F/U- sleep. My baby is weird.

cindy453 · November 2009

So it's been going better with napping. Em takes 1-2 longish (more than 30 minutes) naps a day now, pretty regularly. But, she cut way back on her night time sleep. She had been sleeping until 3am, she switched to only sleeping until 12:30 or so.

Wellll yesterday we had a bunch of stuff to do. We were out and about for a lot of the day, she took one "decent" nap, the rest were little catnaps. She went to sleep at 8:30 last night and slept until 5am! WTH!

ALL the sleep books say that more and "better" naps mean better night time sleep. Is she just the the exception? She can either take good naps during the day OR she can sleep at night? I'm not sure if I should continue with encouraging the naps so much, if it's making her sleep worse at night... but then I get no break during the day. I'm screwed either way!

cmrand4 · November 2009

I've been wondering if my LO is the exception too. I've read that going to sleep earlier means sleeping longer and with less waking. We've been rocking him to sleep every night at 8pm and even tried earlier. He does go to sleep at those times and I can tell he is tired. He wakes 2-5 times but usually 2 times. Last night he was a rock star and didn't go to sleep until 10:30. I thought I was in for a LONG night...boy was I wrong. I woke up at 5:15 totally aching from not BFing all night. LO was still sound asleep!!!! He did wake only once at 5:30 (I think I woke him accidentally) and now he's STILL asleep!!!!!! He's never ever, ever slept this long!!! Maybe we're onto something...or maybe he's just ready to sleep longer now that he's 3 months. Tonight will be the interesting to see cause I'm going to try again at his regular bed time.

cindy453 · November 2009

How funny, both our babies did a long stretch of sleep the night before their 3 month birthday! I know I woke Em up, I got out of bed to pump because I was leaking everywhere.

We went to an infant massage class last night (that's why we weren't home for her to go to bed at her normal time), I'm hoping it's the massage that was super relaxing That's much easier to recreate than a day of running errands!

shainababygirl · November 2009

I realize my LO is much smaller than yours, but she has pretty consistent sleep patterns.

We don't have a set bed-time yet. My DH has to go to bed around 7 pm, and gets up between 2am-3am (he has to be at work at 4). I'm a night owl, so I keep DD with me in the living room or wherever I am. She's usually awake from 4-7 (somewhere in there, usually not for that big 3 hour stretch, but she's wide awake between that time), then she goes down around 7ish... She's wide awake again at 9pm, so we feed on one side, bath, feed on the other side. Some nights she goes down around 10, some nights she waits and feeds again around 11-12, and then goes down.

She sleeps until 3-4, feeds, sleeps again until 6-7, feeds, and then we're up somewhere between 8-9.

I love it. I know she may not keep this up...but I'm loving it right now! I don't feel sleep deprived at all... of course, being an insomniac before I had a baby has its advantages... I'm use to little sleep.

cindy453 · November 2009

Em slept great at 3 weeks

It's just recently she has decided not to nap.

MrsAmers · November 2009

In my opinion, do whatever works for right now to get you and Em as much sleep as possible. It's all going to change again in a few months (or a few weeks), most likely. So just go with what works for now. The sleep "experts" cite the things that seem to work for lots of babies, but that doesn't mean it works for all babies. Most of them would be horrified that my kids tend to go to sleep best between 9 and 11pm for the first 8-9 months of their life. I know that DS will eventually have an earlier bedtime, but I can't stop him from being awake and happy at 10pm, no matter how badly I want to be asleep myself. He still doesn't have much of a nap routine, but I know he'll get one eventually.

Good luck!

thomas930 · November 2009

Do what you think works. My DD has never napped well, except for the few times she falls asleep on me or DH. We are lucky if we can get one 30min nap a day. But for bed time she usually averages a 5 hour stretch and than two 3 hour stretches before she is up for the day (she goes to be between 9-10pm)

But I totally understand the not ever getting a break...that part is really hard. Hope you can figure out something that works.

cindy453 · November 2009

The no breaks wouldn't be so bad if I was just a SAHM... but I'm a student too! And my H works weird hours, he never is home to help. So, I have no time to do my homework. It sucks.

webMistress0609 · November 2009

If she's fussy w/o naps, get her to nap. If she's happy, then don't stress about what the books say about naps, kwim?

The books all say earlier bed times are best. Ari does not do well with an early bed time. He just gets up every 30-60 minutes until midnight or so. 8-9 is about the earliest he can go down. We did the 7-8 thing for awhile & once he started napping better, it just didn't work.