Catnappers and 'bad sleepers' support thread

[AwesomeSuperTasty]

This is inspired by this napping thread www.mumsnet.com/Talk/sleep/2123505-Any-advice-for-daytime-naps A user commented that they wanted to start a catnapping thread, but seeing as no one did, I thought I might start a 'support group' for all parents of catnapping babies and generally poor sleepers. (I hope the user who prompted this thought will come forward to claim the credit!)

Anyway, it's really just a place to vent and maybe share experiences.

So, I will start. My 7 month old son still catnaps 30 mins at a time, something he allegedly should have grown out of. He also wakes every 90 minutes at night, and wakes up at 5.30 in the mornings. He self settles to sleep and has an early bed time but can't resettle at night. Basically, since he was born, I've not slept longer than 2 hours at a stretch. I'm sure I'm pretty exhausted but stopped registering it.

I do have some questions for anyone who'd like to share.

• If you have an older catnapping baby, how long does she/he go between naps?

-Has anyone managed to sucessfully implement some kind of a napping schedule, for babies who sleep only 30 mins?

And please don't tell me to get a sling...or co-sleep

Decided to go to bed together for third nap as I was frazzled. He's still sleeping after an hour 20, so crisis averted!

We ended up down the 4 nap route, it's been a while since we had 4 naps in a day! I don't really know how it all came about

I don't like him sleeping after 5 these days so I took the gamble on a longer nap if we co-slept. I don't know why he had such crap sleeps earlier either.

Hey ladies,

I'm after some advice please for my 4mo little catnapper. I'm so isolated and feel that I can't get out with her as she is very cranky and cries as she is tired. I've paid for some baby yoga and swimming classes and end up leaving half way through as she's screaming because of tiredness (even though she's only been awake for an hour).

Our day currently looks like this:

7am- wake up and feed
9am-9.45am- self settles for nap
11am- feed
12am-12.35am- self settles for nap then I have to go straight to her and rock her to sleep. She then sleep for another 40mins

3pm- feed
4.15pm- 5pm- nap
5.45pm- bath and massage and feed
7pm- in bed

I just cannot understand why she is so tired after her morning nap and why i have to rock her back to sleep in the afternoon. She completely self settles.

Could someone please help me. I'm sorry of this has been covered but as it's such a long thread i haven't had a chance to read it all yet.

Thank you :-)

Pretty horrendous day today

Up at 7
Napped 9:30-10 and 1-2

Thought we were in for a decent sleep once he passed the magical 45 minute mark but no...

Tried to wind him down for a sleep about 4:30 but he doesn't seem tired. He's a bit fussy in that he needs constant entertainment but no eye rubbing or grizzling. I guess he's dropping his afternoon nap.

4 hours awake so far. Guessing it'll be an early bedtime pretty soon.

Not long after I posted this he ended up having a 20 minute snooze on me after a feed as he suddenly got really cranky and I'm not a fan of pre-7pm bedtimes due to early rising which just exacerbates naps the next day.

He's still tired even now but at least he'll make it through to a decent bedtime now.

we were back to our version of normal today. Yesterdays issues came from a 7am wakeup.
The good news is the last week he's dropped the 3-4am feed (abit of hope for you mrsm!) however hes sometimes waking around 6.30 for a feed then going back to sleep but some days waking at 7 and up for the day which as a catnapper makes positioning naps abit of a battle.

Hi proud

I wish there was some magic advice I could give but we're all in the same boat! My DS is now pushing 8 months and is an absolutely horrific sleeper; on a good day we get maybe 2 hours of nap time spread out from 7am. Today, he had the grand total of 45m from 7am-7pm as he was at nursery and there's too much distraction for the nosey bugger. He was hysterical with tiredness by the time we got home.

I know it's little consolation, but to have a DC that self-settles at 4 months is pretty good going.

Looking at your schedule, your first awake block is very long for a 4 month old. At that age DS was managing-at most-1h 45m awake (he'd only nap for 30m but literally couldn't keep his eyes open any longer)

I'd bring nap 1 forward, making sure your DC is winding down at 830 and asleep for 845. It's only 15m but you may find that this encourages your DD to sleep for 1h and, at that age, the extra 15m may make her more affable during her second awake period.

Move second nap forward to 1130-1145. She could be overtired, meaning she needs more reassurance. It's a big maybe but worth a shot. Hopefully this will make her sleep longer, meaning an awake time of 2h max before her last nap of the day.

Good luck!

Schmoop - I think out LOs are very similar! He has been fairly consistent recently with sleeping through to at least 3am before needing a feed, often nearer to 4 and once he didn't wake to 5:15.

LIke you, the earlier he wakes the easier it is to get him to go back down. Last night he woke around 12:45 and usually would self-settle without needing me to attend to him but he was still doing a low level moany grizzle after almost an hour. I don't really have any way of making him sleep other than feeding so rather than continue to keep me awake I just fed him and he went straight back to sleep. He woke again at 4-something when I fed him and again at 5:30 (ugh) where I brought him in bed with me and he settled without boob until 7.

He has been waking at 6 and coming in with me and sleeping until 7:45-8am so same as you, an early wake up is annoying for a catnapper.

My other issue is that his wake time has extended (he can now stay awake well over 2 hours, is managing 3) so his third nap of the day is regularly getting refused/fought but if he's only done 2 piddly naps previously (like today) then we have a sticky situation in the evening as he can't make it through to bedtime and there's no way I'm putting him down before 7 as otherwise I'd be up for the day before 6.

Mine can do a good stretch before bedtime somewhere between 3 and 4 hours (I think its because daddys home for the last couple of hours so its something different to distract him) but still settles well for naps with a 2hrish wake time at the moment.
He's abit grizzly at the moment during the day but I think he's in the middle of another leap, he's got 3 teeth coming through at once and he's desperately trying to crawl and bum shuffle so he's got a lot on his plate!

@inapickle123- thanks so much for your thoughts. I normally put her to wind down at 8.30am and by the time she actually falls asleep is 8.55am/9am so she's never awake more than 2 hours.

With her 2nd nap I put her down straight after the 11am feed at around 11.40am and she falls asleep by 12 latest. Just a little frustrating as her swimming lesson is at 11 and she's so cranky. I've already paid for them thinking it falls within her 2 hour awake period

Yes, desperately trying to crawl here too - bless him.

I think the max he can do awake before bedtime is 4 hours. He slept 1-2pm today and crashed and burned big time just after 6. He slept about 20 minutes in my arms and still went to bed by 8.

First nap of the day was 45 minutes but I haven't gone up to him yet as he's just waving his arms and legs about. Although I've heard the odd noise if I didn't have a video monitor I'm sure I wouldn't know he was such a crap napper!
I'm tempted to just leave him unless he cries to see if he'll go back to sleep

Mine too- I put her down a little earlier today at 8.20am and she slept for 55 minutes which is fab. However still woke up at 9.25am which means she will def be screaming before her 11am feed :-S

Hi all! How's everyone been? I've not had a chance to check in as I'm, quite frankly, losing the plot. It's been busy at work and on the days that I'm home naps are not pretty much ad hoc.

Absolutely no idea what's happening with DS. He's now 9 months and definitely dropped his third catnap of the day; now we have the joy of making sure two 30-min naps last him till bedtime.

On top of that, he resists every single nap, even the morning one. His wake time is about 3 hours now. No idea what on earth to do.

I know lots of people move their DC onto a schedule now but with us it's pretty much impossible since he'll be up at 5am one day, 7am the next, so one day a nap will be at 8am, the next at 10am, etc....My friend keeps telling me to work out his 'rhythm' and see when he will most likely be tired, and I've tried that but there is just too much randomness and variation from day to day.

He's in his cot right now; husband has been trying for an hour to get him to take his second nap. No chance. Bedtimes have become the same. He used to self settle so easily now he just resists and calls for attention.

And night wakings continue every 90mins, pretty much.

No idea what else to do or try! Hope everyone else is doing better.

Proudmummy - welcome to the thread! Sorry, I don't have any words of advice, we're still struggling with naps at 9 months but hopefully the thread can be of some support.

Mine did not resettle after his 6:15 wake up this morning (couldn't even feed him to sleep, he wasn't interested) so was napping by 8:15 (ugh!) but he stayed asleep until 10!!

We had waterbabies today at 12:15 and his next sleep was in the car seat on the way home and he managed about 30 mins.

He took a third 30 minute nap at 4-4:30 so it's been a game of two halves today!

He went to bed at 7:30. I'm shattered. Watching bake off then going to bed.

DH back tomorrow after 2 weeks away woohoo!

What is wrong with our children???!!!

DS caught a vomiting virus from the snotty girl at nursery who is obsessed with him. Not only will he not eat properly or sleep, his daily reflux vomit has now become repeated torrents of yogurt/fruit (the only things he'll let us feed him for going on 2 weeks) chunder.

The horror of the waves of sick reached new heights when he was sick in my hair last night. This was after straining so hard to poo that he was sick through his nose.

So far he's managed no more than 20m of napping at a time at nursery. I dread to think what tomorrow brings.

Oh no pickle! Your poor DS! I hope he gets better. How does he sleep at night now after the nursery and poor naps there?

Mrsmugoo sounds like you are back on track with some naps at least. Enjoy bake off! I only managed to see the first episode.

It's 5pm over here and DS has just fallen asleep whilst I was feeding him. We are back to super early bedtime which doesn't bother me too much as it will make the jet lag easier when we come home in two weeks.

Right, I'm off to put DS in the cot and then having a glass of wine; even though it's Wednesday and I have work to do!

Ps- pickle, yes, what's wrong with these sleep fighting babies? I am
Starting to think I did /am doing something wrong. Like there is one thing everyone does to get their babies to sleep, and I'm doing it wrong!

Is it just me or do you feel like you spend your whole day obsessing over putting LO to sleep?! My LO must be soooo bored!

Another half decent nap day -

Up at 7
Nap 9 - 10:20
1:20 - 1:50
4:30 - 5 (well it's 5 now and he's still sleeping but I'll start making some noise soon as otherwise it'll be a late night for him)

I know what you mean about spending the whole day thinking about naps Proud, I really try my best not to obsess so much these days but its hard not to!

I think if you can get one extended nap in a day that's a good day :) its been about 3 weeks since my ds did his first nap longer than 45 mins and since then he's done one every few days (usually when its inconvenient!)

We've had the usual 45ish min naps today and he's just woke up from last nap

Just been catching up. Sounds like it's been tough all round!

I've just ALMOST burst into tears on a main road because she would not go down. She was doing her most annoying whining sound as well and I nearly lost it. In the end I gave up and turned around... she closed her eyes the second we got onto our road. Maybe tomorrow this might make me laugh, but not today!

And she was doing so well after the crap of the other week! Still 45min naps mostly, but we're both so used to it now.

Sigh. Currently standing outside of the house (wifi through the window!) letting her have at least 20mins. Any longer and she won't go to bed, any shorter and she won't be able to stay awake for her last bottle which she needs as she's been crap at eating, too. Can't give it earlier as she won't eat enough and will wake up in the night for 2hrs at a time.

Bah. This'll be over soon, right? People keep telling me to enjoy the tiny stage but it's hard when you're dealing with this nonsense. I love her to bits but this has driven me crazy for months!

AND a bug flew into my mouth on the way home

Well DS finished his morning nap at 10am. Its now 1.35pm and he's still awake! He had a complete meltdown when I put him down for his lunch nap at 12, I tried letting him cry for a little while but instead of dying down it got worse and worse so I gave in and brought him back down.

He's on his playmat all smiles and giggles now, I'm watching like a hawk for tired signs but so far I'm getting none. I hope this is a one-off!

P.S. he was definitely tired before I put him down, did everything as normal so only thing I can think is its the next tooth coming through

After 5 days of lovely 1hr20 morning naps, yesterday he woke up after 40 minutes again. Did nothing different. These babies are such enigmas!

He's been asleep 20 minutes so far this morning so currently dashing round emptying dishwasher, shovelling toast down my throat and jumping in shower for 3 seconds in case he wakes in 20 minutes - byeee!