Please criticise and help with 5mo sleep - mainly need advice on extending naps

[DermotOLogical]

@FATEdestiny and others

Currently 5mo day looks something like this
630 wake and feed
830 nap for 45 mins to an hour
930 wake
12ish nap for 45 mins
Wake until 3ish
Nap for an hour until 4
Bed time 7pm

Sleeps til 8, needs settling and then wakes at 11 and 3 for feeds.

Naps are in the pram and he needs rocking. He will self settle overnight.

I've tried rocking him when he wakes during the day and he just screams.
He doesn't seem particularly irritable but I'm worried he's not sleeping enough.

Any help or ideas?

If he's not irritable or clingy then he's getting enough sleep, so don't worry. A content baby should be happy to be left playing under the playgym (or whatever) without much demand for being picked up and whatnot. I would always take clinginess (wanting to be carried it held and being unhappy being put down to play independantly) as the first sign of needing more sleep.

So given that children all have different sleep needs, if he is content on the amount of sleep he gets, then don't worry.

Working on extending the first two naps is avoid idea, I wouldn't be keen on the teatime nap going longer than an hour though.

Is the rocking you mention in your arms, or the pushchair? Rocking in your arms is a harder habit to break since it is about more than just movement. In the pram, the idea is to start rhythmic movement before baby starts stirring awake. That way when baby first leaves the deep sleep phase and enters the light sleep phase, you give the extra help so baby doesn't wake from the light sleep but instead goies into another deep sleep. Once baby wakes up, you've missed the opportunity to extend the nap. My DD used to scrunch her face up as she first stirred from a deep sleep, or make a whine noise - I'd start the movement at this point.

"a good idea" (Not "avoid idea" - autocorrect not working in my favour)

He gets rocked in the pushchair. I'm at home a lot this week so will work on extending the nap.

He will happily play on playmats etc, once he gets irritable I know it's nap time.

One other thing, at night he reliably does 11 and 3 for feeds, some mornings he wakes again at 430. At this point I move him to his own room (I know I know) and he goes back down until 630/7. Some mornings he goes all the way through. Any idea what could be causing this?

I wouldnt be feeding after 11pm at 5 months, on the whole anyway. I'd keep the option of a middle-of-the-night feed as a last resort for occassional nights if baby wasn't settling. But it would only be on rare, occassional nights. I would be expecting most nights to involve wake>resettles, but not feeds. I would also be having regular nights without an 11pm dreamfeed too by 5 months, so no feeds at all for 12 hours.

If two feeds are needed routinely at night, then baby needs more calories in the day is aim for at least two extra feeds, but possibly 3 or 4 extra feeds in the daytime, to be sure.

Then go cold turkey on night feeds.

Remember no night feeds does not mean no night wakes. It just means you get baby used to be settled back to sleep in the night without being fed.

I was bottle feeding by 5 months. I would feed every 2h throughout the day - so around 7 or 8 full feeds per day. Say feeds at 7am 9am (9-11 nap) 11am 1pm (1-3 nap) 3pm (4.30-5/5.30 nap) 5.30pm 8pm and then sometimes an 11pm feed, sometimes not.

There were still wake ups in the night. I had baby in the cot next to my bed (until about 12m) so would do all night wakes without picking baby up, by leaning into cot to settle with the dummy and my touch.