Bath time makes baby hyper before bed - change of bedtime routine

[Jellybabie3]

Anyone else experience this? For weeks we've noticed 5mo DS gets very difficult to settle before bed. Its been taking up to 90mins from getting to our room. His arms flail and he chats, stares at the ceiling, curtain, any light in the room (we make it as dark as poss but have a groegg and night light which make shadows). He feeds well but then gets very cranky which either results in me trying to bounce and shush or feed (which ultimately results in comfort feeding). This really does take 60-90min so added on to his bath means hes awake for 3 + hours.

We thought it was overtiredness but have really been nailing the naps atm. Hes stopped feeding to sleep for naps and going down alone. Night times are a nightmare in comparison. Albeit he cant self settle and wakes 5 or 6 times.

His routine is roughly

6-7am wake up
Nap 1 hour 15 later
Awake 1.30 - 1.45
Nap

Repeat irrespective of number of naps until 7-8pm where we would take up for bath, massage, story and feed before bed.

I'm thinking we may need to ditch the evening bath which is shame for both daddy and for a routine hes used to.

Did anyone else have similar and did you find a good routine minus the bath??

My DD loves the bath and gets really excited so it doesn’t really calm her down. I often bath her straight after dinner so about 6ish then she has time to calm down and we just do pj and nappy change, story and feed in the dark. We’ve always kept the bedtime routine consistent but simple

@user1493413286 so what time would you put her to sleep? Does she wake at 6pm and straight to bath?

I'd suggest working on consolidating the naps. Depending on how long and late the naps are there might just be too much sleep so he's not ready for bed when you're bathing him. You've got two choices. You could start bath time later or try to consolidate day time naps to three defined periods:
Morning start at 7am
try to extend morning awake time (slowly - a few mins each day) to 2hrs/2.5hrs, have a 30-45 min nap
then another awake time of 2.5 ish hours and a long nap (2hrs)over lunch.
A third short powernap of 10-15 mins around 3 hours after the long nap no later than 16:45 - don't let baby sleep past 5pm (this nap will be the first to be dropped by 6 months - you'll know when you have a very awake baby at bed time so can reduce the length of this nap to 10 mins then drop when ready) with bedtime routine concluded by 7pm.
If that doesn't seem palatable I'd definitely start by dropping any naps after 5pm and bring bed time forward so baby doesn't get overtired. So more like 6-7 than 7-8.
Good luck!

@fannythrobbing

Thanks!

Yesterday he had:

Up at 7am
Nap at 8.30 45min
Nap at 11am for 2.5 hours
Nap at 3.40pm for 30 min
Nap at 5.40pm for 40mins (awake 6.20pm)

his bath routine started at 6.45pm ish (i shower first)
Didnt get to sleep til 9pm.

Because of SIDS i go up with him to bed (hes in next to me). We stopped watching tv upstairs when hes asleep to see if it was disturbing him. He wont sleep downstairs unless on me so we opted to not stay down there.

Could drop that last nap and put him to bed but geez thats early for me to sit in the dark!! I guess its only a few more weeks...

OK i see now that you mean if I keep the routine I have I am trying to get him to sleep too soon after that 6.20pm wake up so instead of doing bath at 6.45pm I should wait for abit longer OR do as PP suggest and bath then bave wind down time and try to feed bath etc at maybe 8.30pm..

My only concern keeping him awake between naps longer is he gets cranky and is much harder to settle. If i time it right he noda off on my shoulder or i can lay him down. If i get it wrong he screams in my ear fighting it while i bounce and shush.

Thanks!

Yeah that's too much sleep. After that last nap he'll be raring to go for a few hours. Start by reducing the last nap gradually to 15 mins (I think mine (an avid sleep refuser prior to my military routine) dropped it at 6 months).
Alternatively if you want to keep it as is you could make his bed time later - but it'd be around 9:30pm 10pm to start the routine which you may find him sleeping in much later in the morning.
I generally work on 7-7 so I have some evening time to decompress from toddler-hood!
Google the 2/3/4 routine and adopt the bits that work for you.

@fannythrobbing so you mean if i kept that 5.40 40min nap start bathing him at 9.30pm?

Atm we have no evening 😞 because of SIDS we just sit with him. We will start putting him to bed alone at 6months so actually a 10pm bedtime would mean we can atleast stay downstairs with him for now (rather than go to bed at 6pm!!)

DD used to sleep midnight to noon as a baby. Had the same issue with baths - didn’t do them daily anyway as not good for their skin so just had showers/baths with her during the day/early evening a few days a week.

Be prepared for sleep to go haywire at around 8months for the big development leap that happens then. And weaning can impact on sleep too (fewer calories in food than milk).

DD is 5.5 months, she usually has 3 naps, and she sometimes 4 if they are short. Last nap of the day finishes around 4.30 though, 5pm latest, and is 20-30 minutes.
I don't bath her every day because she is DC3 and I don't have time!
So she has nap, dinner about 4.30/5, some awake time, sometimes a bath about 6pm, last feed downstairs at 6/6.30, into bed 7/7.30.

He’s definitely having to much sleep at his age I would try to be asleep for 8.30/9 for 1 hour, trying to push for a 9am nap. A two hour nap after lunch time then at the most a 15 min cat nap around 5, which as said above needs to be stopped by 6 months. I think if he’s generally having longer then 30 mins after 5pm that more then likely is your reason for the late and excited bed time period.

Hmm ok my fault i was going for the rubbing of eyes = sleep and dont wake a sleeping baby oops

My first thought was that bedtime might be a little late? My DS is 8mo and we struggle to keep him up past about 6.30.

We do:
Tea at 5.30
Bath at 6pm
Bottle and story at 6.30. He usually falls asleep feeding.

To contrast, the other night for some reason he just couldn't get to sleep and was wriggling around, flailing and blowing raspberries until almost 10pm! So i think he had got himself overtired.

I let him have as much sleep as he wants but definitely not after 4pm, preferably 3.30pm.

Mine have always needed more sleep/shorter awake times than the Gina Ford type routines suggested. I don't think DD will be dropping the third nap by 6months.
Currently our day goes
Awake at 7am
Breakfast at 8am
Nap 9-9.45/10
Breastfeed at 10.30
Lunch at 11.30
Nap 12-1.30/2ish
Couple of breastfeeds between 2&3.30pm
Nap at 4 /4.30 (30 minutes awake by 5)
Dinner
Breastfeed 6/6.30
Bed 7-7.30
Bottle 10-11pm
Breastfeeds between 3am-7am

Why do you have such an extreme fear of SIDS?

TBH, his is still very much the baby stage. Maybe you’re just trying to enforce a bit too much routine?

Yep I agree I think that late sleep is scuppering you! Maybe try and ditch that (but then consequently bring bedtime forwards a bit if he’s tired). You might find you get into a new routine for a couple of weeks and then he changes it all again anyway, they do that!

Is following the standard SIDS guidance really an 'extreme fear'

Ok so if DS falls asleep at 4.45pm (depending how the other naps have gone) you would still wake at 5pm then aim for 7pm bedtime?

OK I will try keeping him awake between naps longer.

Albeit he woke at 6am today. Zzzz

@Marcine - what do you mean?

I would probably allow 20 minutes if fell asleep at 4.45pm and aim for a 7.30pm bedtime. I tend to work to 7pm if awake by 4.30 and 7.30 if 5pm.

I also tend to keep an eye on the end of the previous nap considering when the next nap needs to be iyswim. So I wouldn't let the lunchtime nap go beyond 2.15/2.30 because the last nap would be too late.

Ok thanks much appreciated. What did you mean Re extreme fear??

Oh sorry I missed a post!

@Battleax i wasnt in a strict routine. As i said i looked for eye rubbing and let him sleep but clearly ive mucked up his bedtime by expecting him to sleep when not tired.

The advice bas been really helpful

Sorry, replying to Battleax's rather odd post.

I don’t get the UK obsession with 7pm bedtimes. DD is 7, a night owl and would only ever be asleep by 7pm if poorly!

At 4.45, provided he had been asleep at some point in the afternoon i'd be trying to keep him going with mealtime and bath. If he seemed really tired we can be a little quicker and have him in bed for 6pm. If he hadn't napped since morning i'd only be letting him have 15 mins at most, as i'd be worried about overtiredness.