[Thais Teves]

Hi Emma,

I just wanted to share a quick update from our last discussion. I removed the pacifier for naps, but unfortunately, it didn’t make his naps longer. The good thing is he still falls asleep easily without it, so I won’t reintroduce it.

A couple of days ago, I started making his wind-down routine longer, minimum 15 minutes now (vs 10-5min before), with very little stimulation so he can relax away from his toys and noise. It might be a coincidence, but since then, his first two naps have been around 1 hour 10 to 1 hour 20 minutes.

As for the early 5 am wake-ups, it’s too early to tell, but yesterday he woke up at 5:40am and today at 6am, which looks promising. I’ll share another update in a few days.

[Thais Teves]

Understood. Will try to remove the pacifier for naps and see if the nap length and early mornings wake improve over the next few days

[Thais Teves]

Hi Emma,

Thank you for the quick reply.

He has been falling asleep independently at bedtime only for about 1 month now.

– Wake up time: usually at 6am, but no later than 6:30am

– First Nap: 8:30am (9am if he wakes up at 6:30am) for about 1h (wake up time 9:30-10am)

– Second 12pm (or 12:30pm) for 1h, waking up at 1-1:30pm

– Last nap: 3:30pm (or 4pm) for 30min, waking up at 4-4:30pm

– Bedtime: 7am (or 7:30pm), falling asleep 5-10min after that

– Nap as well as bedtime in his crib in his bedroom that is very dark. The only difference between nap and bedtime is that for naps I give him a pacifier and don’t give it at bedtime (or I only give it to him at 5am when he wakes up and it is a nightmare for him to sleep again, sometimes the pacifier helps, but often it doesn’t)

Thank you.

[Thais Teves]

Hi Emma,

I wanted to circle back and share an update on our current situation.

The 3-nap schedule you suggested has been working well most days. On days when his naps are shorter, we still need a 4th nap, but we’ve been able to keep bedtime between 7–8 p.m., and we consistently wake him up between 6–6:30 a.m. each morning.

He has also learned to fall asleep independently at night. I put him down awake in the bassinet, and he usually falls asleep within 10 minutes.

Unfortunately, the early waking hasn’t improved. To avoid starting the day before 6 a.m., I used to bring him to bed and nurse him back to sleep, keeping him with me until it was time to wake up. I hoped he would eventually start connecting his sleep cycles and stop waking up so early, but that hasn’t happened.

It’s been over a month now with this routine—he falls asleep on his own but still wakes twice at night for feeds (between 1-2a.m. and 3-4 a.m.), and unfortunately, he now wakes consistently at 5 a.m. every day (previously it was at random times).

Last week, I tried changing a few things to see if it would help. I moved him to his own room and stopped nursing or bringing him to bed at 5 a.m. When he wakes at that time, I go to his crib and use the pyramid method until 6 a.m., but it often involves a lot of crying. Sometimes I manage to get him back to sleep, but he usually wakes up again after 5–10 minutes.

I’m not sure what else to do—he just turned 5 months this week. Do you think it’s time to consider formal sleep training? I’m not very comfortable with the idea, but I’m starting to feel quite tired from the lack of proper sleep and I don’t know what else to try.

Also, at this age, shouldn’t he be sleeping through the night already without waking up 2x for feeding?

[Thais Teves]

Hi Emma,

Thank you for the tips. I believe he would tolerate the suggested schedule. I will try to implement it for a few days and will report back next week.

Just want to clarify a couple of things.

1. Should I wake him up after 30min so he doesn’t go beyond 4/4:30pm on the third nap?

2. With 4 naps, he alternated between long and short naps, meaning the first and third were long and the second and forth were short. With 3 naps, is there any issue if the first and third nap are long, whereas the second one is shorter? In a way that he still wakes up around 4-4:30pm from the last nap?

Thanks

[Thais Teves]

Hi Emma,

I just want to share how this past night went.

The forth nap happened from 5:40-6:10 (I had to wake him up). I put him in his crib at 8:40 and he slept by himself at 8:50!! This is such good news!! I’m looking for more bedtime like this (fingers crossed!)

Continuing with the good news, he woke up at 3:11am for feed, took a full feed and slept again easily in his crib at 3:34am.

I was hopeful he would go until 6am this time as he usually wakes up again after 3h of the first feed, but unfortunately, he woke up at 5:22am.

This time, I was confident he wasn’t hungry so I left him in his crib as he wasn’t crying. After 20’ my husband decided to try to help him fall back asleep using the pyramid but, as expected, it didn’t work. To stop the cry, I nursed him for a few minutes just to stall until 6am (lights off, no talking, no noise). He wasn’t hungry as he didn’t feed properly, he was just pacifying my breast while exploring everything will his hands.

Most nights he wakes up for feeds between 1:30-2:30am so I thought he was waking up at 5ish due to being hungry and therefore not able to fall back. However, he did the same this night despite of waking up only at 3:11am for feed, validating my hypothesis that hungry might not be the reason he is waking up. Also, he went to bed later this time but that didn’t seem to help pushing his wake up time to 6am either.

Thanks for your help.

[Thais Teves]

Hi Emma, thanks for the reply. As requested, I’m sharing a table that summarizes the sleep data from the past seven days.

*NAPS* (Last 7 days)

First Nap: Start: 7:43am End 9:25am -> Duration 1:42hrs Wake Window: 1:43hrs

Second Nap: Start: 11:34am End 12:29pm -> Duration 0:54hrs Wake Window: 2:09hrs

Third Nap: Start: 2:45pm End 3:59pm -> Duration 1:14hrs Wake Window: 2:16hrs

Fourth Nap: Start: 6:06pm End 6:36pm -> Duration 0:29hrs Wake Window: 2:06hrs

A few things to note:
1. We aim to start our day at 6am, even though my baby usually wakes between 5-5.30am. As you suggested, I’ve been keeping him in bed with me, breastfeeding until about 6am to officially start the day.
2. When he does 4 naps, I always wake him up after 30 minutes if he hasn’t woken up on his own.

*BEDTIME*

Day: 08/09/2025 Bedtime: 9:08pm Bedtime Wake time: 5:15am

Day: 09/09/2025 Bedtime: 8:53pm Bedtime Wake time: 5:41am

Day: 10/09/2025 Bedtime: 7:59pm Bedtime Wake time: 5:58am

Day: 11/09/2025 Bedtime: 9:05pm Bedtime Wake time: 6:20am

Day: 12/09/2025 Bedtime: 8:27pm Bedtime Wake time: 5:02am

Day: 13/09/2025 Bedtime: 7:16pm Bedtime Wake time: 5:38am

Day: 14/09/2025 Bedtime: 7:10pm Bedtime Wake time: 5:44am

Day: 15/09/2025 Bedtime: 7:47pm Bedtime Wake time: 5:40am

Day: 16/09/2025 Bedtime: 7:00pm Bedtime Wake time: 4:49am

Average bedtime: 8:05pm

Average wake up time: 5:34am

A few things to note:

1. His wake-up time has been consistently around 5:30am despite of the time he goes to bed (ranges between 7-9pm)

2. I’m trying to keep bedtime between 7 and 8 pm (ideally 7:30pm), but it’s been difficult to maintain consistency. I would need the last nap to end around 5 – 5:15pm (but I’ve never been able to achieve that, neither with 4 nor 3 naps)

His wake windows are quite long, which makes it hard to fit 4 naps while aiming for a bedtime between 7 and 8 pm. Usually, the day he takes 4 naps, bedtime ends up being around 8:30 or 9pm because the wake window before bedtime needs to be about 2:30 hours.

On the 16th, he woke up at 4pm from his 3rd nap so I decided to drop the 4th nap and put him to bed exactly at 7 p.m. This day his wake window before bedtime was 3h, but he didn’t seem overtired and slept pretty quickly when I put him down. However, he woke up at 4:49am with one feed around 1:50am. Maybe 7pm bedtime is too early for him? Should I stick with 4 naps and allow a later bedtime of 8:30 or 9pm to see if he will stop waking up so early?

Thanks for your help!