Struggling with 4mo bedtime - critique my sleep routine, please??

[RevoltingPeasant]

So DD has always gone to bed late - when she was born, about 2am. People said it would get earlier, and it did - shifted to 11pm. Where it stuck. From 2mo to now, 4mo.

Trouble is, she is going to nursery in 8 weeks. She can't be doing 8am-5pm at nursery and then not going to bed for another 6 hours So I've unilaterally decided to move her bedtime earlier.

...with mixed results! She will go down okay around 8.30pm but not stay down. Last night between going to bed and midnight she needed properly resettling four times! What am I doing wrong?

Today we did this:

She lay in till 9.45am as she seemed tired.

9.45-12pm, up, playing, feeding, etc.

12-12.25 micro nap on bed with me.

12.30-2.45 out for a walk, coffee, fell asleep on way home for half an hour

2.45-5pm playing, stories, tummy time, picked DH up from station early

5pm tired and cross, napped about 40min on bed with me

5.45-7.45 playing

7.45-8.25 bedtime routine of nappy free play, topping and tailing, pjs on, upstairs, feed to sleep on bed

In bed and asleep by 8.50

9.10.... Just woken up again. DH gone up.

What should we be doing , please??!

Hold her until she falls asleep, whether that's 7pm or 11pm. During the day let her sleep when she is tired, in a sling, in a moving pram, in your arms etc. It does not matter a jot. Nursery is irrelevant. If she is tired during the day she can sleep there. She is a baby. Whilst this feels like an eternity it will not last forever. Please stop stressing. There are years yet to establish routines and you will exhaust yourself going into battle over this, something you can well do without if you are returning to work.

Your late wake up time will also directly affect body clock and bedtime. If she's going to have to be at nursery at 8am when you are back at work - you are likely to need her up, say 6.30-7.00am ish in order to fit in her breakfast as well as getting yourself ready.

I would start with making sure she is woken by 7am at the latest, to get her used to this for nursery. This will change all of your timings, so the rest may be moot points.

Taking out everything else, sleep looks like this:

• 9.45am wake (2h 15m awake)
• 12.00pm sleep (0h 25m asleep)
• 12.25pm wake (2h 50m awake)
• 2.15pm sleep (0h 30m asleep)
• 2.45pm wake (2h 15m awake)
• 5.00pm sleep (0h 40m asleep)
• 5.40pm wake (3h 10m awake)
• 8.50pm sleep

I would aim for less awake time. At this age I was aiming for DD to be sleep for 30-45 minutes in every 2 to 2.5 hours through the daytime.

Your last wake up time before bedtime is especially long. Could you be missing tired signs? What if you tied to get her to sleep earlier? Could you resettle back to sleep by rocking, bouncing, dummy or anything?

For the first 5 months or so we followed the EASY Routine on a 2 to 2.5 hour basis through the daytime. This would mean in every 2 hours through the day DD would have one feed and one sleep - usually a 30-45 minute nap.

EASY basically means you follow a predictable structure, but not necessarily predictable timing. So you find a structure that works for your LO and follow that. For my DD, it worked on a 2-2.5h structure, maybe your LO would prefer a 3 hour structure? Whatever fits. For us it would be:

E - Eat - Feed. This marks the start of the structure

A - Awake - Activity (play, go out, whatever) - 60-90 minutes for us, or until tired signs shown

S - Sleep - We did bouncy chair and dummy. Your DD seems to like co-sleeping on he bed, that's fine too. The idea is to keep resettling baby back to sleep until the end of the EASY cycle. For us that would be 2 hours from being fed. So once that point is reached, leave baby to wake up naturally (may sleep for longer, hence the flexibility). When baby next wakes, feed and so re-start the next EASY cycle.

Y - You Time - this is just to make the acronym. Basically means you time when baby is sleeping.

Sounds like a perfectly normal 4 month old - have you looked at the Wonder Weeks site re sleep regression?

She will sleep (eventually) - also remember, any tips you are given will work for one baby but not necessarily any other.

8 weeks is a long time for things to change when they're this little

It sounds counterintuitive, but the more a baby sleeps during the day, the better they tend to sleep at night. (Talking about babies here, not toddlers/small children). Just like the more water you drink during the day, the more water you WANT to drink during the day.

Work on getting her to take longer naps and the night time routine will sort itself out. Him seen need to be taught how to sleep, like they need to be taught everything else. It's all natural to a fashion (eating, toileting, sleeping), it's just that we adults need them to do it the way we want them to. They just need to be trained.

Books by Dr Sears, Naomi Stadlen's "what mothers do especially when it looks like nothing", and the "no cry sleep solution" book are full of helpful suggestions and tips.

Thanks all :)

So I took onboard your feedback about more naps and you were all right!

Today we did

8.30 awake, feed, dress, ready for day

10.15 feed and leave in buggy for baby group, she naps 15 min on way there

10.30-12 massive play session at baby group - her little eyes were practically propped open by the end!

12-1.30 walk home via a very circuitous route, she sleeps all the way

1.30-3.30 play

3.30-4 mini nap on bed

4-5.15 big intense play session

5.15-6.40 big walk, she sleeps all the way

7pm pick up DH, play

7.50 bedtime routine of nappy free, bath, pjs, feed to sleep

Took about 30 min to settle her properly but then not a peep since :) just went up and she is sleeping deeply and peacefully - am very grateful!!