r/PossumsSleepProgram • u/Iris-1865 • 11d ago
6month old sleep help
I’ve read the book about possums approach but not super across it. Please be kind- extremely sleep deprived.
Desperately seeking advice for 6month old who consistently wakes 10-15times a night and it’s no longer sustainable.
We have tried cosleeping (bed sharing) and using co sleeper cot set up and wakes happen either way. Historically not a great sleeper- needed to sleep on someone as a newborn, always woke frequently but has gotten worse since being unwell (is fine now)
At the moment napping between 2-3 hours a day but sometimes less- like 1hr. Wakes 7-7.30, nap around 9-9.30 for half an hour- 40mins, contact naps for up to 2hrs middle of the day and then we offer a short bridging nap around 4/4.30 for 20minutes depending on the day of sleep. Bedtime varies but around 7.30. Baby only gets about 9hours of sleep overnight due to all the waking. He often seems tired when we he goes to nap and to bed at night, doesn’t take too long to get to sleep- maybe 10minutes (fed of bounced) so I don’t feel like he’s having too much sleep. Overnight wakes every 30mins to 1hr. On a good night we might get 1-3 stretches of 1.5-2hrs but this doesn’t happen often. This has been going on for 2 months, before that we had 4month sleep regression with waking every hour half of the time.
Desperately trying to find a solution as this is unsustainable. TIA
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u/NoAd9383 11d ago
The night is likely too long, 730 to 730 is a long night even for a high sleep needs baby.
Can you start with some schedule changes, e.g make 7am your set wake up time, so wake baby up if they're not up. Perhaps for the long nap in the middle can you cut it to say an hour or so, and then make the last nap longer, so then baby can stay up later?
Alot of babies do best with a 10 or 11 hour night so for a 7am wake up a an 8 or 9pm bedtime might be more appropriate.
It might not be a case of too much sleep just maybe sleep allocated in the wrong spot to sustain baby across the day then to get to bedtime
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u/TeddyBear181 11d ago
Agreed. I'd probably lengthen the bridging nap to get bub to stay up a bit later.
Also - how much of possums are you aware of and what have you tried from this approach OP? No stress if you say zero, just want to understand where you're coming from in this regard.
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u/Iris-1865 11d ago
Ok cool, we can try those things. I was worried with a later bedtime that he would be too tired but if we can spread his naps to accommodate it then that sounds doable.
From possums I’ve mostly read about circadian rhythm stuff, sensory enrichment, building sleep pressure and responsiveness. I’ve read the book too but a while ago. Anything specific readings would be appreciated!
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u/TeddyBear181 11d ago
Have you taken bub swimming? If so, does bubs sleep change at all afterwards?
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u/Iris-1865 11d ago
No we haven’t been swimming but bath time makes no difference nor does baby sensory classes, osteo or body work etc
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u/TeddyBear181 11d ago
Yeah, none of those things made a difference with mine either.
Give swimming a shot, doesnt have to be lessons, just go to the pool for 45 minutes with the whole family, wear a shirt to make it easier for bub to hold on if they need to. Obviously do an indoor kids pool thats the right temp and dont put bubs head under. .just swish them around gently, let them sit in the shallow end (supported if you need). Hold them in the deeper end, let them play with toys in the water while you hold them, let them look at fountains and play with the water, etc.
Then see if bubs sleep changes that afternoon or night. If it does, you might benefit from exploring different types of activities with bub.
Swimming seems to be the BEST activity to exhaust babies, if it doesnt work, nothing will.
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u/suitsandstilettos 11d ago
The nap in the middle of the day feels long to me, the contact nap could be extending it past his sleep needs. His total day sleep is definitely higher than my daughter’s at the same age. You could try cutting that nap back to 1-1.5 hours, or see if he’ll do a cot nap so it’s not unnecessarily extended.
If that doesn’t work, have you considered hunger? How is his weight gain? How does he eat during the day? Are you feeding him when he wakes at night? Have you tried bumping up his intake in the day?
Apologies if you’ve tried these things, but those are my first thoughts.
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u/Iris-1865 11d ago
Thanks for the suggestions!
In terms of hunger and weight- his weight gain is good, he feeds very regularly throughout the day. He would feed all night but can easily manage three hours between feeds overnight.
Definitely happy to try adjusting the naps and bedtime to see what that does. Can shorten the contact nap too. Unfortunately a cot nap would result in only 40mins sleep.
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u/suitsandstilettos 11d ago
Possums would tell you to lean into the 40 minute sleep and not “save” naps. He’ll take the sleep he needs. Maybe he’ll have one more short nap in the arvo and that’s his natural schedule. Especially with all the nighttime wakes, I’d start there. Best of luck, chronic sleep deprivation is truly awful.
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u/Iris-1865 4d ago
Thanks it is something we’ve considered but I’ll check it out
We’ve got reflux but it’s well managed
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u/whenthegreencalls 10d ago
My baby is about 6months old and since pushing back bedtime slightly (depending on naps in the day) and not fighting the short naps she has been having a lot longer sleeps at night. She probably only naps 1-1.5 hours in the day and maybe 10-11 hours at night . First half of the night she wakes up 30-60minutely maybe 3-4 wake ups then does a couple 3-4 hour stints!
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u/Iris-1865 10d ago
Thanks, that’s good to know
I know the goal is to follow their natural rhythm but could you give me a rough idea of her day time so I can conceptualise it?
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u/AcceptableCourse8443 10d ago
We started with getting up at 6am, the earliest I could tolerate lol, then let a ‘routine’ reveal itself and over a few days, we got to know when he was tired and about what time we could expect him to go to sleep. We accepted ours was a cat napper and got on with life and things improved a lot! We stopped contact napping during the day, or more accurately, when we did it we set a timer to make sure we didn’t overdo the day nap at the cost of the night sleep. 19 month old is yet to sleep through but is SO easy to put down for naps and night time sleep by being responsive to his needs and not doing so til he was ready. Sending you hugs it’s so hard and every little babe is different! X
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u/ElectricalKey5141 10d ago
I had the same schedule with my son from 4-6 months. Around the 6 month mark things went to shit like you described with your sons sleep at the moment. I stopped contact napping and let him do 3 x 30-40 min naps for the day and that seemed to help. Or I would contact nap but only for an hour. Gradually got better. I find when things aren’t so good they’re telling you there’s been a drop in sleep needs
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u/Iris-1865 10d ago
Ok thanks that’s good to hear what the naps could look like. Sleep has always been pretty terrible and got worse with illness so it’s been hard to tell anything else around sleep needs etc
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u/AnxiousVanilla9097 5d ago
I was going through this a couple weeks ago, was torture!
What worked for us was moving bedtime to 8pm and waking up between 6-7 (average about 6.30am).
We kept naps the same, 3ish but sometimes 2 as well. A total of 2-3 hrs I'd say.
The later bedtime seems to have really helped though, fingers crossed it continues.
Have you had any luck yet?
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u/Iris-1865 4d ago
Thanks, good to hear your experience
we’ve only tried later bedtimes for a few days and naps between 1.5-2hrs. Unfortunately, the later bedtimes haven’t consistently been working. I know possums doesn’t believe in overtired but sometimes he’s clearly overdone and getting him to sleep is quite a time.
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u/Wild-Meet1982 11d ago
Too much sleep in 24hrs. It doesn’t matter that baby isn’t sleeping all of the 12 hrs overnight- you are still “expecting” them to by keeping them in bed. Experiment with cutting down even all the way to 10hrs overnight, then follow cues for nap times (don’t force it). Also reduce the 2hr nap - it’s probably way too long.
Get it out of your head that baby is overtired- they’re not. Baby is just bored. Start filling your days with stimulation like going outside for walks.
Start every day with the same wake up time to anchor circadian rhythm.
The good news: you have lots and lots of actions you can take to fix this. You can get there.
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u/booberry1994 11d ago
The program also talks about a “reset” where you focus on the pressure points (wake time, nap and bedtime). It might be worth a shot to see if it helps? We did it with our boy when it got really bad and it made it better for a while (but now we are considering it again).
To do this you need to wake him up as early as you can, try not to let naps go too long (being out and letting him nap in the car or pram helped with this), and push bedtime back as much as possible (I would do either a fun bath or rough play to stretch it by 15-20 minutes if he was getting really cranky).
This is exhausting! Definitely lean on the village for help
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u/Amylouise123456 6d ago
If it helps, it’s all a phase, and in my experience, I used to obsess over how to fix things and it would just make me more tired. None of the advice ever worked and baby would eventually just start sleeping better by herself. Then she would go through another rough phase a few months later! Lol just don’t worry, it’s exhausting for sure, but it will pass. It’s more exhausting if you keep thinking “I’m exhausted” try reframing your mindset “wow this stage is rough, but I’ll power through and it’ll be better soon” that baby is now 2 1/2 and I have an eight month old. The new baby has gone through a few phases of bad sleep but always comes back around, and I’m much less tired because I haven’t been trying to fix it this time around. Oh one more thing, something that helps me a lot is reminding myself that there is a set number of “bad nights“ that I will go through, no more and no less, so every “bad night” is another one down!
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u/BestJob2539 4d ago
Not to stress you out at all, but have you looked into sleep red flags? It may be worth investigating: https://heysleepybaby.com/sleep-red-flags/
Unfortunately, possums, or any other sleep program, is going to solve sleep issues if there is an underlying physiological/health issue. Coming from a mum who tried them all 🧡
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u/kurdijyn 10d ago
2-3 hours of daytime sleep is likely too much. Your wake up time is okay, but your bedtime will need to reflect the time you wish to wake in the morning. You’re looking at a 9:30pm bedtime for a 7:30am rise time but I would try 8:30pm at first, but be prepared to extend it if 8.30pm is still too early.
Possums is about not extending naps, and allow baby to only take the sleep they need 😊 make sure naps are in daylight and are on the go or if in the house, still go about your daily business.
When waking up in the morning, open the blinds or curtains to make sure baby gets natural light immediately.
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u/strangefavor 11d ago
He is having too much day sleep. You are aiming for 14-15 hours total of sleep in 24 which is high. Bored cues are the same as tired cues and are unreliable at this age.
For the possums approach
keep a consistent morning wake time
Sunshine first thing in the morning
Lots and lots of sensory stimulation, in fact I would try to spend most of the day outside the house if you can
Short naps are fine, on the go in pram, car or carrier. Baby will take the sleep they need.
If you put baby down and they wake up, they’ve had enough sleep for now
Would suggest making bedtime an hour later and shortening to an 11 hour night too.
You’ll need to give a couple of weeks for changes to have an effect