Nap time hell

[fairgame84]

Can anybody help me with DD and her naps please?

She is 5 months old and would only contact nap until around 14 weeks. After that we've managed to get her to sleep and then transfer her to the rocker napper in the living room.
However the past week she has been a nightmare. She fights every nap. We try rocking and patting her like we always have done but she screams and screams until she cries herself to sleep. We've tried putting her in the napper straight away but she screams.

At night she is perfect. We put her in her crib and she goes straight to sleep. Occasionally needs a pat if she stirs. We do pick up put down on the rare occasion that patting doesn't work.

I don't know if we need to start putting her upstairs in her crib for naps or if we need to try and catch her before she gets over tired and continue to try and settle her in her napper.

It's awful seeing how distressed she gets.

Does she have general nap times? Or amounts of time she is awake for between naps?

Could be teething or other discomfort caused by a developmental leap, physical growth, anything really. Baby sleep is a rollercoaster.
It also might be that her wake windows are now a bit longer and you offer a nap too early.
Nap times are very stressful with our PFBs, I remember well. I am currently contact napping with my 6mo, I usually wait until he’s a little cranky (wake window varies between 2 and 3 hours), then offer a nap. If not asleep after 15-20min we stop and go about our day. If he’s tired but fighting sleep I put him in a harness and gently rock or walk around.

Hang in there, it will get easier! 💐

We go by wake windows rather than a schedule. She normally does around 2 hours of waking then naps. She has a distinctive whinge when she's tired or hungry so if we hear that we assume it's nap time. I wonder if we're trying her nap her too early and her wake window has lengthened.

This sounds quite a long time awake to me. Every baby is different, but at 14 weeks I think 45m - 1.5 hours is the norm.

Sorry I didn't make it clear in my op, she's 22 weeks now. She stopped contact napping at 14 weeks.

When my DD was around 4/5 months I started tracking her naps and I paid for huckleberry to tell me her wake windows. Took away all the guesswork. I read that if they're showing signs of tiredness it's too late you want to get them asleep before that point. It could also be the 4 month regression tho!

I read somewhere when dc were young, wake times get wider through the day as they get to 6m.

So we did 90mins wake til morning nap, capped at 45mins sleep. 2hrs wake window followed by a nap for as long as they liked, then 2.5hrs wake win

Wake 7.30am
Nap 9-9.45 (capped at 45m)
Nap 11.45/12 til about 2.30
Nap 5-5.45 (capped at 45m)

Then bed at 7.30.

The 5pm nap drops first, so bedtime became a bit earlier (6.30/7).

Could she be undertired? I used to have a nightmare with naps, I religiously followed awake windows but my daughter is on the lower end of sleep needs and always needed a bit longer than recommended for that age. Once I realised this, naps got much easier.

We left a bit longer at her next nap and she was the same. She settled with a feed and then napped.
I think it might be a growth spurt/getting ready to wean as she's hungry every 2 hours at the moment.
We'll offer her a feed before nap if she's screaming and see how that goes.

OP if you are breastfeeding - when they are in discomfort they fuss because they want to latch for comfort, even if they’re not hungry.

Unfortunately she stopped breastfeeding at 18 weeks.

She normally feeds, plays for around 2 hours, naps. Naps between 30mins-2hrs. Then when she wakes she will either play for 30 minutes or so then feed or feed straight away, depending on how long she slept. So she's normally 2.5-4 hours between feeds.
She still has 7 feeds a day, between 3-4.5oz, so little and often.
Yesterday she was trying to nap after 2 hours, looked tired but then wouldn't sleep and got in a tizz. I think she was probably hungry and tired but we'd missed her hunger because she doesn't normally feed until 2.5 hrs. She'd usually have a quick half hour nap then feed.
She's just mixing it up for us, keeping us on our toes!
We'll offer a feed if it happens again. She's not an overfeeder so if she doesn't want it she won't have it.

Sounds good 😊
My 6mo fusses a lot for no apparent reason currently. He wants to be held/actively entertained all the time 😑