Nap advice please!!!!

[NeverGotMyPuppy]

9 month old - used to be a dreadful sleeper, now does 6 30-5/5.30.
The early wakkngs are the problem.
We had a sleep consultant. She said max an hour nap in the morning and 2 in the afternoon with a quick catnap at 7am if he woke early.
Problem is he doesn't do 2 hrs in the afternoon and he always wakes early.

Any advice? I wake him from the morning one under her advice- should I not do that? Should I just ignore her advice?!

Anyone?

He napped for an hr this lunchtime - he had an hr 10 this morning which I woke him from. He also has a quick 15 mins at 7.30.

This is doing my head in. It really is.

At 9 months old I’d put down at 10.30 & 2.30.

You don’t want to reward early waking with an early nap.

Have you tried putting to bed later?
So 7pm?
Does he wake happy or crying?
Anything before 6am I treat as a night wake.
I feed to sleep.
My DD is now 11 months and will sleep 7.30/8 to 8/ sometimes 8.30pm. If she wakes it will be at 3am...and she always wakes half hour after going down at the start of the night and then hour later ...but then usually straight through.
Naps at noon anywhere between 45 and 2 hours...

Try a later bedtime. Longer bathtime to stretch it out a bit...

Books. Last feed and bed.

Hm maybe I'll try 7 tonight. Thanks

I think I'm.jist getting myself utterly stressed about 45 min lunchtime naps. Everywhere I read it says they should have 2hrs.

Try following babies lead. Put them for a nap when they are tired rather than when the claim says you should. Seems to be an unpopular approach on Mumsnet but the most logical.

The idea that a baby can be 'rewarded' by being allowed a nap is batshit.

Cap the morning nap and work hard on extending the lunchtime one.

I'm not convinced that you can use sleep as a reward or punishment so I dont think he sees it like that

@GenevaMaybe how do I do that?! Again he had an hour this morning which I woke him from but only 50 mins for lunch. Consultant said 3 hrs in the day and 7-7 at night- that means that today he is 2 hours under where he should be.

I'm just so stressed about it

@stillmoving j try to go by his cues but sometimes he is yawning about 30 mins after being awake!

At 9 months I did 9.20-10am and then 1-3pm, bed at 6.45.
The morning nap is dropped at 12-15 months anyway so it is ok to begin shortening it.

Iirc at that age my son was doing 2 x 1.5hr naps but his nighttime sleep was nowhere near as good as yours so maybe I was just doing it wrong. He only started doing a really long (2-3 hours) nap once he was down to one nap

Ok your timings sound pretty similar to mine.

But how do I lengthen the nap?!

If you cap the morning nap your baby may extend the lunchtime nap naturally.
Otherwise you can leave him up to 20 mins when he wakes to see if he goes back. Make sure he falls asleep on his own with no movement or feeding at the start of the nap as otherwise he’ll need that to resettle which is tricky.
Of course also he needs a nice full tummy and a comfy place to sleep.

If they’re still doing the 45 minute naps you could push for 3. So 9.30-10.15, 12.45-1.30 & 3.30-4.15.

To clarify, I don’t think that the baby will see it as a reward or punishment but I absolutely think that putting down for a nap at 7am is facilitating an early waking. If they have to make it til 9.30/10 then they’re less likely to get into the habit of early waking.

Only marginally batshit although admittedly worse if I’ve been up since 5.

Good luck OP.

Naps are a proper chore. I’m looking forward to dropping to one.

I did wake to sleep with baby 1 to extend the nap but baby 2 did it on their own at some point, probably around 9 months old iirc

Thanks everyone for your suggestions!
@GenevaMaybe he completely self settles. I just read him a quick story, sing his song then put him down awake.

@missanony that makes sense. Thing is he could sleep for longer than an hr for his morning nap so it just feels wrong to wake him when he doesn't do his lunchtime properly.
You are absolutely right. I was prepared for the sleep deprivation but I wasnt prepared for how long I would spend just trying to work it all out. It's a fucking nuisance.

My 20 month old wakes at 530 whether he has gone to bed at 7,or had a freakishly late night. Whether he naps for one or two and a half hours in the day (or rarely, none). He is an amazing sleeper, puts himself down without fuss... But I realise now that I cannot control these wake up times, and nobody else could either, even if I was paying them loads

I think I probably need to think how you do! I'm following what the consultant said, not much else I can do really.

It all sounds perfectly normal and healthy and very good. However you sound worn out. Why is that do you think?

It does sound like you're obsessing over something that doesn't need fixing. He sleeps through the night and naps without fuss. I get 0530 starts are hard and second a later bedtime to see if it makes a half hour difference. But that might be how your baby is. This might not be a popular solution but I used to plonk my ds between us on the bed and switch on CBeebies! Was the only way to get an extra 45 mins as he napped for only 30nmins x2 per day and dropped all naps before he was 2! We had calm downtime (cuddles and telly mostly) when he needed it. Didn't affect him adversely at all.

Mine did this. For quite a while! Sorry to say.

It's good that he self settles to start with as that's half the battle I think.

I shortened the morning nap drastically (30mins max) and kept him awake until as near to 9am as I could for it.
I then tried to get him to go back if he woke early from his afternoon nap. My aim was 1.5h as that's two 45min cycles. Back to sleep by any means necessary so rocking, singing, patting. Sometimes it worked, other times not. They have to learn to join up their sleep cycles I think.
I also left him in the morning until as near to 6 as I could get. I would go in if he cried but only to lay him down, check he had a dummy and say 'it's sleep time'. We didn't 'get up' until 6ish.
It has worked. He now sleeps until about 6.15/6.30am which is fine for me and has a two hour nap in the afternoon. You will get there!!

@Angelik in actually feeling better than I have done for months but I do worry that I am fixating on his sleep. I am very much a 'try to get it right' person which may not be the best approach. I also get quite anxious.

He woke at 6.20 today after only a 45 min lunch nap so I think j just have to hope the nap gets longer. I dont want to start using sleep props again because he does so well without them.

Sp we are trying ditching the cat nap. He was awake at 5.10 - he is already tired. Sleep consultant said first nap should be maximum of an hour and start between 8.30 and 9.30. Cant see how I'm going to last him beyond 8.30

If my DS woke at 5, I would just put him back to sleep whenever he was tired. Usually 7! I let him nap as long as he wants and I would have a sleep too.
He now wakes regularly between 7.30 and 8.30.
I wouldn't worry about timing naps. They change all the time. Just go by cues and let them sleep as long as they need.

I used to feel the same as mine never slept more than 45 mins at a time, but when we dropped down to one nap it was much easier and started getting a solid 2hrs which was bliss. Don’t get too worked up over the guidelines. All children are different. Mine have always been early walkers too. Perhaps let dc sleep longer in the morning then shorter nap in afternoon?

By sleep props what do you mean?

Some kids just wake early. After 2.5 years I’m awake at 5:30am whatever time I go to bed because dd consistently did from weeks old. I go to bed at 9!