Baby fighting naps

[MylittleP]

Hi there,

New to site so please be patient if I am not navigating it well.
I have a 13 week old daughter who i am starting to get a little concerned about. She 9/10 times will sleep through the night often taking a final feed at 21:30 (despite trying to put her down much earlier it seems to be her pattern) and will wake around 07:30am. She would previously either get her nappy changed and feed then go back down for an hour / hour and a half or get up and go back down within 2 hours. She would then take an afternoon nap especially on days where we have been at a baby class or similar. However she got her 12 week immunisation on Wednesday and from Friday onwards has been a nightmare trying for hours at a time to even get her to take half an hours sleep. It is draining the life out of me as she's clearly tired and grumpy. We go into our room where her Moses basket is and keep it dark, read a short story offer a feed then try to get her to go down. It is now almost 4pm and she's had about three half hour stretches.
We play in the morning and wind down 20-30 mins before expected time. I look for cues which are generally eye rubbing but nothing is working. Even at night now it is taking 1.5-2 hours to settle despite a routine of bath, massage, change of clothes, feed all in the same dark room.
Does anyone have any advice? Could the immunisations really knock her this much?

These phases happen often. I recommend downloading an app on your phone called the wonder weeks if you can. It explains growth spurts and developmental leaps babies go through from time to time. My baby has had various days like this over her 6 months! X

How do you get her to sleep, do you feed to sleep? Have you tried lying on the bed with her and letting her nap next to you, does it make a particular difference at all?

You could also get a sling/baby carrier and see if baby will sleep longer whilst carried?

Thank you for your responses. She used to BF to sleep and this worked fine as when she had enough she went straight to sleep however recently she will feed and then want rocked by my husband. He seems to do it and she's asleep at night quite quickly whereas for me she takes forever. I have tried lying on the bed with her cuddled in and she will sleep on me but then I put her down and she cries. The odd time she is so tired she sleeps for the 30mins then wakes back up. It is taking over the entire day, I don't get anything done or time to myself and she's so grumpy I don't want to take her out with people as she just fusses.the naps she was taking before were really helping her to be happy and as my husband is currenty working 6/7 days I am just getting a bit bogged down now.

If she likes movement, you could try naps in the bouncy chair.

Also worth trying a dummy.

Thank you, you would think she would sleep in one we have a normal vibrate one and a rocker 4mums and she doesn't sleep in either. She will happily sit in one whilst we eat or for short periods of time but after 20 mins max she is done. We tried a dummy last week and I started again over the weekend but she just makes a 'yuck' face and spits it out. I got a Nuk one that is supposed to be similar to the nipple. I am hoping it is just a phase and she will go back to entertaining her naps as she was so happy when she was having them. I feel like she is mega grumpy now and nothing I do is right

It really is just a phase, 13 weeks is still really little x

Unfortunately my little girl is now 17 and a half weeks and this is still going on. Her night sleeping has got worse so she is probably living off of 10-12 hours at best a day. She fusses a lot and if I get her to nap it takes the best part of 2 hours for 45 min of rest if that. I have read loads on the topic and follow a routine. She's just battling like a warrior princess and I'm getting concerned for her health. The health visitor agreed it's not a good amount of rest and has to improve but she couldn't think of anything I haven't been doing

Sorry to tell you my dd was like this and at 19 months doesn't nap anymore at all.
At 6 months she went too two times 30 minutes nap a day then at 13 months went to one times 30-45 minutes a day and at 19 months nada

If you're on a routine, are you actually waiting until she is tired or going by preset times?

Hi there, by routine I mean at bed time we go up to the dark room 15/20mins before to chill then she gets her bath, a short massage, feeds on both breasts then goes down. This usually starts at 19:30 and she is down for 20:30 (hopefully). We have tried starting earlier but she always ends up sleeping for the same time as we need to resettle her. In the day she is normally up for the day around 7am so she will get a feed &a nappy change then be downstairs for a wee play with her dad before he goes to work. Then we stop stimulation & might take another small feed. If she shows signs of being tired I will take her up right away otherwise we aim to go up to the room about 1.5 hours after she's awake in the hope she will be asleep by the 2 hour mark. This doesn't happen often now she usually fights it & I could be in there for an hour+ for a short 45 min nap. I will stay in the room when she's down (&swaddled) until she's in a deep sleep with white noise playing. When she wakes she is wide eyed so we usually either play/go to a wee class/ a walk etc. Her afternoon nap depends on what time she has her morning nap, will range between 12-1pm and I will do same sort of thing. It can take hours & many days she won't sleep at all. She's not even much of a car sleeper maybe get 20mins out of her if you are lucky. I think she has slightly irritated gums as she's started to drool a bit so I have tried some Ashton and parsons teething powder in the morning and evening to try to give her relief if she needs it.
She is capable of sleeping through the night she's done It many times but then she throws herself off and I have no idea why. There is no current pattern to her night waking one night it's 12am and the next it could be 3/4am and she can be up for 1.5 hours. last night she slept 20:30-03:30 then 05:00-07:30 she had 45 mins when I eventually got her down at 10:30, 20 mins at 13:30 and 40 mins at 17:00. If she was happy & content it wouldn't concern me as much but she's grizzly and being so tired makes her fuss when getting fed. Sorry for the long post trying to cram in all the info I can think of.

Hi there! Sorry you're having such a hard time of it, it's exhausting isn't it!?

I can't say I'm an expert, as I'm on here because of issues with my own 9mo. But I've had two sleep resisting cap napping daughters so thought my experience might help.

I see the problems started at 12 weeks. From what I've read, babies change at that age and no longer sleep like newborns (falling into a deep sleep quickly), but start to sleep like adults (falling into a light sleep first, with a sleep cycle lasting 30-45 min). I guess that's what happened here and your baby can't link sleep cycles easily during the day when the pressure to sleep is lower. This goes on until 6 months or later when babies become developmentally able to link sleep cycles (I'm still waiting with my 9mo).

My two babies were the same and only slept for 30min during the day. But, the crucial difference was that I was putting them down for 5 or 6 naps a day!!!! I think your baby is super overtired if she is only having 2 short naps. If she's sleeping for 45 min, I would aim to get her to have 4-5 naps a day. I know what you're thinking - nobody has time for that! But I expect it's taking her so long to fall asleep as she's chronically overtired. Until naps start to lengthen, try to get her to sleep in the quickest way possible - bouncer, buggy or sling. If it takes forever to put her down in the cot, try a different approach. With DD1 I took her out for walks, all day long! With DD2 that was more difficult as I then had a toddler as well, so I used the sling. But crucial is frequent naps! It's no fun having an overtired and grumpy baby.

I think starting the first nap sequence after 1.5 hours is far too late. Try 45 min after her morning wake up time. The first nap should always be after a shorter awake time for others. Tgen aim to start getting her to sleep after 1 hour awake time for every subsequent nap. Don't look for sleepy signs - by the time she's rubbing her eyes it's too late. Look at the clock instead.

I hope this helps! Sorry if I sound a bit brusque but I'm typing quickly as my 9mo is bound to wake up any second!

Good luck!

With my first baby she refused to nap in cot, there was up to an hour's crying to get 45 min nap. So I decided to scrap the cot naps and had 3 or 4 buggy/sling walks a day instead. All of a sudden at 5 months she just started sleeping in cot no bother.

Obviously only works if your baby will sleep in buggy and you don't have other commitments/kids in the day.

MylittleP - 2h awake time is too much. Especially so if it's sometimes longer than that if it takes ages to get her to sleep.

I would aim for 60-90 minutes awake time. Include the time it takes you to get her to sleep I'm awake time. So if it takes 30-60 minutes of settling to get her to sleep, then you have a 30 minute happy/awake time from waking up and in that needs to fit a feed. Then straight back to getting baby to sleep. Yes, it really is that shorter time.

60 minutes to get baby to sleep is excessive. Once out of this over tiredness cycle I would suggest more like 60 minute awake time and then up to 30 minutes settling to sleep time will be more reasonable.

While in an over tired cycle, which you are, work on the basis of "any sleep any how" for about a week. So do everything you possibly can to get baby to sleep after 90 mins max awake time throughout the day. I'd suggest car journeys for emergency go-to-sleep methods. Lots of well timed car journeys. Another thing to try is relentless foot bouncing on the bouncy chair:

• baby wakes from nap, note the time.
• full feed (so you know any cries after this feed are due to tiredness not hunger)
• floor play time
• at first grumble or 1h from waking (whichever hapoens first) check nappy and place in bouncy chair.
• position bouncer on floor in front of sofa and sit on your sofa with your foot on the z-frame of the bouncer
• Get yourself a cuppa and the tv remote. Start bouncing. Be rhythmic, keep the exact same tempo. Baby is likely to need more vigorous bouncing the move over tired, more gentle bouncing when not so exhausted.
• be completely relentless about it. If you have a dummy keep reinserting. Watch tv, largely ignoring baby. With your foot just keep on non-stop relentlessly bouncing. Bounce, Bounce, bounce.
• slow down bounces once aslerp but be prepared to keep going if baby is over tired and wakes easily.
• baby wakes from nap, note time. And you are back to the beginning so repeat:
• full feed
• Up to 1h awake time
• into bouncer. Bounce bounce bounce
• wake
• repeat. Over and over and over again all day long.

Hi all, thank you for all of your responses they are so appreciated.

She is now 21 weeks and sadly things have not changed they have only gotten worse. I have tried shortening the length of time before I attempt to put her down but she just wakes back up. The odd very quick catnap will occur in her bouncer (20mins max) or out in the buggy but they are few and far between. Getting her to even take 30-45 mins is a challenge! I have no idea how she can go the whole day without one. I cannot increase the amount of naps because she hardly ever goes down for one despite my best efforts. I have spent an entire day trying to get her to sleep in any way I can think of with no success and my poor hubby comes in to tears.
She’s been sleeping through the night from 19:30 to around 06:30/07:00 but napping still seems like a foreign concept to her. My health visitor does not seem too concerned given her night sleep but it is worrying me that she is not getting the sleep she really needs. She seems to think she is just very alert and nosy and doesn’t want to miss anything. So many people have said she is very alert for a 5 month old but I don’t have much to compare it to as she’s my first.

She is now ready to transition from her Moses basket to her cot because she’s getting too big. My original plan was to attempt naps in the cot to make the transition to night sleeping in it much easier but that is obviously not going to work at the moment.
We go to baby classes twice a week (baby sensory and a music class) and I spend time playing with her so I know she is getting stimulation prior to a restful period. I try not get her over stimulated so it’s just short bursts before winding down to what I would hope would be a sleep.We also stick to a strict night time routine and that appears to work well. Feeling like such a failure when it comes to napping and worried it is going to cause her harm.

Sorry if I've missed it, but have you got baby taking a dummy yet?

@FATEdestiny she refuses a dummy. To be honest when I had her I really didn’t want her to have one but for a while when she was very little she was feeding on me as comfort and it was getting uncomfy so I tried. We tried a few different ones but she just spits them out. I persisted by putting it back in but she was having none of it just screws her face up and chucks it out. She uses Sophie the giraffe as a teething comfort and her toy lion but not to fall asleep with.