do you wake your baby from their naps?

[eddy26]

i am wondering if anyone wake their DDs/DSs from their daytime naps?

DD is 12 weeks old and until last week had colic in the evenings and wouldnt sleep till 10/11/12pm however for the past 7 (7!) days she has been sleeping from around 7/8pm to 6/7am with 2 or 3 feeds in the night. joy of joys!!

in the daytime however she still fights naps and will only sleep in her pram. i had thought that it was best for her to have three naps a day, a solid two hour lunch time nap with shorter ones in the mid morning and mid afternoon which is what i have been trying to do but they are a real battle. she prefers to sleep for longer in the morning (sometimes two or three hours if i dont wake her).

so, it is best to go with her natural cycle? or should i wake her (she hates this), even if she goes 4 hours or more and try and encourage her to do her main sleep at lunch time?

i would love to hear your views though as i type i am starting to wonder why i do wake her..... but have a pea brain from lack of sleep right now so please help give me some perspective :)

that should read

so, it is best to go with her natural cycle (even if she goes 4 hours or more)? Or should i wake her (she hates this)and try and encourage her to do her main sleep at lunch time?

as i said, pea brain...

dd2 is 14 weeks and her naps are still very erratic
i only wake her if she is still asleep 2hours before bedtime, or if dd1 needs to be somewhere
for dd2, i think overtiredness is the biggest cause of poor sleep, and sleep begets sleep, hence my reluctance to wake

I'd always go with baby's natural inclination, within reason. My own DS used to tuck away 3 x 2 hour naps a day when that small and was pretty comatose all night as well. Very boring child, basically. He trimmed it back to 2 x 2 hour naps - can't remember what age that was excatly. What I do remember was that waking him before the nap had got to a natural end was like poking a bear with a stick!! I'd say, therefore, let her sleep it out during the day and see how it goes. Enjoy the peace and quiet whilst it lasts. Good luck

Let the baby sleep! It's a nightmare to feed or entertain a baby who is tired and was sleeping happily. She will probably need less long naps once her evening colic is sorted, but do let her sleep as much as she wants. Babies can sleep a lot and they will sleep more easily at night if they napped well.

The other day my DD fell asleep at 4pm and just wouldn't wake up from her nap, and as she had had a very tiring day, i just let her. I just fed her briefly before i went to bed at 11 (when she was half asleep) and she ended up sleeping through till 7am. She is 16 weeks now, but up to 14 weeks or so she also had evening colic and needed to catch up on sleep in the mornings.

Just set the scene in the evenings from 6pm onwards by dimming lights, switching off music etc and her bioclock will adapt gradually. My DD was up screaming till midnight till about 12 weeks, then slowly went to bed between 9 and 10 and since 14 weeks or so falls asleep by 7pm. I did no sleep training, no schedule and breastfed on demand and i never wake her from sleep!

I generally go for letting them sleep. Is there any reason why she needs to have a longer sleep at lunchtime, or is it something you feel she ought to have?

I only woke if I had to go somewhere or do something.

thank you all. I am going to let her keep her own hours, unless we are due to go out, and see what happens. i initially started working on getting her to sleep three times a day to solve the fact that unless i helped her she would never drop off naturally. it seems, on reflection, most probably due to tiredness on my part, that i became too focused on the three naps and less on the fact that she is actually sleeping your replies were very helpful and have clarified things in my mind. thank you!!!!

DS1 (11 weeks) settles down for morning nap regular as clockwork, but that nap lasts anything from 45 mins to 2 hours, depending on a lot of factors (growth spurts just one). He's a lot more erratic with his other naps, but i figure as long as he gets at least 3 hours nap time per day i'm happy and so, it seems, is he. I rarely wake him from naps unless we're going out and even then i just try to keep him calm and give him the opportunity to go back to sleep again if needed in the car seat or wherever. He still settles well at bedtime and goes for long stretches at night however long he's napped for during the day. I only ever woke him from sleep when he was newborn and was jaundiced so needed regular 2 and half to 3 hour feeds. Depends on your baby really. Mine is unbelievably easy providing i don't mess around with what he feels he needs and try to impose heavily structured routine on him. If i wake him he's noticably more cranky. He only needs guidance to help him in the right direction and picks up easily on my cues and seems to be naturally getting into his own swing. Others will need more guidance and structure.