6.5month old bedtime advice

[Carriecollins]

Hi guys, wondering if I can call on you for some advice......

I have a 6.5 month old baby boy harrison. Up until about 6 weeks ago he would cluster feed continuously from around 6 til 11pm then fall asleep until around 5am. As the cluster feeding gradually stopped I have tried to make his bedtime earlier but so far this has not been successful.

I tried at first to do his bedtime routine (bath, massage, story, feed) 15-30mins earlier but whereas he is usually sleepy and ready for bed at 11pm, he is wide awake and gets upset and really wakes himself up even when I have tried to put him to bed at 10.30pm.

He tends to be ready to sleep at 8pm (I'll put an example of an average routine below) so I have tried doing his routine earlier so he is ready for bed at 8pm. He often will go to sleep but will treat it like a nap and wake up 1.5 hours later crying and wide awake. It is then very difficult to get him back to sleep before midnight on these occasions. The same goes for if I try at 9pm.

He also has become quite unsettled in his sleep. Once he is asleep he will stir a number of times with a cry. I wait to see if it is just a sleepy cry but 9 times out of ten if I don't get there quick enough to pop his dummy back in and give him a stroke he will wake himself up fully. He is still in his co-sleeping crib because of this and of course my MIL is certain that this is why he wakes (because I disturb him or he knows that he will receive my attention if he cries out) I am certain however that I do not disturb him as I am usually awake reading quietly with a night light and pretty certain that he doesn't really even know where he is when he stirs. I also do not need to feed him to get him back off again so it is not for this. I would consider putting him in his nursery but the lack of sleep currently is tough enough, getting up and down 10 times a night would be even worse!

Average day
5am breastfeed
7.30 breastfeed
8.00 awake for day
9.30 breakfast and water
10.30 nap (1hour)
12 breastfeed
2.00 nap (1hour)
3.00 breastfeed
5.00 nap (45mins)
6pm dinner and water
7.30 breasfeed
8.00 catnap (20 mins)
9.00 bath, massage, story
10.30 breastfeed
11.00 asleep

So I'm a bit unsure what to do for the best. Does anybody have any experience or advice firstly on how to possibly get him to bed earlier and/ or any reasons why he might be so unsettled in his sleep?

Thanks for reading, any advice would be greatly appreciated ☺️

My 6.5mo gets really moody beyond 8pm so i do bath bottle story bed from 6.45 so she is asleep by 8 but she wakes up to cluster feed pretty much every hour but falls asleep each time so i just leave her in bed between each feed. Maybe do the routine earlier then some sleep training if he does wake up? Or do bathtime half an hour after dinner and dont breastfeed to avoid the catnap but possibly do that when he wakes to get him back to sleep. Looks like hes getting enough food through the day though, mine hates milk so shes been on solids since 4.5 months and is now having 3 meals and a bit of a snack and will only take a bottle uf shes sleepy so ive always had to feed to sleep to ensure she gets enough calories! Im no expert by any means just felt id offer an opinion. Hope you get sorted soon :)

It looks like your whole day runs a couple of hours later than mine! I'd be tempted to get up and start the day at the 7.30 bf and try and get to two longer naps in the day at around 10ish and around 3ish so that your baby is ready for a 7.30 bedtime. what happens between 9.30 and 10.30 bf (after bath etc before last bf)? How does he nap?