We have been experiencing some sleep problems lately. Dd is now almost 9 months.
She has been sleeping quite well the last few months , 7-7.30 till between 6 and 7, sometimes if we're lucky even a little later although generally not. Of course there are the odd bad days when she has been ill or sometimes for no apparent reason but these aren't frequent.
But the last week hasn't been good. She has been fine for a few nights but has had at least 3 or 4 bad nights. A bad night usually consists of great difficulty in settling her, which has been the case for the last week or so and then 2 or 3 wake ups during the night. She used to go down so well but recently she takes AGES, fussing for sometimes an hour. Why is this, because she wants to be up with us / she thinks she's missing out ?
Last night was the worst, she settled fine, no problem but from 10.30 onwards it was like having a newborn baby again, or worse. She was awake every couple of hours crying and was hard to settle - I'm knackered ! Any advice ?
The funny thing is that she stayed at my mums on Monday night because mum bought dh and I a night away for my birthday a couple of months ago and it's the first time I've left dd overnight so I was anticipating all sorts of problems but she was fine , went to sleep like an angel and slept right through till 6.30 with no wake ups !
I have been considering cutting her afternoon nap, normally between 1 and 2.30 so she's more tired and only has 1 1-2 hour nap in the morning but I don't know if she'll last that long. Also it doesn't seem to equate, when she has a bad night and how much sleep she has during the day because sometimes she'll have had a lot of day sleep and will sleep soundly all night and others she will have a little day sleep and will sleep soundly all night.
Her nap times are regular but the length varies. Normally between 1 - 1.5 hours but sometimes as little as 45 mins or as much as 2 hours.