Just after some pearls of wisdom please?

[janski31]

My daughter is nearly 20 weeks old and started the gina ford routine on saturday to try and get her daytime sleep in order as come t time she is exhausted and can sometimes cry for up to an hour.

Her nightime sleep has always been ok but last night we had to put her down at 6.20 as she was shattered meaning she was awake just after 5 this morning.

The problem is she cant sleep longer than 40 minutes, she is in her cot her room is completely black have tried stroking her etc she wants her dummy but every time she spits it out she crys( doesnt need it at night though).

Have recently read once they get to between 5 and 6 months they then have the ability to sleep for longer at nap times so do you think i should continue or scrap it and continue to spend my whole day trying to get her to have cat naps as that she is all she is capable of?

Many thanks for your replys in advance.

We had exactly the same problem with DS - he was a serial 40-minute napper at that age and it drove me berserk! I used to try resettling him, leaving him in the cot until an hour was up etc but with very mixed results (usually failure). He used to have five 40-minute naps a day and I seemed to spend the whole day putting him down for naps, and he would just get more and more tired as the day went on. And then when he got to around five-and-a-half months he suddenly started to nap for longer occasionally and now, at 7mo, he usually naps for around an hour and a half. Bliss!

I'd just go with the flow tbh and try not to stress too much - I think there's very little you can really do and hopefully she will grow out of it. Does she sleep for longer in the pram? Maybe you can take her out for a walk to try to get her to nap for longer? Or put her in the sling when you're in the house?

Ah there is light at the end of the tunnel!

She always sleeps 40 mins whether we are in the car on a long journey in the pram where ever really always 40 mins!

Did you do anything at 5 and a half months to encourage the longer naps? or did it just happen?

Yesterday after she woke for 40 mins i tried for nearly an hour and a half without success to get her back to sleep! then I read on the internet if they havent gone back to sleep within 15 mins give up as they are fully awake!

Also she is very nosy so if put her in her sling she would just be looking round all the time I think she finds it hard to switch off! Like me ha ha

Thank you for replying.

It all sounds so familiar...I'm guessing you have one of these pesky 'alert' babies too

If he woke up crying, which he generally did from the later naps, I would usually try to resettle him for about 15 minutes so at least he would maybe get the idea that he had to stay in the cot for longer. Sometimes blasting a hairdryer next to his head seemed to work! But I'm not sure anything made any difference tbh - I think he just slept longer when he was ready to.

DS3 is nearly 6 months and a napper too. The best advice I could give is don't stress about it (I know that sounds glib and I do know it is Very Frustrating when they nap, so you have my complete sympathy).

I would suggest trying to stretch the length of time between naps so your DD isn't ready to go to bed so early and maybe a bit more tired when she does nap. I have found that taking DS3 outside when he is tired/grizzly works wonders as it is just too fascinating to carry on grumping-use her nosiness to your advantage! I tend to just grab him, keys (his brothers and sister if they are around!) and carry him around the village for a bit.

I find this works really well between 5-6 pm when I really don't want him to have a nap before bedtime.

I really don't have naps 'sorted' but something I've found usually successful in getting my 5 mo to have a long nap is this: settle for a sleep in the pram, when he wakes take him for a walk immediately, without talking/picking him up) and he usually goes back to sleep. I think the idea is that if you do this for 7-10 days they should get in the habit of a long nap and you can move the nap to their cot.

Also if I give a short top-up BF before naps he can sleep longer.

I struggle with naps generally and some days feel like I spend all day trying to get him to sleep!

Thanks for all your replys some really great advice here!

Dont want to speak to soon but seem to have had a little bit more success today put her down just before 12 and she was asleep more or less straightway she woke after 40 mins (surprise) but i wen in soothed her didnt make eye contact and just kind of lurked in her room in the darkness as soon as she started stiring again i just stroked her this took about 20 mins.

Was just about to post that and she woke up! Anyway just did the same thing will prob give up at 2.