Hi everyone. My little girl is almost 4 months and the last 2 weeks have been awful when it comes to day time naps. Every single nap is a struggle as she fights sleep so much. I look out for signs of her being tired (spacing out, rubbing eyes, going quiet) and start to rock her a little before trying to put her down drowsy but awake. As soon as she becomes aware that it's time for a nap, and that I'm trying to help her to sleep, she starts screaming, throwing her arms about etc and this escalated until she is completely inconsolable. I've tried putting her down and just patting her nappy or stroking her hair (she likes this usually), but that doesn't work. Sometimes she will fall asleep in my arms with rocking but this is now rare.
Before this time, day time naps were a piece of cake - she would just fall asleep when she was ready..usually in my arms having a cuddle or feeding. She didn't need any help so I think I was a bit spoilt there. The only thing that works now is a pacifier - almost every time if I give her this she will sleep. But I feel like a failure that I can't settle her myself. I also worry about weaning her off it because every single nap today has ended in her needing a pacifier (She used to fall asleep on the breast but because of poor latch I'm exclusively pumping now). What if she never sleeps without one?
Please can I have some tips of how to get through this? I really hope it's just a phase as I can't get anything done, I'm exclusively pumping and it's hard to fit my pumps in. I should mention I have PND and PNOCD so it's probably impacting me more than it should do.