[Rita Razauskaite]

Hi Emma,

I will be contacting our pediatric department as, I think, there is nothing I can do about our baby’s sleep.

We have tried to implement your advice, but it is not going anywhere. She sometimes can sleep these 3 hour stretches, but it is rare and not the first one at night. Some days she can sleep solid naps and some just 20 min. Some nights she only sleeps in her crib from 7 to 9 pm and then after an hour of settling/feeding and waking every 10 min she ends up in my bed. This pattern drives me up the wall and looking back she sleeps worse than in her newborn stage.

The only difference from 4 months old (then she was sleep trained and could connect her sleep cycles etc.), is her eating solids. There are continued issues with her bowel movements and we give her laxative every day. It could be that we need special diet or other intervention.

Cheers,

Rita

[Rita Razauskaite]

Hi Emma,

To answer your questions:

1. You mentioned that for naps you stand by the crib for 2 mins or until her movement and finger sucking slows down before laying her in the crib. Is she asleep when you lay her down in the crib or awake?

I think, she is awake, but sleepy. It is very dark in our bedroom, so can not see if she opens her eyes. She rolls on her side immediately and after a minute she rolls again on her belly. If she is very upset/overtired then we have to wait until she is asleep to put her in her crib. In that instance she does not move immediatelly and she is not sucking her fingers.

2.Can you describe to me what her bedtime routine looks like and if she is feeding to sleep or asleep before you lay her in the crib?

-We start with a shower, change etc.

-Head downstairs to dance a bit to calm down. (Recently the shower rouyine can be challenging and she gets very upset. We really try not to overtired her. It seems like she is developing separation anxiety from me. The last wake cycle she has to see me, touch me etc.)

-Feed in a lit up bedroom. I monitor her that she would not close her eyes fully and fall asleep. Recently falling asleep again is not a problem as she is a bit anxious.

-Once the feeding is finished dad used to lift her up, turn off the lights and we sang the lullaby together. Then she would be placed in her bed.

We had to change this part. Now, after feeding I carry her and sing her lullaby alone. Dad is not needed or wanted. If he tries to pick her up, she will cry and scream. She is a bit harder to settle, but after I repeat the lullaby 2-3 times, I stop moving and wait to see if she will start lifting her head and looking around. If she does it – more walking and singing. Once, she is calm and not moving, but sucking her fingers, I place her in her crib. She turns on her belly. The first cycle she moves a lot and sometimes wakes up. She crawls (inchwhorm style) in her sleep through the crib from bottom to top and starts banging her head then she wakes up.

About this anxiety – mornings are fine. She can be with her dad and I can leave them for an hour or more. He can settle her to nap. In the afternoon and specifically during the last cycle. I have to be around and dad is useless.

3. Is she room-sharing with you?

Yes, she is.

4. If you are room sharing, what time do you or anyone else enter the bedroom at night?

I sleep with her. I enter the room past 8.30 pm. She wakes up about 9 to 9.30pm. There has not been a problem of me waking her up.

All the best,

Rita

[Rita Razauskaite]

Hi Emma,

Since the last time I wrote to you we have been implementing nap routine in her crib. She is connecting nap cycles now. However, it is not completely predictable when she would have a long sleep and when she would have a shorter one. If we follow her tiredness ques setling is fast and easy. If we try to push the wake window longer she gets overtired and it results into long settling. She falls asleep from exhaustion. My husband takes the first wake cycle and it is the shortest. She gets tired after 1.5 hour. After the first nap her wake windows are about 2 hour long. Sometimes second or third wake window (if she had nice long naps) can get 2 hours and 10-15 min long.

The nap routine looks like this:

Sleep sack in the living room

Dancing with her until she places her head on my shoulder (it shows she knows what is going on and is ready to sleep)

Heading upstairs and singing the lullaby

In the bedroom finishing the lullaby and standing by the crib for 2 mins or until her movement and finger sucking slows down

Placing her in the crib and leaving the room

The problem is night sleep. Most nights she has the same sleep cycles of 1.5 hour sleep and 30 min feed (falling asleep while feeding). Some night she managed 3-3.5 hours between feeds. Moreover, she continues to wake up about 4.30-5.30 then it is impossible to settle her. We start the day early. We aim to put her in bed for the night at or around 19:00 in the evening.

So, a typical day looks like this,

Wake up 05:00

Sleep 06:30-07:30

Sleep 09:30-11:00

Sleep 13:00-13:15

Sleep 15:30-16:30 (here she needs help to connect the cycles, we help her by picking her up and walking with her for 5 mins)

Start bed routine around 18:30.

Asleep 7.10

Wake 9.10

Wake 11.30

Wake 2.00

Wake 4.30 to 5.30

For a while, we thought that teething could be what is making things so challenging, but that does not seem to be the case. We have not seen any teeth or swelling in the mouth, for example.

There is no problem with her developmental milestones. She is getting stronger and pushing on all fours, so soon she should start real crawling (now she does army crawl).

PS. She is exactly 7 months old now.

Best,

Rita

[Rita Razauskaite]

Hi Emma,

I will try to shortly go through what we are implementing.

Solids – no real difference in her sleep after she does a bowel movement.

Pacifier – we used it only in a pram. I have removed it and there was no problem. She falls asleep well.

Naps – we can not get the pram into a bedroom. So we can only do outdoor pram walks.

We started a simple nap routine for the pram. Reducing movement so far has not worked very well, she wakes up early.

Night sleep – we were already doing the suggested things. We are trying get her to sleep with less movements, but it is not working very well.

The same horrible sleep pattern continues. She is placed in her pcrib awake. She settles well and falls asleep in 5 to 10 mins. She wakes up in 1.5 hour and gets to eat. After that I try to place her back. Sometimes it works and sometimes does not. But this waking every 2 hours is not changing. We are exhausted.

As I understand, the only real fix of this situation would be to start naps in the crib?

Cheers

Rita

[Rita Razauskaite]

Ah and the normal night time sleep time is somewhere from 8.20 to 8.40 (her falling asleep in her crib after evening routine).

P.S. not sure if this is relevant, but this month, she has started solids. In Finland, the advice is to give tasting portions 1-2 spoons of vegetables, meat, and fish starting from 4 months old. It is done to prepare digestive trackt for eating after 6 months and to start exposing baby to various tastes. She likes food but has problems with making bowel movements. We have to give her laxative to make her poop. She is not constipated. She just forgets how to do bowel movements, this has happened before when I stopped my iron supplements. It happens almost on a regular basis. We give her laxative if she has not pooped in 36 hours.

Cheers,

Rita

[Rita Razauskaite]

Hi Emma,

We tried to use sling during the last month, but it was not possible for her to link sleep cycles there, so most of the naps were only 30 min long. It was not sustainable with such atired baby who does not sleep well at night.

The pram sleep is outdoors and we push the pram all the time. We did this since she was a newborn. Sleeping outdoors is recommended in the Nordics. If she is not stiring and the previous naps went well I sit down for a bit on a bench. This is why I mentioned that we need to start her sleep training in a crib. My knees are giving me trouble with so much walking.

There is no real routine there. She loved pram and once placed there she calms down, sucks on pacifier (we introduced it after she started not linking sleep cycles, which was at 3.5 or 4 months old), even makes cooing noises. Once she averts her gaze from me, I close the pram curtain and she falls asleep in 2-10 mins.

The pram is a basinet type where she lays. Soon we will need to change into sitting type which again might make pram not a good sleeping place.

The last three nights were horrendous. The above mentioned routine of waking every half hour once in her crib continues, falling asleep is a huge ordeal in a crib and she sleeps a only bit better with me. Still, I have to feed her every two hours. From 5 to 6 she wakes up again there I feed her and go to sleep. Husband takes over morning play and walk that I could sleep.

It feel like she does not have the circadian rhythm any more. She is so awake and angry when we put her down at night. Even after a feed she wakes up immediately during the transfer to her crib. We are all exhausted. It so hard to not know when it will get better.

Cheers,

Rita

[Rita Razauskaite]

Hi Emma,

Here are the answers:

1. Her current nap routine – we try to follow the second option in the nap routine with 4 naps, all naps are in the pram. The first nap starts at 8.20 and usually lasts to 9.30 or 10.00. Second nap 12.00 to 13.00 or 13.30. Third nap 15.30 to 16.00. Fourth nap 17.45 to 18.30. The last nap is longer than recommended because she is usually so tired and cranky that she can not last for 2 hours awake window.

2. Her current bedtime routine— we start with a shower, continued with some dancing in a living room by dad, feeding in a bedroom that is brightly lit to prevent falling asleep. Then lights are out. We sing a lullaby, while dad is carrying her and she is placed in her crib. At present she opens her eyes and starts screaming right away, if we try to shush her it will make her even more upset. If we pick her up and try to place down after several minutes while she is awake, she will scream and cry immediately. Usually, we carry her around more that 10 min and put down drowsy. Even then she might need several attempts to fall asleep. When drowsy she turns sideways, but does not fully turn on her belly. Later she usually wakes up a bit, turns to her belly and starts screaming again. Even when I help her to turn on her belly, she will wake up anyway 30 min later… She is so awake and tired at the same time. Only my presence calms her down and she falls into deeper sleep.

3. Overnight details—below is a full recount of yesterday night. It was one of here “rare form” nights. Usually the past month it was a bit better, but this week was especially hard. Might be this is a peak…

19.30 start of night routine. A bit early as she was very tired. The night before was hard and she slept very little.

8.25 sleep (she was resisting a bit, shushing did not work, 10 min of carrying to make her sleepy, put down drowsy)

8.50 awake (fell asleep after 5 min of carrying)

10.40 awake and feed. Lots of carrying as shushing did not work. 11.45 drowsy placed in her crib.

12.10 awake, carrying did not work

12.17 feed

12.46 lot of carrying after a feed, drowsy placed in a crib.

1.00 awake, transfer to my bed for cosleeping. 1.20 asleep.

4.23 awake, feed. 4.56 asleep in bed, cosleeping

6.25 wake up and feed

Cosleeping is the last ditch effort. As the first 5 hours of getting her to sleep a longer streach did not work.

Cheers,

Rita

• This reply was modified 1 year, 1 month ago by  Andrew. Reason: Edited to remove HTML tags

[Rita Razauskaite]

Hello, Emma.

Since the last time I wrote to you, there has been a lot of developmental milestones for our daughter combined with sleep regression. Because of that we could not train her to sleep in her crib, as she’s doing many new things: pushing up with her hands, sitting, pivoting her body and dragging herself with her arms (army crawl).

She wakes up 3 to 4 times a night and fights sleeping. She does not want to fall asleep after waking, screams if we put her down while fully awake. It does seem consistent with the previous times when she had a sleep regression.

This regression lasts so long and generally not sustainable from my side.Is there anything we can do to help her to sleep better during night?

Can we train her to seelp her naps in her crib while she only gets 6-7 hours of sleep during night?

Cheers,

Rita

[Rita Razauskaite]

Hi Emma,

The baby has settled and started connecting sleep cycles now she sleeps until 3 am. After a feed she manages to fall asleep and sleeps until 6 or 6.30. This happens almost every night. Sometimes she still needs a feed at 12 pm.

My questions would be about the day naps and nap schedule. When should we try to start transitioning the baby to crib from sling? Should we try to transition towards the sleep schedule nr. 3 ( please see below)? Or stick to the current nap schedule with 4 naps (she will be 5 months in a week, her wake window is about 2 hours)?

Option 3: Trying a 3-Nap Schedule

If you’re open to an earlier bedtime, a 3-nap schedule could work well:

• 6:30am – Wake
• 8:30am – Nap 1 (max 2 hours)
• 10:30am – Wake
• 12:30pm – Nap 2 (max 2 hours)
• 2:30pm – Wake
• 4:30pm – Nap 3 (30–45 mins)
• 5/5:15pm – Wake
• 7/7:30pm – Bedtime

Cheers,

Rita

[Rita Razauskaite]

Hi Emma,

Thanks for the fast reply. It feels great to hear that many babies go though this and it should get better soon.

We will try to practice rolling many times during her wake windows. The baby is happy to practice, because she does get stuck in a “superman” pose once she is on her belly. She still needs help to get out of that position.

Cheers,

Rita

[Rita Razauskaite]

Hi Emma,

We were implementing the suggested changes and she seemed to start connecting the sleep cycles. Every second night she was able to extend the first sleep cycle by two hours and wake up at about 2 am. Once she was able to sleep to 6 am.

However, since Sunday there was a major shift. She started rolling from back to belly. During day time she is much happier, but at night she refuses to sleep.

We put her to bed at 20.30, she is a bit fussing, but in 10-15 mins she falls asleep sucking her fingers. After 5 mins she wakes up and starts screaming. That repets for 1,5 hours. At 22.00 I breastfeed her again. She fusses for bit more and falls asleep at 22.30. Yesterday she only fell asleep at 23.50. Then she wakes up every 2-3 hours. At 5 am she refuses to sleep in her bed. So I let her sleep on me for a bit. We start our morning at 6 to 6.30.

This change leaves her with less sleep. She struggles with 2 hour wake windows during day, and we often start her sleep cycles early.

Our day routine became a mess. What is this? It seems like a developmental thing, because she is not in pain. She seems very happy. Could it be teeth? But we checked and there are no visible signs. We thought about bely issues. She seems to poop slight more often, but it can not be called a diarrhea.

We are very tired 😫

Cheers,

Rita

[Rita Razauskaite]

Hi Emma,

There was a formatting error in this chat and it did not function as intended. I got your answer when you sent it the first time, but could not answer to it.

We are implementing the suggested changes for our routines. Night time routine – only the first night she had a longer crying period when placed into a crib awake. Now she looks around, closes her eyes and starts.suckimg her fingers right away. However, sometimes she will wake up in 10 or 20 mins and will need help to settle. Otherwise, nights are usually with two feeds and the last wake up after 5am . Even if I feed her at 5am, she is not sleepy enough to sleep independently. She will sleep on me or on feeding pillow. Should I allow her to get a bit of sleep before starting the morning or better not?

Naps – I try to put her in a slig and get her calm before going to the bedroom. Generally, she is awake longer in the bedroom and I can finish the routine, but sometimes she falls asleep within couple minutes, which is not a bad thing 🙂

Cheers,

Rita

[Rita Razauskaite]

Hi Emma,

Here are the answers:

Based on my calculations, is your little one around 4 months old now? – yes she is almost 4 months. Sidenote, she was overdue by almost 2 weeks. So dewlopementaly she is a bit over 4 months.

From what you’ve described, it sounds like her overnight sleep pattern looks something like this:

Bedtime: 8:30/9:00 pm

1st feed: Between 11:30 pm – 1:00 am

2nd feed: Between 2:30 – 3:30 am

3rd feed: Between 5:00 – 5:50 am

Yes to two 1st and 2nd feed. The 3rd I delay a bit if the second feed is a bit later at about 4 am. I start our morning and feed her a bit later.

Does that sound about right? You didn’t mean that she is awake from 11:30pm until 1am did you?

No, she is not awake after the second feed she usually goes to sleep immediately.

Settling to sleep – we apply the routine that we discussed previously and try to apply settling pyramid. But it seems we are a bit to cautious. We sing lullaby several times that she would be really calm and still before we set her in the crib. Most of the times she is already very drowsy when she gets into a crib and will drift off to sleep sucking her fingers without much help. Then she wakes up in 10 mins and cires for me. I have to settle her again. It is just so easy to make her very upset when setting her down to the crib…

Settling for Naps – in a sling and applying settling her to sleep routine that you suggested. However, many times I just need a lullaby and walking around. She will fall asleep almost instantly. It probably counts as settling that I dance with her in a bright room (she is in a sling) before I head upstairs to the bedroom. Usually, the last nap is the most challenging and I go through all the settling steps (gradually reducing movement and sound).

Nap routine looks almost exactly as it is written in the schedule option 2, just the morning nap is extended to catch up to the routine and wake her up at 10 am. She sleeps very well in a sling or a pram, so I have to wake her up almost from all the naps. Only the last nap, she will wake up by herself, but it is about 20-25 min nap and fits with the schedule.

And lastly, you mentioned that her wake windows have shortened—how long are they currently?

I think, I have mixed up the wording. Her wake windows are now about 2 hours. But her night sleep streaches have shortened somewhat. Before her first sleep strech was about 4-5 hours now it is closer to 3-4 hours.

Cheers,

Rita

• This reply was modified 1 year, 3 months ago by  Andrew.

[Rita Razauskaite]

Hi Emma,

We have moved to the sleep schedule option 2 and her sleep starts at 8.30 pm. She had problems falling asleep, but we think it was more related to belly issues.

However, two things are not so great.

1) Her sleep windows are not lengthening, but seems have gotten shorter than it was a month ago.

2) She wakes up too early in a morning and I can not put her to sleep after that wake up. We have to start morning before 6 am and she is usually a bit slow and cranky. To catch up to schedule I let her sleep after 2 hours wake window until 10 am. That usually is about 2 hours or more.

Here is her normal night schedule. She usually sleeps from 8.30-9.00 to 23.30 -1:00 then second feeding occurs after 3 hours 2.30-3.30. And then she started waking up around 5:00-5.50. Trying to put her to sleep after she had 3 hours without feeding is not possible, she might calm down but she wakes up in 10 minutes. She will only go down with feeding.

We are not sure what is going wrong, because we try to follow your schedule strictly, she gets her naps and she is very tired in the evening.

Cheers,

Rita

[Rita Razauskaite]

Hi Emma,

Yes, This sounds good. She is exactly 3 months and 5 days old. She should be sleeping longer night sleeps 🙂

I will start with the option 1 and move towards the option 2 within a week or two.

I believe, now she already got nap routine in a sling. She falls asleep really fast. Hopefully, this will work.

Cheers,

Rita