Any tips for Gina baby not doing lunchtime nap?

[ladymoo]

Have been roughly following Gina Ford for my now 8.5 month old DS but over the last week or so his lunchtime sleep has varied from 1 hr - 1.5 hrs which is driving me nuts - I know it's still a decent sleep but I feel as though he needs more & don't know whether to just get him up as he's pretty awake when he wakes iykwim or control cry him back to sleep as Gina would have me do! Although i am not sure he would actually go back to sleep & do I want to have a crying baby for an hour? Any tips??? x

Hi cornflakegirl, HV advised to start solids rather than up milk. He has upwards of 40oz a day as it is and is putting on 1lb a week. He doesn't need the calories but rather the feeling of being full for longer apparantly, which solids will give.

I did wonder about re-introducing a bottle of milk in the night but have been advised by many not to. It will not only reduce his daytime intake but will get him used to a feed at night and when I drop the feed he'll carry on waking up for it.

Just gotta keep on hoping. For the first time in 2 weeks he slept through at lunchtime nap. Yippee!

YAY!!! Well done forevared, so pleased about the lunchtime nap. Hopefully that food will start kicking in soon and he will sleep better at night. I found my ds only finished his daytime milks once i dropped the dream feed so I wouldn't now add another milk, just food food food!! btw i have now had a shower, he is crawling so crawls around the bathroom while i'm in there - probably highly dangerous

x

Forevared - I don't want to butt in if stuff is working for you, but there are an awful lot of threads on here about HVs who have made similar suggestions, and why it isn't a good idea (including gut maturity in a baby under 6 months). If you're interested, I suggest you do a search. If not, I'll leave you to it!

I know Cornflakegirl and I can't say I'm too happy about it, but both GP and HV advised it, and I've been getting grief off dh who's a doctor about starting, due to his size. I figured they all knew a little more than me, so I agreed to it. Thing is I think they're right.

we introduced some pear over the weekend and Saturday night was a much better night and then last night, well he went right through to 6.10am. He's not slept for 6 hours solid since he was born! It's also helping his daytime naps go better.

I'm not doing this just so I can have an easier time of it, I want to do what's best for ds. I've felt really torn about should I/shouldn't I start to wean him early. If he's a happier more settled baby because of it then I'm happy. If it all goes tits up, I'll go back to the drawing board and rethink things.

How are the lunchtime naps going for you now ladymoo, hope I haven't taken over your thread!

follow your own instincts that's my advice

Hi everyone,
Sorry to butt in on your chat, but I am just having one of those mad days where I've lost the plot! I have a brilliant dd who is just 7 months. She sleeps about 11hrs at night and in the daytime has three 30-45min naps (at around 9.45am, 1pm, and 4pm). She is weaning fairly well (still can't get her to eat food for breakfast, just milk). The thing is I can't help but wonder if she is ever going to start doing a long lunchtime nap, as I never get more than about 30 mins or so to myself in the day, which makes getting any jobs done almost impossible! Any ideas, reassurance or help would be great - I seem to have lost my confidence and my dh is away for 4 months (RAF) so no one to babble at!

Oh golly no dh to moan to what do you do?!? Sounds like you have done brilliantly getting into the routine you are in. My ds kind of got himself into a long lunchtime nap at around 4 months - although he has now stopped so that doesn't really help! I can say tho that now he is crawling it's brilliant as he's so self-sufficient so I can potter about doing jobs around the house or even dare I say lie down & watch desperate housewives on the sofa while he crawls around the lounge & plays with his toys. So it's not exactly time to yourself but it is a break from entertaining!

Forevared how's it going? There has been no improvement on either lunchtime or nightime sleeping for me oh well - just praying it's this sleep regression that i've read about & it will pass!!!

It amazes me that mums credit GF for their babies sleep patterns- how on earth can the sleeping/waking/eating patterns of individual babies have anything to do with someone who has never met them???
Totally bamboozled as I haven't read the book.

forevared- it is normal for a 4 month old to wake a lot to feed at night.

Rockclimbingmum - my ds had several short naps at that age, but started having a decent length lunchtime nap at about 1 IIRC.

It's interesting, my DS is 20 months now, and without exception, all his little mates of a similar age have one decent (1-2 hrs plus) nap around lunchtime, regardless of what they did as babies.

I think it will happen naturally in time. I wouldn't make a big deal of daytime sleep if the baby seems happy, and you'll find she'll settle into a longer sleep pattern as she gets older.

Hi charliegal, I don't really credit GF for the sleep routine because despite following her (vaguely) I've not actually met a mum yet whose GF baby does exactly what it says on the tin (IYKWIM).

I really use her book for the general sleep and feeding times and then have some flexibility round that. I bought the book when I had ds1 and he was an absolute nightmare. We were so exhausted and I got very depressed. DH went out and got it after some advice from some work colleagues and frankly within 48 hours we had a different baby. We then tinkered with things to suit him more and have carried on in the same vein with ds2, adapting it here and there for him.

Right, as to the feeding at night. As so many of you have said I should be giving him a night feed I thought I'd just try it. No go, wasn't interested and ending up screaming at me! At least I've managed to discount that one. I don't want you all to think I'm being mean here because I'm truly grateful for the advice, but I KNEW that he wasn't hungry and would NEVER leave him hungry if I had the slightest suspicion of it. Mum knows best right?

Hi ladymoo, how's it going? We're now getting much better. The pattern seems to be one good night, where he goes from about midnight till 6/6.30 then the next night up several times.
I can cope with this as at least I get one good night's sleep.
Well, he's just woken up from his lunchtime nap so better run.
Good luck all, and hope it gets better rockclimbingmum.

Thanks for your advice and encouragement! It's good to hear what other little babes are doing! My dd has just started crawling would you believe it - it's very funny!! I hope she starts wearing herself out and sleeping more in the day, but as you say, she'll find her own routine as she grows up and I'll just chill out for now and enjoy my 30 min breaks!!