11 month old not coping with nap routine

charchar222 · 2022-02-05T13:51:39+00:00

Kind of a follow up from my last post. I said that my 11 month old was taking her naps okay but at night she's up every hour until 5 and then either decides to get up or go back to sleep. Someone suggested her naps were too long so I looked up at her age she should be having 3 hours of naps split between 2 naps. I also thought maybe her awake time wasn't enough. So I was doing 3 hours up, 1 nap - 1 hour 15 minutes, 3 hours 30 up, 2 nap - 1 hour 15 minutes, 3 hours 45 up and then bed. She wasn't coping with the naps so I upped it to 1 hour 30 minutes. And she's still miserable throughout the day. There's no fighting with her for hours to get to bed now but once she's asleep for the night, she's still up every hour but now she's asleep for 6 hours and she's awake again for the day which is usually 2 - 4 in the morning. I'm at a loss and I'm exhausted. I don't know what to do anymore, any suggestions would definitely be welcome 😊

AreWeThereYetMummy · 05/02/2022 13:55

There isn't a magic number. I really think it's trial and error with each child. My DH took over primary daytime care from me when DS was 10 months. I had tried all sorts but night sleep was awful. DH announced he was going to try no naps! Crazily this worked and we then had a happy child, sleeping 7 to 7:30/8am!

AreWeThereYetMummy · 05/02/2022 13:56

Meant to say, he's now 7 and needs less sleep than all of the rest of us in the house, including me!

AndSoFinally · 05/02/2022 14:15

What do you do with her when she wakes up in the night? Feed? Cuddle? She may just be waking up to get those things.

Have you tried just patting her in her cot and just walking away again? If she doesn't get any reward on waking she might sleep longer?

Original poster

charchar222 · 05/02/2022 14:37

@AndSoFinally

What do you do with her when she wakes up in the night? Feed? Cuddle? She may just be waking up to get those things.

Have you tried just patting her in her cot and just walking away again? If she doesn't get any reward on waking she might sleep longer?

I do feed her a bottle or cuddle her. I haven't tried turning her on her side (that's how she likes to sleep) and patting her back or bum but she forces herself back onto her back and cries. Or when I'm walking out the bedroom door, she cries. Sometimes it does work though. I'm trying to get her into good bed time habits. I've done the bedtime routine, next I'm trying to tackle this and then I was going to do the bottle. Don't know where to start with that one though because she's pretty stubborn

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Original poster

charchar222 · 05/02/2022 14:39

@AreWeThereYetMummy

There isn't a magic number. I really think it's trial and error with each child. My DH took over primary daytime care from me when DS was 10 months. I had tried all sorts but night sleep was awful. DH announced he was going to try no naps! Crazily this worked and we then had a happy child, sleeping 7 to 7:30/8am!

I wish this would work but we tried the one nap a couple of months ago and she went to bed at 6, woke at 9 and wouldn't go to sleep for ages. We then realised she was putting in the second nap herself since we weren't. Plus she just gets so grouchy with no sleep

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Vicky1989x · 05/02/2022 22:07

At that age I wasn’t going by wake windows anymore, I just had ‘set times’. My DD was usually up between 6 and 7, first nap was 9:30-11 and second nap was 2:30-4.. bedtime was between 7-7:30. Give or take 15 mins either side depending on the day.

How are you getting her to sleep initially? Does she self-settle?

MilsDogMom · 05/02/2022 22:12

My DS was pretty much the same as @Vicky1989x

Shorter wake window in the morning. Slept 9.30-11 then 2-3.30 (we never woke him up). Then slightly longer wake window 3.30-7/7.30 bedtime.

I read that sleep induces sleep so we just let him nap for as long as he wanted around those times and it was always around 1.5-2 hours max.

busyeatingbiscuits · 05/02/2022 22:16

At that age I'd go for a nap schedule around 2-3-4
So roughly up at 7am, 2 hours awake nap 9-10, 3 hours awake nap 1-3, 4 hours awake and bed at 7pm.

Frequent night waking might be because she can't settle herself yet. Does she go into her cot awake at bedtime and fall asleep by herself?
Once they have cracked doing that at bedtime they can usually settle themselves back again if they stir in the night.

Original poster

charchar222 · 05/02/2022 23:42

@Vicky1989x

At that age I wasn’t going by wake windows anymore, I just had ‘set times’. My DD was usually up between 6 and 7, first nap was 9:30-11 and second nap was 2:30-4.. bedtime was between 7-7:30. Give or take 15 mins either side depending on the day.

How are you getting her to sleep initially? Does she self-settle?

Usually at night or naps, we give her a bottle, put dummy in and close the door. We know we need to get rid of the the bottle and eventually the dummy but have no idea how to do it yet as she's very stubborn. However, we leave her awake and she usually falls asleep on her own with the dummy though. I'm wondering if because she dummy keeps falling out, that's what's waking her

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Original poster

charchar222 · 05/02/2022 23:54

@busyeatingbiscuits

At that age I'd go for a nap schedule around 2-3-4 So roughly up at 7am, 2 hours awake nap 9-10, 3 hours awake nap 1-3, 4 hours awake and bed at 7pm.

Frequent night waking might be because she can't settle herself yet. Does she go into her cot awake at bedtime and fall asleep by herself?
Once they have cracked doing that at bedtime they can usually settle themselves back again if they stir in the night.

I've heard of the 2-3-4 method. I was actually going to try it tomorrow depending on what time she woke up.

I never used to wake her up. I just figured she was taking as much sleep as she needed. 1.5 hours - 2 hours each nap. More recently it's been 1 hour 40 minutes each nap.

I'm not really sure what she's not coping with whether it's the awake time or the less sleep during naps. Today I let her sleep as long as she wanted during naps and she refused to go back to sleep after 3 hours sleeping at bedtime.
However, we've never sleep trained her. She does fall asleep on her own but with a dummy

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user1493494961 · 05/02/2022 23:59

She should be able to put her dummy back in herself if it falls out. Maybe she's hungry, try a bowl of porridge before bed to fill her up.

busyeatingbiscuits · 06/02/2022 06:59

When you try a new nap routine you need to do it consistently for a week or 10 days before you know of it works or not. Sounds like you have tried lots of new things once or twice and not had an instant result?

Original poster

charchar222 · 06/02/2022 08:12

@user1493494961

She should be able to put her dummy back in herself if it falls out. Maybe she's hungry, try a bowl of porridge before bed to fill her up.

That's my issue, her weaning isn't going great either. My partner and I are trying everything to get her weaned - all meals and snacks with bottle as a last resort but she's not wanting it. There's very few things she will eat unfortunately porridge not being one of them. But yes, she puts her dummy back in herself during the day (we try not to give her dummies during the day but I mean if she finds one lying around). But at night, it falls out and she'll lay crying on her back not even trying to find it

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Original poster

charchar222 · 06/02/2022 08:19

@busyeatingbiscuits

When you try a new nap routine you need to do it consistently for a week or 10 days before you know of it works or not. Sounds like you have tried lots of new things once or twice and not had an instant result?

No, I tried a schedule that I saw online for a couple of days that was for 11 month olds because we were struggling to get her to bed and keep her asleep. The longer awake time has seemed to conquered the fight of getting her to bed, we're just working on the keeping her asleep and the fact she's absolutely miserable during the day now and waking up at silly o'clock 😊 I am exhausted so I'm trying 😂

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ChittyBang1987 · 06/02/2022 08:39

As a pp said. Lo should be able to put dummy in. I have about 20 dummies in my lo cot at night. I wouldn't get rid of dummy; there's plenty of time to do that. That's a good way to self soothe, with dummy.

Personally, I would night wean. I don't do bottles at night as it affected my Los appetite in the day. I just offered water for a couple of nights, and it was rough but worth it. Then, during the day tank lo up calories.

My lo is 11 months old we go by time for naps.

930am till about 40 minutes. 1010am. Nap
1pm put back down. 315pm wake if not already awake.
7pm bed.

ChittyBang1987 · 06/02/2022 08:42

You posted as I posted. I would definitely night wean after seeing your last post. Especially with no appetite in day. It will take a couple days.

I do 3 8oz bottles a day for my lo at 11 months

Original poster

charchar222 · 07/02/2022 08:07

@ChittyBang1987

You posted as I posted. I would definitely night wean after seeing your last post. Especially with no appetite in day. It will take a couple days.

I do 3 8oz bottles a day for my lo at 11 months

I'm stuck on how to night wean. Any tips?

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ChittyBang1987 · 07/02/2022 08:50

I was mean. I just offered water in a cup or bottle I can't remember. I didn't reduce feeds like some people do.

JustAnotherUserinParadise · 10/02/2022 16:53

I was going to say night wean too...
I did similar to the Dr Jay Gordon method (google it) - pick a time interval (I started with midnight-5am) and during that time you can rock, shush, cuddle etc but no feeding.
Then extend the windows.
My DD took to it pretty well and was night weaned in a week. Unfortunately it didn't stop the night wakings and we did controlled crying in the end, which worked like MAGIC.
Mine also only has 2x 35 min naps each day, so maybe she doesn't need quite as much daytime sleep? But they're obviously all different!