Split Nights SOS 😴
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Maybe something like that is more like what I need to try - although that's nearly 14 hours in 24 I think, that's quite a lot (no criticism, it's obviously working for you guys, I just don't know that my wee one would manage quite that much). Do you wake her? I agree that 9pm is a late bedtime and it doesn't sit well with us. I sought advice elsewhere and we were suggested that sort of routine. They actually suggested a 9.30 bedtime! Thank you for replying ❤️
Yes I wake her each nap. You could do shorter naps of course if your LO has less sleep needs and move bedtime back to make 7.30 or 8. Or if you want to keep that bed time maybe allow her to sleep until 8 am maybe ? It may take some trial and error but going to bed at 9m30 after waking up a 7 is a very long day xxx
Your schedule looks fine to me, we are very similar. Maybe a little earlier bedtime for us most days but I'm not too strict with it. Can you explain more what split nights look like for you? And what a disturbed night might look like? Its very normal for babies this age to still be waking for comfort or milk (hunger). I think a lot of emphasis is put on babies sleeping through the night and it causes more stress than its worth! But obviously if baby is up for hours on end or waking every hour throughout the night then some support is needed x
Too much daytime sleep and too late of a nighttime sleep. I’d be trying to keep the second nap to 20/30 mins and pulling back bedtime by 1.5 hours.
Could you try a one nap schedule? Eg wake at 7, nap at 12, bed at 7.30. X
@Bethany I've seen others say that it's worked for them too but it doesn't work for her, she was getting progressively more tired. Split nights she's normally awake for 1-1.5 hours, sometimes 2 hours. Most of these nights she is actively trying to get back to sleep - I bring her in with me when she wakes so she has the comfort and this helps me sleep when she does too. Some nights she goes back to sleep for a sleep cycle and wakes again for another hour. The restless nights she may have got back to sleep in my bed, and dozes for hours. Literally hours. I give her all the support that I can to help her get back into a proper sleep but she just can't. This is a new feature of the last couple of weeks, since we started that new routine. She then has a catch up day, where she's so tired that we can't actually wake her, and then sleeps better that night. I'm not fussing over her sleeping through every night but I know that she can and she would be doing it more if we could get the balance right.
@Caroline we did try that before, a while ago when her sleep needs may have been higher, but she was having lots of false starts and seemed generally overtired.
@Lily she's ready for her first nap after about 3 hours so I think she'd struggle. She sometimes has a 1 nap day but she can't handle 2 or more in a row. She normally goes down ok for both naps so I don't think she's ready to drop a nap yet but this is definitely something I reassess a lot at the moment!
You might find a better rhythm once she’s down to 1 nap when she’s ready. I def find that - mine is a lot easier to get to sleep for both nap and nighttime. Mine also does a lot of split nights though regardless of daytime sleep. She’s just really excited to be awake and in bed with us lol
We were having the exact same issue as you and reached out to a sleep consultant as it was ruining our lives tbh. She was up half the night then we were sleeping in which meant bedtime was late, and we were capping her naps thinking too much day time sleep was the problem. We were so wrong. We were advised to move to the following routine 7.30am wake up 10.30-11 nap 2-4 nap 7.30 bedtime We were also told to remove the dummy cold turkey and make sure that how they go to sleep is how they wake up in the night. So no dummy, dark, white noise on. I’m not even joking from the day we moved to the new routine we haven’t seen a split night. It has completely changed our lives and I feel so much happier and more like my old self. I’m even able to flex it a bit to work round any plans we have but on the whole I try and keep the times as close to the plan as possible. If they aren’t getting enough sleep they get overtired and their bodies release stress hormones to keep awake
I think this is your babies problem. She isn’t getting enough sleep overall and the late bedtime is out of sync with her circadian rhythm. If she’s waking up at 7 her bedtime should be 7. Moving to the new routine has made us less flexible but the most important thing is we are all getting the sleep we need now!
Hey hun she may be pretty tired. Personally that bed time looks so late . Eg. My LG wakes at 7am too. First nap at 9.45am for 1 hour. Second nap at 3 for one hour and then she's in bed for 7.15 for the night .