Baby sleep…help!

[LuckyMumofTwo]

Hi,

I know there are already so many similar threads but there’s so much conflicting advice out there so I’m just after some guidance.

My 3 month old is a great sleeper at night. She only wakes two or three time between 8pm and 7am for feeds. She has a bath before bed, then gets put in her sleep bag and I breastfeed before putting her into the cot almost asleep.

However, in the day she’s a cat napper! Her naps are between 20 and 40 minutes long and she tends to have 4 of them throughout the day but is grumpy and tired in between. I feed in the same room as bedtime, feed before I put her into the cot again almost asleep, but unlike at night, most times as soon as I put her down, her eyes pop open and she’s wide awake. Or she will sleep for 25 minutes and wake up. She doesn’t have a sleep bag for naps, just her blanket.

We have the room completely dark at night and light during the day.

Any advice on how to help her sleep longer during the day?

I would also follow what you are doing at night for nap times. To get to sleep babies need to feel a sense of comfort and for that, they need conditions similar to the womb.

Put her in the sleep sack. Invest in some black-out curtains. Trial it and see how much longer she sleeps. Babies need a routine for every sleep cycle - including naps.

It’s how it is until they transition to two naps to be honest, then it’s generally two longer ones.

Every baby is different but I'll share what works for me & my nearly 3 months old. Night time sleep is no problem. She wakes at about 6 and is only awake for about and hour (enough time for some cuddles, a nappy change, little play and a feed) I let her fall asleep on me for 30 mins or so (it's much more relaxing than trying to put her down straight away.) She tends to wake up happy then and we play for a while. After 2 hours she starts to get tired and so I take her for a walk in the carrier. She is out in a few minutes, I do a 10km walk and she sleeps for 2 hours. Early afternoon we have a nap together, usually about 40 mins. We then carry on with our day, sometimes she'll have a little nap in the carrier if I'm out doing some errands. Later when she starts to get tired I keep her up a bit longer with bath time, she has a feed and then she goes down. (I cheat and often let her fall asleep on me at a out 7pm before we go to bed together at about 9pm) That our routine. I know I would struggle to get her to nap on the cot by herself during the day. Even in the pushchair she was wide awake and trying to look around!

So summary. The two ways she can have longer naps. 1. in the carrier or 2. On me