10 month sleep

[Overtired123]

Disclaimer - I have a good sleeper so very little to complain about! I just want some advice on where our routine could be tweaked please... The reason is that bedtime has become a battle. We previously used to stay in the room and pat/stroke to sleep in the cot but this is now impossible due to the wriggling/rolling/crawling and standing! I've tried leaving her to it but that results in crying until we come back into the room.

Wake - any time between 6 and 7.
Nap 1 - 2.75/3 hours after waking for approx 1 hour
Nap 2 - 3 hours after waking from nap 1 - can be up to 2 hours. Usually over by 3.45.
Bedtime - aiming for 7 but has been taking up to an hour to settle. We start at 6 with bath so she is usually asleep by 7.15 but the battle to get her there is just awful. Even if we resort to rocking, it takes 45 minutes and I cant rock 22lbs for that long!

Does she need a later bedtime? Do I need to cap naps?

Selfishly, i really like her to be asleep by 7 so that we get a couple of hours before bed and i think 7 is an appropriate time for her age but perhaps I'm wrong?

Sleeps through and self settles during night. No night feeds.

Feedback from any experts welcome please!

I’m not an expert but have a 11 month old so may be able to offer some shared experience.

DS does wake up, nap 2-3 hours later of about 1.5 hours, nap 2-3 hours later of about 45 mins, and then bed time about 2-3 hours after that.

I think they’re quite comparable, so I can’t see that there is anything particularly alarming about your schedule.

Is she going down for naps OK or is there a battle there? Is it just bed time? Maybe she’s overtired by the time she gets to bed? How long does she have dinner before bed time?

Thanks for replying. I didn't think I was going too badly wrong but have been wondering about wake time before bed - is it too long or short? At the moment it is 4 hour, though we start trying to put her down at about 3.5 hours.

Dinner is around 5, bath at 6, bottle after bath in dim light, read book, cuddle and then attempt to put down to sleep.

Naps are not such at battle but we do rock her to sleep, it only takes 5 minutes so it doesnt bother me to do this.

I have a 10 month old and a 4 year old. I think your expectations are too high. Is she bottle or breast feed?

She is bottle fed.

Totally agree my expectations are high but they are based on what she used to do.... 15 mins of patting/stroking/singing used to put her to sleep at night and she has been sleeping through since 3.5 months. Naps were a battle for a long time but improved at around 7 months. I'm just wondering why she is suddenly resisting bedtime.

How long has it gone in for?

To be honest it might just be a phase. I have found with my little one that after a fortnight of something like this, as soon as I go into full on panic mode he suddenly stops doing it.

I think perhaps the current climate isn’t helping. These poor kids aren’t getting a lot to stimulate them.

We’ve started seeing family (from 2m and yes we should have waited until Monday!) and I’ve already noticed a change in him.

Oh and maybe it’s a regression thing? Has she just started standing? As soon as my little one learns a new skill he definitely gets panicky at bed time because he wants to carry on practicing.

Betty you are probably right. I need to just be consistent and hope the phase will pass. Yes - standing is an issue and part of the reason why patting her in the cot doesnt work - she just stands up!

How long does it take you to get your DS to drop off in the evenings?

I also agree about them being bored. So much time just playing with toys that she is bored with- normally we'd do some kind of activity, even if just visiting, every day. We are visiting people this week so hopefully that will help. Hate how much lockdown is impacting their socialisation!

I know, it’s really hard not to worry about the impact. I wasn’t that worried at first but the longer it goes on the more worrying it is. Fingers crossed they bounce back, kids are pretty resilient 🤞🏻

When DS learnt to stand I switched to sleeping bags. He struggled to stand in them so he just didn’t. Worked wonders.

He’s really good at bed time. The feed/bath/story routine lasts about half an hour - 45 minutes. And then I leave my husband to have a little cuddle with him for about five minutes, think there is a small amount of rocking happen but he’s always asleep when he puts him down... and then he generally goes to sleep straight away. He can be a pickle at nap time, if they’re not instant, they can take up to twenty minutes before he gives in.

Yes I'm sure they will bounce back and I'm probably focusing too much on little things because of lockdown too!

We've done sleeping bags since the beginning and unfortunately she has mastered standing in them!

That sounds like a great routine - hopefully we will return to something similar!

My eldest was like this. Absolute dream from 7-10 months and then started fighting bedtime. As a PP said, it was just a phase and it did get better and then worse again .

While you're waiting for it to get better, the only thing I wondered is if maybe you could try cutting down the daytime sleep? Not by much, maybe half an hour or so? I think the total sleep she's getting is at the upper end of what they need at this age so when she is not as busy or worn out as she might have been pre-lockdown it might be a bit too much.

Sunlight - yes that really is exactly what I have been wondering. Waking a sleeping baby seems unintuitive but may be necessary if we dont want bedtime to drift too late...

I really feel for people whose babies constantly wake or just dont sleep but there is something hard to accept about a great sleeper suddenly stopping! Maybe it's the fear that it will be permanent.... she is due to go to nursery when that is possible so am hoping that will be very tiring for her!

Your naps look spot on to me. General advice for when baby has 2-nap days is 234 - so 2h from waking to 1st nap, 3h from waking from 1st nap to 2nd nap then 4h through to bedtime.

Don't cut naps short. If anything your morning nap could be earlier and in turn longer.

The problem is rockingto sleep for daytime naps. I know it's easy and "If it ain't broke why fix it". But it's giving baby mixed messages and what's really important in baby sleep is consistency.

In an ideal world, if you can, I'd start the in-cot settling for naps as well as bedtime.

Thank you FATE.

We did used settle for naps in the cot until a period of illness and never quite got it back after that. Agree we should try. I also want to speak to the nursery about what they do and their proposed schedule because I dont want too many different methods and confusion.

How would you advise settling in the cot when baby is super wriggly, crawling and standing. It's almost impossible to calm her when shes moving so much. Do we just leave her to wriggle herself to sleep...? I think this would take a while....

I say leave her to wriggle herself to sleep.

I’d been breastfeeding DS before every one of his naps in an attempt to calm him down and get him sleepy. I couldn’t see there was another way. Until about three weeks ago when I was brave enough to stop doing it. Now we just wait for sleep cues and take him up there, quick cuddle and leave the room. He does eventually settle himself, I only interfere if he cries.

Perhaps set yourself a time limit and if she’s still wriggling or if she gets really upset then you can go in and do a little rocking?

Yes that is what I'm leaning towards. We've never had any need to 'sleep train' or allow her to cry but I suppose whinge is different to upset crying.

So go in if shes upset, put her back down and leave again. I'm sure it might be a difficult few days but hopefully wouldn't take much longer for her to get the hang of it!

How long does he take to settle that way? Do you start nap time earlier to allow for that settling time?