20 weeks bad at napping

[stressingmum]

My LB is 20 weeks today he is an awful napper always has been and no matter what I do I can't improved it.

He sleeps from about 6:30pm - 6am in a next to me crib but normally starts stirring around 4am where I will get him into bed with me and we co sleep till his wake up.

He goes to bed so early because he is beyond exhausted. The nap situation is he will go to sleep usually within 15 mins of me trying this is always done in his own room where I play white noise, make it as dark as possible sometimes he will fall asleep with my hand on his belly when he is in the cot other times I have to rock him this is normally determined by if he cry's when placed in cot. The problem is with the length of his naps I can time it too the second of either 30 or 40 mins I stick too the awake window for his age of 2 hours but we normally have too start the nap routine before as he is already whining.

In general I would say he isn't the happiest of babies lots of tears for no obvious reasons other than imo lack of sleep. How can I improve this or are my expectations too high as he sleeps all night with no feeding.

He had a maximum of 2 hours worth of naps total over normally 4 naps sometimes 3.

He will need significantly less awake time between naps. So that he is having a lot more naps per day.

Your issue is he is over tired. Being over tired means that when he does manage to sleep, his sleep is restless and very light sleep. This results him waking fully when he goes between sleep cycles.

So to break the cycle and help him lengthen his naps, he needs more sleep. Since he can't (yet) sleep longer in one nap, he needs lots more naps.

As a general rule, awake time wants yo be around double the previous nap length (give or take). So 30 minute map means next nap wants to be about an hour later, 40m nap means next nap about 1h20m later. It's not an exact science, but a decent approximation.

That means you day might look like this:
6am wake
7am to 7.30am nap
8.30am to 9am nap
10am to 10.30am nap
11.30am to 12pm nap
1pm to 1.30pm nap
2.30pm to 3pm nap
4pm to 4.30 nap
5.30pm to 6pm nap
7/7.30pm bedtime

I'm counting eight 30 minute naps there - so 4h of daytime sleep.

When naps are short they need to be frequent. Then your baby is no longer over tired and that in itself will improve the quality of baby's sleep- which will in turn means baby is better able to link sleep cycles and have longer naps.

@FATEdestiny were did you get this rubbish from? Babies are not machines, their sleep needs change daily as they develop.

@stressingmum It's tough at the moment, but a change of room or even the angle the baby sees things from can help make them less grumpy. It's not always over tiredness, could be hunger, teething, need some simulation, want to be picked up, on front not back or vice versa or even wind.

Find some things to show them books, material ( could use patterned clothes) take a walk around the garden and chat ( my garden is tiny but we do ohh lovely flower, a bee blah blah)

You will find they will probably fall into a routine of maybe 2 naps a day in a few months time and then it will drop again to 1 nap a day probably around age 1.

I have a 20 week old now ... and an older child. It's a cliche, but enjoy them. At the moment I wouldn't worry about a routine, just loosen it up.

I have quite a lot of experience ishouldtryabiteachday. Nonetheless I wouldn't be so rude as to rubbish your suggestions just because they aren't the same as mine.

@FATEdestiny sorry was a bit rude I guess

I'd recommend to you both the book the gentle sleep book by Sarah Ockwell- Smith, it explains the science of sleep and basically to follow your baby's cues not the clock.

Thank you for your appology. I'm not a fan of Sarah O-S. The basic premise behind her commercial enterprise is good: don't expect babies to sooth themselves without a lot of crying until they are preschool age. The big however though is that it could be replaced with: use a dummy (efffectively) from birth and have reasonable expectations.

But that wouldn't sell many books.

Sarah O-S's commercial enterprise is centrally based on the flawed assumption that getting baby to sleep well in a gentle, no cry way can only happen in a dependant way, not an independent way. She completely misses the point that the humble dummy can offer the simplest and easiest of no-crying, gentle way to get independent sleep from baby.

I agree with her assurance that good sleep habits develop best in no-cry, no-distress ways. But her methods in getting there assume her way is the only right way to achieve that. Which simply is untrue and end up only increasing parental guilt in the general parenting population.

@FATEdestiny THANK YOU- this is what has driven me mad about SOS.

@stressingmum FATE has it right, your baby needs more daytime sleep! At 20 weeks my DD could handle about 1.5hr max awake time, which was usually pushing it. Don't worry about the cat naps, as he learns to join up his sleep cycles the naps will get longer (source, have been in the bath for an hour and a bit, DD fast asleep still). Also don't panic if his nighttime sleep goes to shit about now, youre prime for a regression.

And, it bears saying, you're doing a fantastic job. Every phase passes, the only way through is on, cliche cliche cliche, the most important thing is that your baby is safe and loved and you are absolutely nailing that bit. Well done.

OP although I agree with the others that your baby is a little short on the daytime sleep, he's not actually THAT far off the recommended amount if he's getting 11.5 hours at night and 2 hours during the day.

Is there anything which is guaranteed to send him to sleep? Pram walk, sling etc? Could you do that for an hour or so a day, every day for a week (in addition to his other naps) to try and get him a bit more sleep and break the overtired cycle he is in?

Thank you all for your replies I really appreciate you taking the time to comment I know he is short on the day time sleep he averages 2 hours just. I have today tried shortening the awake window with not a huge about of success we have had more tears than usual but that could be the 5:30am wake up.
The problem I have is he isn't a baby that will just fall asleep watching tv or sitting in his bouncer etc he has always needed assistance since day 1. A dummy has been offered since birth and he will stuck on it for 10 seconds and spit it out. I was using a sling but with the hot weather and the fact he is getting much heavier I only use it if I'm desperate and I'm worried about developing bad habits.