8 week old daytime sleeps
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Topic: 8 week old daytime sleeps
Posted By: lilliz
Subject: 8 week old daytime sleeps
Date Posted: 26 May 2010 at 9:22am
| How long should an 8 week old sleep for each nap during the day? My son has been sleeping 2-2.5 hours each time but the last few days has been waking after 1-1.5 hours. How do I know when he has had enough e.g should I keep trying to resettle if he crys and crys!!?? |
Replies:
Posted By: 1st_Time_Preggies
Date Posted: 26 May 2010 at 9:36am
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Hmm it is a toughie. Babies are so unpredictable! :-) When my bubs was young (under three months) plunket advised the "one hour up, two hours asleep" idea. However my wee boy never did that! He was and is a pretty shocking sleeper during the day.
Is your wee one happy when he wakes? And can he last until the next feed/sleep time? If so, I would just get him up. If he is grumpy (like mine!) you could try putting him in a rocker or bouncer and let him have a further nap. Or for a walk in the pram. I often did this cause I couldn't stand hearing him cry :-) For a friend in my coffee group getting her son up for 20 minutes or so, then putting him back down for a further sleep worked. He was tricked into thinking it was just another sleep :-) Hope you can figure something out either way :-) |
Posted By: High9
Date Posted: 26 May 2010 at 10:21am
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What I do is see if she is still tired, if so I try resettle, if not I will play with her or see if she wants a feed.
Like 1st_time said, is he happy to do something else? I don't let Lily cry jic she gets too worked up, but sometimes she is happy after just an hour and will happily do something else until she wants a feed or sleep again. Also Lily does 2-2.5hr sleeps also, but during growth spurts she'll wake after an hr/1.5 hrs. ------------- http://lilypie.com"> 
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Posted By: Lightning McQueen
Date Posted: 28 May 2010 at 9:43am
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My son did exactly the same thing when he hit the 8 week mark. Before that he had been up for an hour and sleeping for 2 hours, and I was wondering what I had done differently/wrong.
I read somewhere that babies' daytime sleep cycles (which are around 45 minutes long) become more established at 8 weeks, so they wake up a bit more fully between sleep cycles, and may need help resettling. It's really hard to know when to get him up and when to try and resettle. I would get him up if he had slept for more than one sleep cycle, but if he had only been down for one sleep cycle (so if he woke around the 45 min - 1 hour mark) I would try and resettle. If I couldn't resettle him in his cot, then I would pop him in his pram and take him for a walk like 1st Time Preggies did. He would usually sleep. Also, it was around this point that he became a lot more alert and wanted to stay awake for more than an hour - more like 1 hour 15 or 1 hour 30 before he began to show his tired signs. Good luck! |
Posted By: WestiesGirl
Date Posted: 28 May 2010 at 12:11pm
Gosh, 1 - 1.5 hours seems like a luxury  Up to 9 weeks old Jackson was generally on a 3 hourly cycle. He was up for a max of an hour (change, feed, basic play etc) then down for 2 - 2.5 hours. But at 9 weeks old he decided that he would cat nap for anything from 20 minutes to 45 minutes. I would try to resettle him but like your baby, would just cry and cry. So I gave in to the fact I had a cat napper.
As it turned out, it was my milk supply that was the issue (he wasnt gaining weight). I agree with the other ladies on resettling too. They change so quickly, he'll be doing something new soon. Jackson started having better day sleeps at 4 months when I started taking supplements to boost my supply. Good luck, I hope you can sort it  ------------- Our Angel July 08  Gone but not forgotten
And to complete our family, our princess has arrived 
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Posted By: Helen1
Date Posted: 28 May 2010 at 8:16pm
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I firmly believe (after 2 children) that most babies go through a period of lesser naps in the day anywhere is age from 8 weeks to about 5-6 months old.
Both by children became cat nappers during the day for this period of time and I have heard of so many other babies that do this. IT TOTALLY STRESSED ME OUT. Finally I just went with it (albeit with #2) and scheduled my day around lesser - but more - sleeps per day. They both evenutally settled down. Check things like if he could be hungry, hot, cold or dirty nappy. If all is okay then please just go with the flow for a short period of time. He won't always be doing this. ------------- http://lilypie.com"> 
http://lilypie.com"> 
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Posted By: Booski
Date Posted: 28 May 2010 at 8:42pm
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DD was a catnapper from about 12ish weeks. She was just too nosey and wanted to know what was going on in the world. I tried a lot of things to help her sleep longer ect but she just wasn't ready to. At about 7 - 8 months I moved her into our bed for day sleeps, and I'd have a nap beside her and could sometimes settle her back into another sleep. After a week or so she could sleep a full sleep cycle or sometimes more without being settled in between. ------------- 
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