Anyone read Ferber's book?

5 replies

Ruddy · 09/06/2002 08:43

DS, 7 months, is waking up at 5.15am (having gone to sleep at 7pm) despite blankets pinned up to curtains etc! While in a bookshop the other day, I read some of C Ferber's book hoping for some tips. I didn't find it that accessible but, he seemed to suggest delaying ds's morning nap. At the moment ds does down at about 8.15am as of course he is v tired by then. Ferber seemed to advise trying to delay this nap until about 10am as the baby is apparently using the early nap as an extension of his nighttime sleep.

Thing is, how do I keep poor old DS awake until 10? He'll be exhausted and surely then won't sleep very well. Has anyone tried this and did it work? Yours, in anticipation.

OP posts:

bayleaf · 09/06/2002 17:23

Yes I've read his book ( Think it's Richard Ferber)I don't know HOW you can keep baby awake if he is actually falling asleep as opposed to just tired/grumpy - but yes it does defintely work - or did for us - so at least try and delay morning nap as long as possible.
And an added bonus is that now dd at 16 months has dropped morning nap altogether she now sleeps from 7pm to 8am every day!!!!

Original poster

Ruddy · 09/06/2002 18:28

Thanks Bayleaf, if you look at this board again could you tell me what happened with your dd in more detail? Did you manage to hold out until 10am? How long did it take to change her wake up time? And what time did she then wake up? Thanks again for answering.

OP posts:

pupuce · 10/06/2002 09:12

If your baby can't hold on until 10 AM, you can slowly build it up. Especially as he currently wakes so early, you can't expect him to be up between 515 and 10 - on the first try.
Gina Ford recommends 9 or 930... for a 45 minutes nap and then a longer lunchtime nap 1215.

bayleaf · 10/06/2002 13:24

Yes - very much as Pupuce says ( dd is a GF baby) - we never held out till 10 ( didn't even try to as my aim was GF times ie 9.30am - but I had been bending her rules as dd started waking early so that often she was going back to bed at 8.30. I simply tried to keep her up ''as long as possible'' towards a goal of 9.30 am - it varied day by day as to how close that would be just depending on how late she had woken etc - the ''breakthrough' for me was understanding that by making her morning sleep earlier when she woke earlier I was exacerbating the problem.
It is almost impossible to say how quickly it improved things - probably weeks not days - maybe 2 weeks? But I'm guessing - a few monhts further on and it all seems so long ago and so vague!
HTH...

bayleaf · 10/06/2002 13:26

Flip