I suspect that LO's longer naps are interfering with his night sleep.
Do you limit your LO's naps? If so, how old is your LO and how long do you limit naps? Does your LO get upset if you wake him/her up from a nap?
ETA: LO is almost 10 months
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My LO is only 10 weeks but I do wake her up from naps if it's time to eat. Day sleep doesn't interfere with her night sleep but if I don't get enough food in her during the day then she doesn't sleep well. She's not grumpy if I wake her up. Often she'll eat and then snooze a little longer if she needs to.
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I don't let LO go more than 4.5 hours between feedings, and I don't let his last nap go beyond 5:30. Other than that, I let him sleep. it's actually generally true that the better a baby sleeps during the day, the better he will sleep at night, so unless your LO is having like 5 hour naps during the day, it's probably not negatively affecting his night sleep! ETA my LO is 16wks.
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I didn't until around 7 months. Before then, no amount of napping would affect night sleep. If she slept well the night before,she doesn't get to sleep more than 2 hours for each nap. If she was restless, sick, teething, etc we're flexible. 4pm is the latest she can nap on the afternoon. She needs at least 4 hours of awake time before bed, and I don't like her going to sleep after 8. The instances of that happening are few and far between though.
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@MamaMoose: @hilsy85: thanks for your sharing your experiences!
@Weagle: thanks! That helps. How many hours does your LO sleep at night?
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I don't, but he generally will not nap for longer than 2 hours unless he is sick (in which case I just let him sleep). More commonly he sleeps 1.5 hours in the morning and an hour in the afternoon. I don't let him sleep past 4 p.m. though now that he's on a morning and afternoon nap schedule, it's not an issue. Also he only sleeps 10 hours overnight, so he needs as much day sleep as he wants. He's 8.5 months.
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@NerdBee: 11-12. If she slept any less than 11 I would be less likely to limit naps. She is such a mediocre napper, though. Chances are, if she's sleeping longer than 2 hours she really needs it.
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only if the last nap is extending past 5:30 or 6! The longer naps have not seemed to interfere with either baby's night sleep.
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When LO was a newborn, I would wake him for feedings, but he was a preemie and he would have slept past feedings if I hadn't woken him up. Now, this is not an issue, LO doesn't tend to nap long enough. He's 8 months old.
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I hate to admit it but yes, if I have to be somewhere then I will wake him up earlier so that he will eat before we go and so I can change him.
I hate when he wakes up from a nap *while* I'm out because I have to go to back seat, feed him, change him and get him in a good mood (always wakes up so groggy and cranky). -
I really try not to (my LO is 10 months also) unless we have to be somewhere. I have to wake him up every morning out of a dead sleep for daycare and it sucks so the guilty mommy in me lets him just get whatever sleep he needs on the weekends. We've never really had any problems with naps affecting his night sleep though. He usually sleeps about 11-11 1/2 hours a night. The problem we've been running into lately is that his morning nap goes 2 1/2- 3 hours and then he refuses a 2nd nap in the afternoon. If it continues, I might need to start waking him up.
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I think once babies get older, naps need to be limited in order that the night sleep is not affected. I agree with @weagle, it started around the 7 month mark. Last week i let LO have 4.5 hours worth of naps because i know she was super tired from our flight back home. Well, she woke up 3 times that night!!
LO is almost 10 months as well, similar to yours. I limit her naps to 3 hours total, though lately i haven't had to wake her up. I do slow wakeups by opening the door, and if the light doesn't wake her up i turn off the sound machine, and then i start calling her name slowly. By letting her wake up on her own, she isn't upset when she wakes up. I try to make sure her first nap doesn't go too long, because i would hate for the second nap to be less than an hour, which i don't find is restorative for her. She usually sleeps 10.5 hours before a feed, and will go down for another 1.5 hours.
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E is 8.5 months and naps horribly at daycare, so he seems to take extra long naps on the weekends to make up for it. I don't wake him up unless he sleeps past 5:30. It doesn't seem to affect his night sleep.
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@caffeinated: Agree with the "soft" wakeup that you described. If I ever need to wake LO that's how I do it.
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@caffeinated: Same:) Basically if I open the door, the light itself will slowly wake him up. He will immediately start squirming and then wake up. After that, I actually flip the light switch.
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naps don't seem to affect her nighttime sleep (4 months old) so I don't wake her from them. I figure if she's sleeping, she needs the sleep. she will sometimes take a late afternoon nap and wake up around 430-5, but still goes to bed for 630-7.
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No. I just let him sleep as much as he wants, and he always sleeps great at night.
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@caffeinated: thanks! This is super helpful advice. I also find that a long first nap has been resulting in a short second nap which doesn't seem as restful and then he gets overtired by bedtime.
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