4 month old having very short naps

[babypanther]

My 4 month old DD sleeps well at night but her daytime naps are really short. She’s started napping in her cot and can self settle and get off to sleep with a bit of reassurance (usually I just have to pop her dummy back in a couple of times), but her naps are only ever 45 minutes absolute maximum, usually about 20 or 30 minutes. I follow a few baby sleep consultants online and they all say a 4 m/o’s naps should be about an hour to two hours long. She always seems tired when she wakes up and is still rubbing her eyes and can be quite grumpy so I don’t think she’s getting enough sleep.

Her room is dark, we have white noise on; I always make sure she’s fed, winded and got a clean nappy before a nap. Does anyone know what might be causing the cat naps and how I can make them longer?

FTM to a 4MO here. My understanding is that short naps are developmentally normal for this age. My little girl will typically nap for 30 - 40 mins if put down in her cot, although will nap for 1.5 to 2.5 hours if it’s a contact nap.

My question for you is - how did you get your daughter to self-settle?! Mine will fall asleep fairly easily when held, patted and shushed, but cries whenever she’s put in her cot awake. Would love to be able to help her self settle.

My little girl is 4 months old and only contact naps or sleeps in the pram during the day (I think we’ve got into bad habits due to her reflux and problems being laid flat). She is unable to self settle.

She tends to sleep for around 30/40 minutes too, it’s rare for it to be any longer.

Mine sleeps maximum 45 mins, I've never heard of 4 mo babies sleeping for 2 hours!

Short naps are really normal at that age. They’ll naturally lengthen as baby gets older, you don’t need to do anything to make it happen.

@ShutterHaze @Grace9090 @SamanthaVimes @calorcalorcalor I’m glad it’s not just my little one!

@ShutterHaze it happened almost by accident really, we left DD for the first time overnight last week so my parents had her, I had been having to hold her to sleep for the past 4 months, I had told my mum she needed to do this etc… when I asked my mum in the morning if she had slept ok, she said she just put her down in her cot, with her dummy in, and left the room. She said they had to put her dummy back in a couple of times but said she didn’t cry, just gurgled a bit and eventually fell asleep!! We couldn’t believe it so we have started doing the same, although I also use white noise.

For bedtime, I go up with her about 10 mins before I want to actually put her to bed, put the white noise on, dim the lights and change her nappy. Then I cuddle her for about 10 mins or so, I try not to talk much, then I’ll just quietly put her down with her dummy in and leave the room. I normally do have to go back in a few times because her dummy falls out and it can make her cry a bit, it can take 20 mins or so for her to fall properly asleep. But once she’s out she sleeps pretty well!

I will say it’s very new and I don’t know how much staying over at my parents’ helped because she definitely wasn’t self soothing before!

Online sleep consultants are crazy. 99% of them.

Mine all started napping longer around the 5/6month mark. Which is when a nice routine starts to form, usually quite predictable, instead of feeling like the whole day revolves around getting a baby to sleep and then timing the next sleep etc.

That’s super reassuring!

It's probably just a short nap phase!

What happens when she wakes up at the 45 min mark? What do you do?

This happened when my DD was around the same age but she was also an awful night sleeper (still not much better now at 16mo). I found if I held her once awake and let's say sat on the sofa with her/sat on the bed she fell back to sleep. She will often do this now if she's only had about 30 mins. I've never been able to master the putting her down and letting her drop off but she does this at nursery 🤦🏼‍♀️😂

My first child only ever had 30 minute naps, but had at least 4/5 during the day. He loved the pram then pushchair, we’d go out 3 times a day, he wouldn’t sleep whilst we were out, but would as soon as we got home. In those 30 minutes whilst he slept, I would go mad doing housework, shower, putting washing on etc., He never went on to have longer sleeps. My second son was the complete opposite, slept all afternoon if I let him and come 8 pm he was asleep and in his cot, but he took longer to sleep through the night.

We had the same phase around 4 months. DD is 5.5m now and is on 3 naps a day of 1-1.5hours. I think it’s a combination of it being a developmental phase but also my dd started sleeping longer when I started to gently extend her wake windows. She actually also just wasn’t tired enough to sleep for a longer chunk! I also transitioned from contact naps to crib naps and that also helps her sleep longer I think. Basically what I’m saying is that like a lot of pps have said, it’s a phase and it will pass!

My son used to nap for around 30 mins at a time at that age. I would wait for him to start to stir around the 30 minute mark and then immediately try to settle him back to sleep. Once I did this for a little while he started sleeping for longer. I read that it is something about connecting sleep cycles.

That’s super interesting that cot naps helped her sleep longer. Mine can always sleep forever during a contact nap but not during a cot nap! Anything in particular you found that helped?

My son is the same in that he can self soothe, and he goes down in his crib in the dark (not black out though), white noise etc but he usually sleeps for about 1.5h, if he wakes up sooner I look at him and if he is displaying signs of still being tired (glazed eyes, grumpy, red eyebrows, scrunched up posture etc) then i pick him up and rock him back to sleep. If he is wide eyed, stretching happily etc then its wake up time :)

Even if they can self soothe it doesnt mean they always want to :)

Oh, and his wake windows tend to be around 2-2.5hrs, sometimes longer if we are out and he is being too nosey 😅

Naps are so hard to crack! I think both of mine were 7/8 months old before I started to get consistently longer naps. Prior to that it was hit and miss. Following wake windows was the biggest help. I followed the baby whisperer, eat, play, sleep - it outlines all the wake windows in it. You have to keep tweaking them all the time though as they grow out of them.

Do keep in mind that short naps can be the result of being undertired or overtired. So a wake window might be too long or too little.

Good luck! Longer naps get more consistent as they get older.

Ultimately what did it was persistence - I feed to sleep still and for about 3-4 weeks I put her down after she fell asleep for nearly every nap as contact naps just weren’t working for me anymore (unless we were out and about, then she’s in the carrier). Initially she would wake straight back up, I’d feed her and put her back down - eventually she slept longer and longer in the crib (it did literally just seem to click for her one day though). Now a good nap she won’t stir for 1 hour or more. A dodgy one I might have to resettle her a few times. But there’s no secret, just persistence!! I don’t let her cry but I let her wake up and I don’t go right to her immediately to help her learn it’s okay to be in the crib during the day.

(I also try and mimic what we do at night, nappy change then sleep sack, darken room, white noise on)

What do you do when she wakes up? Do you get her straight up?
My just 4 month old generally has a couple of hour long naps and then a big 2.5 hour nap in the day. I never let her stay awake longer than 1.5 hours, any longer than this and she is over tired and doesn’t nap as well. I also try and time her big nap to be in her cot at home. If we are at home, I always put her down in her cot for nap time so she associates it with naps.
I think if you be consistent with what you’re doing/how/where you are putting her to sleep and don’t get her up straight away she will probably start to nap for longer.

@OrangesAndLemming @Nancy155

I definitely need to practice more persistence and consistency!!