Daytime naps nightmare !!!

[Tidders]

Hello there, I'm sort of new to Mumsnet but love reading everyone's messages and now I need your help !! But I don't know what all the
codes mean so talk to me like I'm 2 which I'm sure loads of you are brilliant at !! My nearly nine month old girl has started to become a daytime sleep nightmare...used to do 1hr 40 mins at 9am (she wakes at 6.30am) and then and hour at 3pm after her bottle, but now it's 45 mins at 9.30am (tried moving her morning nap forward to make her more tired) and then 35 mins sometime in the afternoon...she is therefore VERY grumpy and restless during the day. She has recently started nursery two pms a week but has seemed to settle in well...she also has food intolerances so don't know if it's that or if I need to get strict and start CC (know what that code means !!) She generally sleeps well at night, is put in cot awake and sleeps 11 hours, however I have (in desperation) started cuddling her to sleep during the day..perhaps this is my problem...HELP !!!

Hello Tidders, welcome to Mumsnet. dd = dear daughter, ds dear son, dh - dear husband, dp - dear partner etc.
If your dd wakes at 6.30 having a sleep at 9.30 am sounds about right and 30-45 minutes should be all she needs in the morning, that is assuming you want her to have a long sleep at lunchtime? If she has 30 mins at 9.30 she should be ready for a nice kip at about 12.30 and will probably sleep for a couple of hours. If she could do that you will probably find that a 9 months she would then be quite perky in the afternoon and not need another nap. What time does she go to bed in the evening?
I follow GF which is Gina Ford and she suggests that a baby up to the age of 12 months needs about 3 hours sleep per day and at 9 months this is usually split into a short nap in the morning and a longer nap at lunchtime.
I'm not sure whether you follow a routine with your dd or whether a long lunch-time sleep would suit you?
It sounds to me like your dd is grumpy because she isn't having enough sleep during the day. It may take a while for her to settle herself for her day time naps but as she sleeps so well at night she is obviously able to do this.
Hope I haven't offended you with my suggestions from the Gina Ford - it's certainly not everyone's cup of tea but it sure worked for my dd who is now 26 months and my ds who is 5.5 months.
HTH (hope this helps.....sorry if you knew that one already )

my ds (now 10 months) gradually shortened his lunch time nap from nearly 2 hours to just over 1 hour when he was about 6 months old and was tired and miserable in the afternoon. I did cc when he woke up (went in every 5 mins) until the 2 hours were up and the next day he woke after 1 hour 15 mins, cried a bit and went back to sleep. Most days since then he has slept 2 hours. I think it's really important not to rush in when babies first wake up, but allow them time to resettle themselves if they are still tired (not that I'm saying you're rushing, Tidders!).

Advice please - my DS, now 4mths (we have followed GF from birth)seems happy to sleep up to an hour and a half for his morning nap (GF says should be 45mins) but his lunchtime nap has gone out of the window - if we are at home he will have an hour almost to the minute, far less if we are out somewhere (Should be 2 1/4hrs).

He then has a catnap at around 4.30 of around 15mins though I let him have a bit longer if lunchtime has gone wrong - up to half an hour. My question is - he always settled really well at 7pm but the last few nights has woken crying after between 20mins-45mins, and I wonder if you think his poor lunchtime sleeps could be the cause - ie is he getting himself overtired so he can't settle well?

I know it sounds strange to think he could need MORE sleep to help him sleep well but these disturbances do seem to have come since I have given up trying to coax him back to sleep at lunchtime (the only way I used to manage that was to feed him BTW....maybe CC would work, but when I've tried he has screamed for at least half an hour).

What do you all think ? Sorry for long and rambling post!

If he's sleeping for 1.5 hours in the am then he doesn't have a problem settling himself to sleep if he is tired. He sounds like he's waking when he gets into light sleep at lunchtime, and won't resettle because he's not tired enough. I would try cutting back on his am sleep to 45 minutes (go and open curtains etc and sit by his cot until he stirs. You should (she says hopefully) then find he is more tired at lunchtime and willing to sleep longer.

pumpkin2:

Maybe you're right.

Dd and I followed GF very very loosely and we had a similar problem: I started waking her up after an hour or so (because I think GF is far too rigid) and it seemed to solve the problem.

However dd's lunchtime naps were never less than an hour so we may not be talking about exactly the same thing. Plus there have been times when she would wake up occasionally and she settled down again of her own accord.

so, erm (not sure what I'm trying to say now! ) - maybe try cutting the morning nap by a little. Maybe just wait and see. Does he seem tired and go straight to sleep when he goes to bed?

Hi all,
yes, he does seem tired and settles quickly for all his naps and at bedtime - I watch for his tired signs before putting him down, usually after 2 - 21/4 hrs he is ready for a nap. I only started allowing a longer nap in the am because lunctime was going wrong every day - perhaps I do need to cut it back to the proper amount again and see - maybe feeding him just b4 lunch nap wd help though in the past when I have tried it he still wakes and screams.....

Hi Pumpkin2, sorry to hear about the wakings.

My DS usually has three (some days four) 45mins naps throughout the day as he never seems to get past the light sleep waking, but he doesn't seem any more fractious because they are short. Some nights he too wakes after 30-45mins after going to bed at 7/8pm and I find that those are the days when he hasn't had the full daytime quota (ie. 3-3.5hrs) for one reason or another. I also find that on the VERY odd days he does have a longer nap in the morning, or two naps before lunch, he doesn't settle well in the evening as too much sleep was packed in the early part of the day and he gradually gets more crabby as his naps get shorter before bedtime.

Does any of this make sense?!?! Sorry

What I'm trying to say is perhaps a change in shorter morning nap and longer afternoon nap might help? The even spread of time for each nap seems to keep DS happy.

Hairdryer CD still working and now I've got a 10min CD so all I have to do is get up and turn it on and go back to sleep! When I do awake sometime later, CD is off and DS is snoring!

Thanks Karen! Glad to hear the CD is still working for you ! Good advice re the timing/duration of naps, I'll certainly give that a try. Thanks

Got a couple of bits of info but I'm not sure who asked for what so I'll just say them and hope they may help someone.

Natural sleep patterns go in approx 45minute cycles. So sometimes baby will start to grizzle after that so you go to get him up when in actual fact he may just go back to sleep again if left for a while.

Secondly I read a very interesting article in Junior a month or 2 ago about naps. (You can look back at previous issues on their website)
Anyway a very interesting thing was that people advise you to cut out a late afternoon nap as baby gets older to encourage better nights. They said that a short (15mins or so I think) nap late in the afternoon can actually improve nighttime sleeping. Got to say, on the days that ds has good sleeps in the day and a lateish nap, he goes down much better and for longer.
HTH