So. Napping bootcamp then.

You asked what napping bootcamp entails? Well, it first entailed getting in a sleep nanny who was recommended by a colleague. She came in to do one nap with us, but stayed for two given that Junior simply refused to nap for the whole duration of the first one. She gave us various hints tips and tricks to try to get him down, most of which you've heard before, including darkening the room, swaddling him, having a regular schedule, offering a dummy as a nap cue but taking it away before he is completely asleep, picking him up if he gets distressed, patting until he's calm, then putting him down again, etc. She asked us to make sure that almost all his naps for the next week would be at home in a darkened room, and to make an exception only for the late afternoon nap if we had to.

Being me, we've adhered to the plan almost in every detail in an attempt to give it a good try. The only area where I've been a bit lax is in sticking precisely to time. Sometimes I'll go 15 minutes later if he's finally asleep rather than waking him. But other than that we've been very good. And the results have been...mixed. I thought we'd cracked it when on Monday it took only 15 minutes to get him down for his morning nap, and he went down with no fuss at all, just a little grumbling, for the lunchtime nap. But then Tuesday every nap took at least 25 minutes to kick in, and the breakfast one was really screamy as well. Yesterday the morning and lunchtime naps only took 10 minutes each, and the only crying was when I first put him down, he immediately calmed down when I put my hand on him and then just grumbled and then lay quietly while he waited for sleep. But yesterday afternoon he only slept for 10 minutes of the hour's nap time, and this morning took 20 minutes again, although not much of it was crying.

So I dunno. It's been a long week, and unlike the previous not-very-successful napping strategy of putting him in his pram and walking, I've barely left the house. I'm going to give it another 3 days or so and then start to try him in his pram as well as in his room as I'm not prepared to be housebound for the next three months. I like to think this will work eventually but so far I'm not totally convinced.

Comments

[Kath]

Dear Thalia, that sounds difficult indeed. I hope the next few days are crowned with more consistent success. Being stuck in the house is not fun, is it? Melon's fairly good about naps but she and her sister pretty much only do them in bed, and as they are on, shall we say, complementary schedules at the moment, I see a lot of my living room. And it's not such a great-looking living room...

[Lut C.]

I have no advice whatsoever for you. I hope the naps improve soon.

[Aurelia]

Hmm, well I sometimes found that if I swaddled him, with his hands firmly down at his side, a la miracle blanket style, then nursed, I could get him to sleep and put him down in the crib or whereever.

But he's also pretty young isn't he? So maybe he wants the naps on a different schedule? Like two vs. three? Or at least a two hour stretch in between? Naps for us really affected sleeptimes, and vice versa, so I had to do everything in the exact same style and keep him on a schedule for that.

What's going on at night?

[geohde]

I am a firm believer that there are general guiding pronciples rooted in the physiology of sleep and the way that babies learn and simple conditioning plus or minus a dash of approprate sleep associations.

But I also firmly believe that not all babies haev read the modern science manual in that regard and it is not as easy as it sounds some of the time.

I was lucky, in retrospect, that the sleep nazi approach worked for me. It had to, with mutliples and a firm desire for 10 hours a night.

g

[Girl Detective]

Napping, and sleep in general, is such a fraught thing. I've come to feel that sleep may well be above food at the top of my basic needs list.

I echo the need for regularity, and for practice. It does take time. Sleep is a skill, and some babies "get it" better than others. My first was a terrible sleeper until I got firm and regular, and that got me the practice I needed to help the second one, who "got it" much quicker.

Persevere. And know that you are not alone, and you're doing a great job.

[statia]

I agree with the others. Sleeping takes practice and he's what, 2.5-3 months? At this age, I think they're just too young to adhere to a schedule. I know that the Mini took AGES, despite my best to put him on a regimented schedule. LG is a bit more regular, but still not consistent at 4 months. She naps around the same times daily, and I'm now getting a long nap from 2:30-5, but that's only if she's sleeping on our bed, which right now, is fine with me, since they both nap at that time, it gives me a little break for just me.

[Betty M]

I'm impressed you are sticking to the bootcamp. I would have crumbled if my past form is any guide. I have never been a big fan of the it is x o'clock and baby A must be in its cot asleep until x+2 o'clock approach because I am lazy. My kids would probably be better sleepers now if I had tried a bootcamp.

[motel manager]

#2 was much more of a sleeping problem than #1 was. Even so, he got it all together by 5 or 6 months, more or less. Napping and nighttime both started improving around the same time, and now he's fairly reliable. I feel like a new person. We did the same sorts of sleep training with both, so I think personality must come into play.

Hang in there....

[May]

Have no napping advice whatsoever, but much sympathy and best wishes for getting Junior to sleep as and when convenient.

[AllAngela]

Your son and my son are quite alike! I also have a two-year-old daughter who naps like a champ, so imagine my horror with my new son who doesn't nap. Mine is eight-months-old and didn't nap at all when he was your son's age (your son and I were both born on July 2nd, so mazel tov) and would only sleep while curled up with someone or nursing. What works for me is putting him to sleep with a bottle (a big no-no but oh well; it gets the job done). He wakes up at around 7 am and I put him down at noon with a bottle. He sleeps for an hour and is up from 1 pm to 5 pm and I put him back to sleep for the night with a bottle.

[Bea]

I missed this post at the time.

This sounds so familiar. I tried all of what you said and the solution in the end was to give up and work around it. Which for us meant our sofabed got the best workout of its life, otherwise there was sleep for nobody. Don't know what you should do...

Actually, the flexible schedule was the one thing that made a definite improvement (within 30mins of the same time each day) but there again, I had to institute a rule that I would spend no longer than 30mins trying to get him to sleep before giving up and just trying again an hour later.

In summary - I can add no advice, but good luck!

Bea