Catnap baby

[Mellin]

My 16 week old has in the last few weeks turned into catnap baby. Every daytime nap lasts exactly 30 minutes (I could set my watch by her).
It doesn't matter if it is in the pram/sling/cot/car the timing is exactly the same. I always leave her when she wakes in the hope that she will drop back to sleep but she is fully alert on waking and ready for action. By the mid afternoon it catches up with her and she becomes grouchy but still isn't interested in napping longer. Nightime sleep is ok (she is bf and wakes 1-2 times during the night).
Has anyone been through the same? Any tips for extending naps or do they grow out of it? [fingers crossed emoticon]

they grow out of it - my dd never really slept for longer than 30 min (to the second) until she was about 6 mths. i started trying to catch her before she woke up fully and shush her back to sleep which sometimes worked. i used to try it if she was asleep arounf lunchtime/early pm to encourage her t have 1 longer sleep in the middle of the day. i would sit there patiently from 25 mins onwards. she has a dummy so if that had fallen out i would replace it as she stirred and start shushing. if it was still in i would make sure it stayed in. i sometimes had to hold her hands to stop her from knocking it out until she went back to sleep. prob worked about 75% of the time and used to take about 10-15 min but was worth it. she is now 7.5 mths and has 3 fairly reg naps per day with a long one at lunchtime . (which will now go completely to pot as soon as i finish posting this.) hth

My daughter often only does 30-45mins too, have sat by her cot shushed her and its worked sometimes. She is 3.5 months old and many people say when she gets more active she will sleep for longer - she is rarely awake more than 1.5-2hrs. Do you go round the house like a madwoman trying to do all the chores in the window too? Just got her down, off to do my whirlwind.

My DD is 7m and also catnaps at most 40 mins twice a day. By bedtime she is really grouchy! She is ready to go to bed by 6pm!

The best way to try and extend naps is as suggested, wait until just stirring and then do whatever you did to get them to sleep in the first place and they should go off again. Eventually 2 small naps are supposed to become one.

Sometimes worked for me! I would love her to have a long nap - just to give me a break!

Thanks for the replies, I am going to try the shushing technique tomorrow. Good idea dcb to concentrate on the midday nap, hopefully she will be tired enough by then to be conned by the shushing!

Tapster I know what you mean about the whirlwind, sometimes I feel like that looney tunes character taz the devil!

Hi Mellin - it will get better. Remember my dd doing exactly the same thing and then eventually slept longer, and now she just catnaps again! I live in the hope that the phase will pass again.

Needless to say I am expecting Kim & Aggie to knock on my door any minute. Bribed my two other children the other day to hoover and dust - what an evil mother I am...

It's really tough and I wish you loads of luck in getting them extended, but... I have a 30min napper (again you could set a clock, he is 8 mos) and I tried everything anyone suggested to try to extend them. I got in a right state over it believing he must need longer naps. The day I accepted that's him, that's the way he is, and worked around it I was so much happier. Now I look at the positives - I can time his nap for the car, it doesn't interfere with timings for the day etc etc. It's hard as you don't have time to yourself, or to do jobs but the flip side of that coin is DS has had to learn that during some of his waking hours he has to play independently to enable me to do chores e.g. sit in the highchair with toys whilst I do cooking etc. I jsut accept he's an alert little guy who power-naps and doesn't want to miss anything. Come 7pm he's out for the count and generally sleeps well at night.

Wise words Weegle. I have discovered this time around that motherhood is all about acceptance - and that once you accept that your baby only catnaps, or doesn't yet sleep through the night, or anything that the books say they're supposed/not supposed to do, its like a weight lifted from your shoulders.

I have been tempted on many occasions to take every damn baby book I have and have a big bonfire in the garden. I think they are turning us all into stress-heads that baby doesn't do what it says on the tin...

Ds (now 8mo) has always done this. I just think it is the way he is - who says they should sleep longer anyway?!