Daytime naps

[Franktank19]

Hey my 4month old has gone 10-12hrs straight at night since about 9weeks so I know I am lucky however due to this he doesn’t sleep during the day - albeit perhaps in the car or out In pram for walks...I sometimes get him down a few hours after he wakes but only with a bottle and only lasts 20mins or so...I find myself going out all the time as so hard to stay in all day trying to occupy and he gets grouchy as tired but fights it!
With winter coming I want to try and get him to sleep during the day if possible?! Help needed :)

He will often fall asleep in my arms with a bottle but I put him down in his dark room and he wakes up or cry’s so much! Should I let him cry? If so How long for? Will it not make him worse but getting so worked up? X

I have a four month old as well, and naps are such a challenge! One thing I've found really works is focusing on his "awake window" - which at 4 months should be around 1h15-1h30ish. So as soon as he awakes, I work out when he should next be going down. If I just wait til he starts looking knackered he is usually over tired and won't go down for AGES and then only sleeps for 20minutes or so. By doing this fairly religiously for the past few weeks I'm now getting 2-3 naps in his cot (but I still need to do a lot of shushing and patting and use a dummy - but we can't make it all perfect!!)

That’s great thank you! So he usually wakes around 6:30 has a bottle and goes back to sleep until 7:30 latest...would I then aim to put him down for 9:30? How many times should they nap? I assume on days you need to go out it works around you?? X

Hiya, my boy only ever cat napped until about 7 months old, at 4 months he had 30 minutes 4 times a day.
I focused on his awake window and as soon as I saw he was tired I would put him down for a nap, usually 2 in his cot and two out and about as I usually had stuff to do.
When they’re overtired they are definitely harder to get to sleep.
At 8.5 months my lad can still only stay awake for 2 hours.

Thank you xxx

Yep my boy is the same as @Abouttimemum - he has 4 x 30-40 min naps a day. So if he woke up at 7:30 I would look at starting to put him down around 8:45ish, with the aim of him being asleep by 9. I used to look out for sleepy signs but to be honest my son is so predictable I now just go by the clock! Then he will usually sleep until around 9:30 and the cycle will begin again. I stick to this routine whether we are in or out really, so I find myself heading out half an hour earlier to make sure he gets his nap in, or madly rocking the pushchair in Costa to get him to sleep! But honestly, it makes such a difference. He sleeps better at night, is generally more cheerful during the rest of the day and getting him to nap is getting easier and easier.

That makes sense thank you so much it’s appreciated xx

No one really tells you how long they should be awake for and so have never considered that he could be tired after only being awake for an hour or so...hopefully this will help xx

Nope it really shocked me when I read into it. I'm convinced all the screaming my DS did for his early weeks was over tiredness rather than the "colic" everyone told me it was. The minute I started considering awake time his screaming dramatically reduced! Weird how it's not more commonly spoken about by HVs etc!