3 month old sleep patterns - can’t seem to stop the crying!

[sittingwaitingwishing]

Hello! I feel like I’m just obsessed with sleep at the moment as I posted on the board the other day too, but my little one seems incapable of going to sleep at the moment without a cry beforehand and it’s really hard to watch. At first I thought it was just at night time and more to do with the witching hour, but the crying seems to be happening in some capacity before every sleep! She’s 12 weeks old today.
The nighttime sleep has gotten better in the last week and while she often has a bit of a cry when she gets out of the bath, she has been more settled when we’ve been putting her down to bed at 7pm.
Her worst times for crying now are before the two cot naps, in the morning and at lunchtime. No amount of cuddling or rocking or soothing seems to help. I follow her sleep cues and have tried to put her down when I first see her yawning etc, or even ahead of this if she’s been awake for coming up to 90 mins as I know she’ll start to get grouchy after that. She sometimes takes a dummy but she’s started to suck her thumb more recently so now she’s more prone to spitting the dummy out in favour of her thumb. I don’t feed to sleep apart from at bedtime (7pm and the dream feed at 10pm).
Is there anyone else out there in the same boat as me or any tips on reducing the amount she cries? We are delighted with how much she’s sleeping at night at the moment but I would love to reduce the tears if we can.

Current routine (give or take!!):
6.30 - wakeup
8/8.30am - first nap of the day in the cot, 30-45 mins
10am - second nap in the pram while I’m out and about, usually for 1.5-2 hours
1pm - lunchtime nap in cot, 30-45 mins (I would love this nap to be longer but she just can’t seem to go too long in the cot for naps! I wonder if I cut the mid morning nap down, perhaps this one would last longer?))
3pm - fourth nap which is usually a contact/cuddly nap, 1.5-2 hours
7pm - down for bedtime
10pm - dream feed, then sleep through to 4am on a bad night, 5am/6am on a good night

Any solidarity or tips welcomed!!

Im no expert. I wouldn't be cutting any naps at this age. Actually ever until a lot older.

If LO is only sleeping 30 mins they should be back to sleep within a hour. I was always advised double their nap time is their awake time maximum of 1.5/2 hours. I hope that makes sense 😂 some of your awake times could be a little too long looking at it?

LO may be overtired? and why they waking at 4am... My lo does this when she's overtired.

Thanks for your reply @Fancyties! I generally keep her awake windows to 90 mins max (other than that last stretch before bed) so didn’t think she was overtired between naps, but could try and put her down even earlier. Perhaps 90 mins is too long when her naps are on the shorter side.
In terms of waking at 4am, that’s only on a bad night. In the last week for example, she’s only woken once at 4am for a feed - the rest of the nights she’s slept 7pm-10pm, has a dream feed, and then gone through to 5am/6am. As that’s a solid 7 or 8 hour stretch of sleep, I thought that was pretty good for a 3 month old but could be wrong!! How old is your LO?

I would say 90 mins is definitely too long if only sleeping 30 mins. Try to get her to sleep by the end of the hour and give it a few days to see if it makes a difference. Short naps is common though, until bit older.

Oh yes definitely good sleep at night, not a bad thing with that.

If LO is waking at 5am long time till 8am is long time for a young age to go. Unless I misunderstood that bit?

My LO is 7 months old (longest awake time is 3 hours and even that can be a stretch some days) and I was in same position as you and looked at all old forums and posted about lo sleep, and it came down to overtiredness.... I still get 4am waking if she is overtired now 😂 as obviously not everyday can be perfect.

Thanks for your advice @Fancyties - I’ll try and put her down earlier and hope that helps out with the crying before naps 🤞
Sorry, should have made the clearer with the night sleeping - we won’t start the day and properly get up until 7am, so if she wakes earlier than that (e.g 5), then we resettle again back in the cot and she will generally babble to herself a bit but drift off again until we are properly up for the day at 7am.

The dummy will solve the crying to sleep issue in its entirety.

You'll need to be much more consistent with its use though and really work on firmly establishing it for every sleep.

All other issues are an aside if your main focus is crying- just establish the dumny for that. But I agree that wake windows st this age are usually very short- 1h, could even be as little as 40 minutes. Your baby is still in the passive sleep new born phase - so is basically supposed to be asleep all the time.

Thanks so much for your reply @FATEdestiny. At what stage would you recommend giving her the dummy in this process? When I try and put her down in the instances I’m talking about, she’s usually crying so much that if I try and put a dummy in her mouth, she just cries around it and won’t suck at all. At other times sometimes she will take it, but when she’s really crying she won’t accept it at all!!

As fate said, Maybe crying so much as overtired?

Sorry I didn't explain that well. Let me try again. As fate said completely.

Maybe she won't take dummy as she overtired at that point?

At this age, both mine went to bed closer to 6pm. Couldn't make it 7pm. Earlier bed time? My 9month old can just make it until 7pm now. Just a thought. At this age they slept more like 14 hours at night. Although my youngest would need a dream feed and resettling around 4am. With my youngest the dummy has been a fantastic help.

I think I also fed them at 5pm and again at bedtime.

I'm sure you do this already. But I would look out for any sleepy signs and act on them quick. Quick into bed, dummy, lights off, leave the room. We used to do very quick bedtimes on the nights ours were obviously exhausted. It's amazing how much sleep they need! Sounds like you're doing a great job though!!!!

Thank you all for your input.
She slept for 30 mins just after midday and then seemed tired an hour after waking, so I thought I’d try and put her down in her cot as you guys suggested. She took the dummy and didn’t grumble half as much and within 10 mins she was asleep… Great! but then woke 5 mins after that, wide awake and gurgling. Tried to resettle but there was no resettling so I have got her up now. Currently cuddling her to see if I can get her off to sleep on my arms which is not what I wanted to do.
All her naps this morning have been half an hour, which doesn’t seem enough. I feel like I’ve lost complete faith in myself with it today. I had thought her night sleeping was pretty good for her age but I’m doubting myself now! And now concerned I’m not doing enough for her for her naps either 😓

Cut the 10am nap and move to just 3 naps per day. A short nap at 9am ish. A short nap at 4pm ish. And a nice long nap at midday ish. Don't panic. You're having a low day. We all have them with babies this age! You're doing a great job!!!!

Do you lay her down flat for naps? My DS hated being laid flat on his back

Thank you @Franca123! I would love to work it so we have a longer nap at lunchtime but I can’t see how we could do this without having longer awake windows, which seems to go back to one of the initial causes for her potential crying every time she goes to sleep. So if I were to aim for a nap at 9ish, she would be awake for at least two hours from her first wake up of the day, which seems too long to me? What do you think?
@Bluerasperry - yup, she’s always on her back in the cot!

I think I've exhausted my 'expertise' here! I just can't remember well enough what mine were like at that age and clearly you know yours best anyway. Good luck! All the phases pass one way or another.

This is a really really hard age for sleep. Especially daytime sleep in my opinion.

Mine is 4 months.
She slept 6.50-6 solid last night. I settle her laying down with a dummy.
But today has slept just 30,30,30 mins.
She can not do more than 30 mins during the day and I've tried pram walks, holding her , sling, in the bedroom etc. Nothing I do helps. I can't resettle her either despite her still looking tired after.
It's exhausting 💤💤
I try not to stress but I'm a anxious person anyway and feel quite stressed about it.

My first never ever extended her naps 😭
At 12 months she was doing 1 times 30 min nap a day and I honestly think this one is going the same way

It's really normal for short naps - 30/45 mins until they get older. I promise. I was like yh yh when I was told this 😂 it's because its one sleep cycle and they can't always link sleep cycles at this age.

My LO 7 months we generally have 2 1.5 hours or morning 45 mins and 2 hours lunch and short cap nap late afternoon.

I did contact naps until my lo was 4/5 month old, and to get into not contact naps it was hard work - but at least she didn't get too overtired and a happier baby.

I know you don't want it. But until she's not overtired and getting enough sleep and a bit older try contact naps then start working on cot/pram naps once she's older. Is there a speicifx reason for not wanting contact naps? I miss my cuddles and being able to watch nextflix with a cuppa 😂

Tbh 4 month sleep regression will be here soon, and you may experience it so may go all over the place then.

Could try having look at the old forums to lengthen sleep - bouncer, pram back and forth etc.

I have a 5 month old and went through the same thing. Still do in the daytime now but not at night. It was hard to watch but once I'd thought about it like this I felt fine about it - they no longer have the hormones to just drop off and need to actively get to sleep. Imaging how awful the feeling of dropping off might be if you don't know what it is or why it's happening and your eyes start to close unwillingly. I felt like that was what was happening to my daughter as she would cry whilst dropping off and take several attempts as shed cry as soon as her eyes shut! As long as you're there to comfort I think its fine.

Thanks @Fancyties - I’m not totally against contact naps and we usually have one a day, but I don’t want all the naps to be like this. To be honest, she often cries as she goes into a contact nap too - albeit not as much. Pram naps she can do as well and they usually last quite a long time. Again, she does sometimes cry before she drops off in the pram but generally not for too long. The crying before the cot naps/night sleep is definitely the worst. I’ve just put her down for bed and she cried for about 15 minutes but has gone off now. Today has been a terrible day for naps so god knows what the night holds. I just HATE seeing the crying. She’s generally a happy baby when she wakes up and playing etc, but she just gets beside herself before these sleeps 😓
Thanks for your input too @gretagreengrapes - did your LO just grow out of it? I stay with her the whole time as that’s all I can do when she’s crying, but it does feel heartbreaking doesn’t it.