Short naps

[Sunnyx]

My lb is 5 months and recently not feeding to sleep in my arms as well. I've managed to get him to nap in his cot and he self settles well after a bit of stroking, patting, shushing etc. Problem is now he's waking up after about 30-40 mins and doesn't seem to enter next sleep cycle. He has 3 naps a day but he seems a lot more tired now. He used to have one long nap (in my arms) of around 2 ish hours and 2 short naps.

Any tips for getting him to nap longer? When did your baby drop down to two naps...I've read it's between 3-6 months.

I wouldn't drop to 2 naps until your naps are extended without needing a resettle.

For now, the trick to resettle is to catch baby before he wakes up. 30-45 minutes is one sleep cycle. A sleep cycle involves a light sleep, into a period of deep sleep and then back into light sleep. If baby is to link sleep cycles it involves noticing baby entering a light sleep phase and killing back into a deep sleep before actually waking up from that light sleep phase.

After a few days/weeks of helping baby link cycles by resettling, baby should be better able to do it with less and less help until staying asleep for more like 90m. It is then that is drop to 2-nap days.

For resettling to extend naps, I kept naps in the bouncer to make resettles easier. In a cot it either means staying with baby and watching to notice the light sleeping "tell", or predicting and anticipating when it'll be. Then do your in-cot settling method while baby is asleep to move from light sleep back to deep sleep before baby actually wakes up.