Baby sleep training

[pancake]

Ah, ok Mayer. I didn't realise he was waking twice.

 

[megumic]

Mayer, I think we have the same child. LOL. C has extremely similar sleeping patterns in that he will do the 12 hours at night with a feed or two that last 1-2 hours each from awake to back to sleep. Very interesting.

 

[mayerling]

Mayer, I think we have the same child. LOL. C has extremely similar sleeping patterns in that he will do the 12 hours at night with a feed or two that last 1-2 hours each from awake to back to sleep. Very interesting.

Yes, but I insist that yours is still ahead of mine since you mentioned that he naps well in the carrier/car/etc.

Pancake, for about 2 months I tried putting him down at 1.5 hours. It doesn't work. I tried the 1 hour a few times; it didn't work. I've been doing the 2-hour thing for the last 5 days and it works every time in that he'll go to sleep within 5 mins (with the other time points it would take me at least 15 to put him down). It doesn't solve the problem of the fact that he only naps for 20 mins, but it seems to me that 2 hours is when he naturally feels sleepy enough to fall asleep.

 

[MuffDog]

Mayerling - sorry I didn't wb sooner. Ugh. That sounds like a tough sleeper you have there!! 20 minute naps must be the WORST! It sounds like you are definitely trying the right things with the exception of the rocking to sleep stuff (if you are looking to sleep 'train'). However in your position I totally get doing whatever works to get your baby to sleep!

As far as the two-hour awake thing goes, as long as he isn't screaming and miserable, that is probably his magic window and good stuff having found it!

I know you swaddle - but is he rolling yet?

One of the things we do with the nap routine is match it up to the night routine minus the bath and the feeding. i.e. bedtime routine is bath, pjs/sleepsack/ feed/ story/song/bed and naptime routine is sleepsack/story/song/bed. I know he knows what is coming because he usually starts to lose it when I'm reading him the story. It is just his thing.

One of the tips my sleep lady gave me for naps is this - if they wake up too early (anything shorter than an hour), you can do one of two things. a) let them cry for 15 minutes (this assumes you are okay with some CIO) to see if they will put themselves back to sleep (if not, get them up, play, and try again), or b) rush in at the first sound of wakefulness and do whatever you can to try to soothe them back to sleep without picking him up - rub back, shush, pat bum, etc) to see if you can get him to sleep again. The idea is that for naps, what is most important is getting them to learn that they need to sleep longer. Usually, the wake up is at 45 minutes so getting a baby to sleep through two cycles (1.5 hours) is important. In your case, getting your baby to sleep past 20 minutes would be amazing!

Another thing is that naps are notoriously hard. Even if you figure out night time sleep, naps are tough. Honestly, it may be that until you can get rid of the rocking/soothing etc to put him to sleep at night, you won't be able to solve the nap problem.

How old is your baby now?

 

[mayerling]

He's 3.5 months and has rolled from tummy to back a few times.

 

[Kunzite]

I know there are still some of us struggling with sleep so I thought I'd share this link. There is a TON of consolidated information here, especially if you check out the links, but it's so helpful for figuring out what is causing the sleep problem. In our case E won't take a long enough nap to transition from 4 naps to 3 and therefore his total wake time (TWT) is too high for his age. While I haven't been able to fix our problem because I can't dedicate myself to soothing him back to sleep after short naps, it's encouraging to be able to at least identify the problem!

You may have to copy and paste to get the link to work. Hope it's helpful to someone else!

https://docs.google.com/document/d/11GHo4keUb2TVJUlSL1kD6HQcEgaNFBmzoQoOzcpcyas/edit?hl=en&authkey=CPXE1bsO&pli=1#

 

[amc80]

I know there are still some of us struggling with sleep so I thought I'd share this link. There is a TON of consolidated information here, especially if you check out the links, but it's so helpful for figuring out what is causing the sleep problem. In our case E won't take a long enough nap to transition from 4 naps to 3 and therefore his total wake time (TWT) is too high for his age. While I haven't been able to fix our problem because I can't dedicate myself to soothing him back to sleep after short naps, it's encouraging to be able to at least identify the problem!

You may have to copy and paste to get the link to work. Hope it's helpful to someone else!

https://docs.google.com/document/d/11GHo4keUb2TVJUlSL1kD6HQcEgaNFBmzoQoOzcpcyas/edit?hl=en&authkey=CPXE1bsO&pli=1#

The link doesn't work for me...it might be blocked at work though. I'll give it a try when I get home!