Help! 4 month old has trouble with day sleeps

[blossombelle]

Hi everyone,
my ds has done pretty well at night, asleep by 7pm without fuss and feeding a couple of times until 7ish. He is currently worse than he was, but that seems to be common with growth spurts etc. The problem is he is not napping properly during the day. He gets 30-40mins in the morning in the pram whilst walking the dog (waking as soon as I get home) and then I settle him when he's tired again around lunch and poss in the afternoon. This use to work, but he never sleeps longer than 40mins and is now harder to settle - and getting very tired 5-6pm ish. I tried him in his cot today and he got really worked up.
How have I got the nights ok and and the days wrong?!! I am getting no time to get anything done!
thanks for any advice!

You haven't done anything wrong- it's just the way of it sometimes. Sounds like your ds just wants to know what's going on! Here's a few ideas, but I'm sure someone else will pop along with more soon...

My DS is less likely to wake up in his buggy if his raincover on and it's covered with a shawl (!). It's harder for him to notice he's home that way! You have to be careful they don't overheat, obviously, so I just put him in fewer layers and unpop the raincover at one corner once he's been inside for a bit and still settled.

Settling him in his cot is a bit more tricky- we have used lullabies and white noise as a background to help soothe DS into sleep, while I read a book in a boring monotone voice.

He's waking after 40mins because that's how long his cycles of sleep are, he's stirring and unable to resettle himself. If you can crack this, it'll also help at night time. If you go in at 35 minutes and be at the ready (!) to pat and shush as he first starts to stir he may well go back off for another 40. the idea is eventually you'll have to do less and less to achieve this until his body naturally does this for himself.

DS is now 16mo and always been a reluctant sleeper so I know how you feel! It's worth trying out something for a few days because not everything works straight away. HTH

white noise - put the static on the radio on in his room when you settle him - it has to be quite loud, louder than them crying. I was v sceptical but I tried this last week and the last 3 naps at home have been over 1.5 hours compared to 45 mins before. good luck!

thanks for the advice!Only 20mins this morning, but I managed 1.5hrs with him asleep on me infront of the rugby this afternoon = no house work done but he woke happy instead if crying will try your suggestions tomorrow - fingers crossed!