How to meet friends at specific times with a baby?

[Ell0718]

My LO is 7 months old and we have never had a consistent nap ‘schedule’. He has the same bedtime routine and sleep time everyday, but wakes up at a different time everyday (some time between 5.30 and 7am), which means every day his nap times are different, and also nap lengths (his morning nap can be between 2-3 hours after he wakes up, and can be anywhere from 30-90 mins)! I find this impossible to work around when I’m trying to meet people, or going to a class because I have no idea when he’ll be needing to nap until after he’s had his first nap of the day

For clarity, we only put him down when he gives sleepy cues, he sleeps great in his cot and the car but won’t pram nap, at all. I think if pram naps were an option I wouldn’t find it so stressful!

I do have a lot of anxiety about it because I would love to be able to do more with friends and their babies, but if he is overtired he will have a real meltdown and I just need to leave immediately. We have a lot of days just the two of us which are lovely, but it would be nice to have more company.

I know we’re on baby’s time and schedule and I should lean into it, he does his own thing! But I (maybe naively?) really hoped we’d be more consistent by now.

any tips on this appreciated, or any tips on how to help him nap in the pram?

The baby was 2 years old.

I forgot to put that in. My point was this is what it leads to...you cannot allow your lives to be controlled like this

She also screamed take me home you fucking wanker in full ear shot of other people.

Dont judge her but I did.

My DS slept when he slept and woke up when he woke up. Still does now at almost 2.

If he was asleep and we had to go somewhere I would just transfer him into the car or the sling. Occasionally I would head somewhere early so he could sleep in the car.

I had to consciously remind myself that second children don't have the luxury of uninterrupted sleep like first borns and they seem to turn out okay so waking my baby up to fit my plans occasionally is probably fine.

I didn't do any paid classes though. I couldn't bear the thought of him sleeping through them. Drop in, church hall style, playgroups all the way for us!

Mine were the opposite - slept beautifully in the pram (particularly when it was moving) but not in their cots for naps.

Meant I could go out and about loads but I couldn’t stay at home and just have a nice relaxing time whilst they slept.

Swings and roundabouts.

I had the odd friend whose baby would sleep wherever. I worked very hard not to hate them.

another thing - what kind of pram are you using? At 7 months old this is probably not useful, but on the off-chance he is still in a bassinet style thing, I’ve seen many babies have their pram-refusal cured by moving to a toddler seat with a lie-flat function. Like a mamas and papas Ocarro or similar. It might be worth borrowing a friend’s pram/getting a free or cheap one of Facebook to give different styles a try?

Mumsnet is very anti-nap schedule and everyone is very sanctimonious about how their babies napped everywhere and they had no constraints. In real life, most of my mum friends had this problem.

It's why i DID have a nap schedule. Wake baby up by a certain time each day and the naps and bedtime will fall into place. Wake him at 6 am every day. There's your day set right there. You'll then likely be able to do stuff reliably between 10.30 - 1.

Between 4 and 7 months, I was out every single day. I loved it. Baby yoga, mum & baby pilates, lunches etc. All with my very anti-mumsnet baby schedule. I went back to work at 7.5 months unfortunately.

Also, around 6.5 months we moved to 2 naps and that was VERY freeing. 3 naps was annoying.

Horrific consequences? Unless someone died you’re being dramatic. It’s a baby sleeping not rocket science.

Do you have any friends that would be flexible and understanding?

I'm lucky to have a baby that will sleep anywhere, however my friends baby is more like yours, won't sleep in the pram and screams in the car seat. We will arrange to do something in the morning/afternoon and I just ask for 10/15 mins notice and I'll happily meet her for a walk or a coffee to fit her babies schedule. If I'm just at home with baby I don't mind the short notice to go out and meet her.

Horrific consequences?

Op here! Thanks for all the replies, advice etc. lots of mixed reviews!

I’d like to clarify that I don’t spend all day everyday in the house just to suit LO’s 3 naps. We do a lot together, but find it 100x easier when it’s just me and him because I can go out at a time when I know he’s had a decent sleep. At the weekend it’s somewhat easier to go with the flow as my partner is there to help.

He hasn’t really pram napped since he was about 3 months old, and if he’s overtired and we’re out, it can be very stressful as he’s not just fussy, he’s prepped for a meltdown!

Therefore say, if my NCT friends are meeting at X time one day for a walk, I’ll be there if it works for us, and if he’s going to be due a sleep around that same time on the day, I won’t go. That is my choice, I would rather him have a peaceful sleep at home than us both be stressed mid-way through a walk. I don’t find the ‘just crack on’ mentality works because the reality is, he won’t sleep in the pram just because I’ve put him there when he’s tired.

Lots of people have suggested waking him up at the same time every day so I think I will start from there and see how we go

Thank you!

This sounds horrible for her. I hope you were supportive of her at the time at least.

Drama lama I suspect.

The thing is you only have the luxury of worrying about this because it’s your first baby.
For subsequent children you don’t have the option of arranging your life around their nap times because the older children have to be at school/clubs/want to go out, so the baby pretty much has to just get on with it. I remember dc3 sleeping on a hay bale at a farm!
The other thing I would say is 7 months is still very little so don’t write off pram/buggy naps or the possibility of a routine emerging, they will change as they get older.

Yeah there’s a reason so many people say the second one was easier and just slotted in to daily
life - they had to!

OP it is highly unlikely that your baby is different from millions of other babies that just slot into normal life. It’s just that this is the first time you’ve done this so you don’t like to let your baby cry, but often babies do have a cry and a grumble before they sleep.

It made me grin to see my friend being so different with her second born. First born: she left social things early, avoided certain groups/activities/socialising, ran about like a headless chicken making sure everything was perfect for his naps. Second born: goes where she pleases/needs to for first child’s clubs and activities. Baby is plonked in the pram while my friend walks where she needs to, and simply cries for a bit before giving in and sleeping.

The vast majority of babies slot into the life their parents live.

Yeah there’s a reason so many people say the second one was easier and just slotted in to daily life - they had to!

I've seen a lot of posts on here where posters say the second baby was really difficult/ velcro/ high needs, and there is typically a comment along the lines of: "if we'd had the second one first, we'd have stopped at one."

They are definitely in the minority though. I don't think people raise how looking after toddlers makes having a small one seem easy, and the benefit of being an experienced parent.

Try a snooze shade on the pram.

Don’t be afraid to wake them up if you need to / risk them waking up if you move them / aim to get somewhere really early and have a book and a travel mug of tea with you and accept a 60 min car nap for a 15 min journey.

I think this is not the experience of the majority

I had twins second time around and if anything, I was more strict about routines than I was with my first.

They are close in age though so I got them napping at the same time when possible which was hard at first but amazing when we cracked it.

I don’t know any MN is so anti routine - it was the norm years ago. Now it seems frowned upon. I don’t imagine there were as many fraught Mums when a routine was more common. It seems all these babies get into a routine once they start nursery so it must be possible?

The only mothers I see who are fraught are the ones obsessing over nap times and wake windows.

It's definitely possible. Having a routine made things so easier, especially with twins.

This

How are they mutually exclusive? I was very big on routine and still am… it just didn’t stop me living my life. Baby napped at the same times every day and I was very responsive to his natural daily rhythm but he had to do it on the go because I have a life to live and I wanted to get things done and see people. He napped in the pram.

When he was much older 1 ½-3 then I prioritised staying at home for his nap because it was a blissful 3 hour long one in the middle of the day. But even
then one or two days a week we could factor in splitting that into two car naps if we wanted to do something fun away from home.

Meh my in laws were positively traumatised by their second child who was a velcro baby and MIL had to send the older one to nursery sooner than she wanted because baby no.2 needed so much attention.

Some babies thrive on routine and having consistent naps in the crib. Mine did/still does. And I quite like planning my day, thanks v much.

Just dropping in to say that your anxiety is valid. Everyone has suggestions from their own experiences but babies are all different and so are their mums. It’s definitely worth trying some things like a baby carrier or trying the pram nap again (even if you’re sure it won’t work) or even a contact nap if they’ll sleep in your arms while you sit on a friend’s sofa. But it is okay to be anxious about it too, don’t feel that everyone else can do this easily. Start small, plan for a nap when out and try and meet someone else with a similar aged child - I promise they’ll understand. Good luck x