
He will not fall asleep in the cot. The room is cool and dark with white noise playing, but he will lie there wide awake until he gets overtired and cries. If I feed him to sleep and then transfer him to the cot he will wake within ten minutes.
He won’t take a dummy. I have tried 12 different varieties and persisted for weeks and weeks but he spits every single one out instantly and now cries if you try to give him one, so I have stopped.
How do I teach him to nap more independently? He sleeps really well in the snuzpod for long stretches at night so I know he can link his sleep cycles etc. But for some reason during the day he cannot nap for more than a few minutes without almost constant input from me.