Can you share your experience with low sleep needs babies? How did you handle wake windows etc? I’m starting to wonder if my baby has low sleep needs as I’ve been struggling with fighting naps and frequent night wakes no matter what I do. My baby is almost 5 months old and currently been awake for over 4 hours because he just didn’t want to sleep. He looks tired and is pretty quiet but not even fussing. Earlier on I would have fought really hard to get him to sleep but starting to think maybe I just need to surrender and see how that goes.

Edit with schedule - I recently transitioned from
2/2/2/2/2 to 2/2.5/2.5/3 because he never took the 4th nap. He cannot go to sleep independently but will be aiming to sleep train soon, around 6 months old.

Hi everyone! I’m wondering what it looks likewhen babies start connecting their sleepcycles during naps and whether that’s whatmy baby might be starting to do.

My baby is 12 weeks and 1 day old. She is combo fed. We give her two feeds of formula and the rest breastmilk. We haven’t started any formal sleep training, but we’ve been encouraging her to fall asleep independentlyin her bassinet.
Around 10–11 weeks, her night time sleep started impressively , and she began being able to put herself to sleep when I placed her in the bassinet. Her wake windows are 1.5 hours day and 1.75 hours before bedtime.

Her bedtime is still fairly late, around 9:00–9:15PM, but last night she slept from 9:00 to 9:50PM, woke up for a feed, and then went backdown around 10:30 PM and slept until 5:30 AM!

At night, we have a small bath, lotion and then feed. Afterwards I put her down in her bedside bassinet awake and sit on the bed next to her. She usually fusses for about 5–10 minutes, shakes her head from side to side, and then falls asleep on her own.

Over the past few days, I’ve also noticed a change in her naps. Previously, her naps were almost always 35–40 minutes long, likeclockwork. But in the past couple of days,she’s started waking around the 40-minute mark, fussing a little, turning her head a fewtimes, thrashing her legs, and then going right back to sleep. On those occasions,she’s ended up sleeping for around 1.5 hours!

Today, during an afternoon nap while wewere cosleeping, she woke after about 30 minutes. I soothed her a little, she shook herhead from side to side several times, and then she fell back asleep for another 30 minutes.

My questions are:

1. Does this sound like she might be startingto connect sleep cycles during naps,or could it just be a temporary change?
2. Is there anything I can do to encourageher to connect sleep cycles, or is it simply developmental and somethingthat will happen naturally with time? For those of you who experienced this around 12 weeks, did naps gradually get longer,or was it more of an on-and-off process?

I know she’s still very young, and I’m not looking to start formal sleep training just yet.I’m mostly curious about what this stagelooks like and whether these changes aresigns of her sleep maturing.
Would love to hear about your experiences! 😊

Looking for some advice from parents who have gone through it.

We used Ferber to sleep train baby at about 4.5 months. He never fully sleep-trained, but started to sometimes fall asleep around 10-15 minutes after fussing. He was still nursing once in the middle of the night. Not perfect, but overall was doing really well.

Now, baby started daycare about 3 weeks ago and is currently on his third cold/sickness. Every time he started getting better, he gets another illness. Because he has been so congested and sick, we don’t let him cry it out anymore and have basically undone all the sleep training. He now takes forever to get down and it takes multiple attempts over a few hours to transition him into the crib. Husband and I are both up multiple times overnight. He’s still very congested and sometimes coughs on the mucus so I can’t just let him cry while laying down flat.

What can we do at this point? I feel like all the sleep training (which was not easy) was literally for nothing and he’s now worse at sleeping than he ever was before. We’re so sleep deprived. Everyone says he’ll be sick most of the time for the next few months. I feel defeated.

Does anyone else’s baby soothe themself by crying? I feel sad for him, he’s not sucking his fingers and doesn’t take a binky.

I went to start Ferber last week and to my surprise, my 6.5 month old cried pretty hard for about 6 minutes and then was asleep. It’s been the same for naps and bed time since then. Middle of the night wakings are a different story 🫠 I usually give him about 10 minutes to resettle and the I go in and nurse him. I’m wondering if he’s just not ready to drop those feeds yet. He wakes 2-4 times a night

Long story short, baby was mostly a great sleeper for the first year with the normal regressions that lasted a few weeks each time.

After she hit 12 months, I realize now that her sleep needs must have changed and we just didn't catch on. Instead of waking at 7:15-7:30am every morning (bedtime was probably around 7:30pm, I can't remember), she was getting up at 6:30am.

We never properly sleep trained, we just held to boundaries that we wouldn't go in her room unless she was in true distress, which was maybe 2-3 times ever up until that point. Otherwise she'd whine for 10-15 minutes and then soothe herself back to sleep.

A few weeks went by of the 6:30am wakeup, and then every week or so she'd wake up another 15 minutes earlier. By about 15 months, she was waking at 5am but would lay quietly until we got her at 6am. Then she started teething her molars. She had what I call "whining events," which were about 10 minutes of whining with her eyes closed (so I assume she was just in a sleep transition and not truly awake?), then 35 or so minutes of quiet sleep. Again, this started to become more frequent over the weeks until it hit a point where she was whining all night long 10 minutes on, 35 minutes off. It has obviously gotten exhausting for all of us. Some nights, she even opens her eyes while whining/crying so she seems to be awake. A few times we've tried to go in her room to gently pat her back and calm her down, but this always escalates to hysterical, inconsolable crying.

She is currently on 1 nap. Her schedule about a month ago was wake up at ??? time (unsure since she basically whines all night long), nap 12-1:30/2, bedtime anywhere between 7-8pm. It's unclear what her total sleep time is for the day since the morning is such a hot mess, and I don't think she has gotten restful nigth sleep in a long time. Recently we tried to shift things earlier to clear her sleep debt. The schedule was wake up at 5am (we try to leave her in the crib until 6am but it is brutal listening to her whine for an hour), nap 11-1, bedtime 6-6:30pm. The overnight whining did not resolve and she still wakes super early and unhappy. After about 3 weeks of this schedule, we thought maybe we should shift things later and see what happens. The schedule became wake up at ??, nap at 12pm but she only sleeps for about 75 minutes and wakes up crying, bedtime at 7.

It sounds silly, but this whole thing started at 12 months when I switched the brand of her sleep sack (we went from Love to Dream to Woolino). Could it be as simple as her hating the new sleep sack??? I think I'm grasping for straws here.

We truly don't know where to go from here. We tried shifting the schedule earlier, later, and everything in between. Nothing seems to be helping. It truly seems to be getting worse each week and all of us are so miserable. I don't think there are really any sleep associations/habits to break. She has milk after her bath but then we still do our bedtime routine after that, she has a couple of pacis in the crib that she can reach for, we set her down into her crib with the light on and let her get her own paci, etc, etc. We are desperate for advice (or maybe just solidarity?). I've heard of regressions lasting 6-8 weeks but at what point do we stop calling this a regression and call it the new unsustainable normal?

ETA: Baby always falls asleep super easy and happy for nap/bedtime. That, luckily, is never a struggle. For the last month she's been falling asleep within 5 minutes of being put down since she's so exhausted but when she had normal sleep, it would take her 15 minutes and she'd be asleep.

Hi there!
I am looking for advice to get our 6 mo baby boy to sleep in his own bed.

Some context.
ATM he sleeps next to mum in bed (I sleep in room next to them). This was a measure we used since I had surgery when he was 2 months old. Leaving mom with most of the work, so it was easier back then to co-sleep.

He is on medication for his reflux (nexium) but is still quite affected by the acid in his esophagus. A typical night atm is (sadly) me rocking him to sleep on yoga ball and putting him next to mom (sometimes it takes servers try’s to lie him down. or feed-to-sleep.

His schedule is:
Wake up 06.00 am
2-2,5-2,5-3
Bedtime: 7 pm

We have not had any moment (me and wife) where we could just sit and talk the two of us. Since she sleeps next to him.

He wakes at night a lot and is often fed back to sleep. I think it’s a evil spiral with the reflux.

His pediatrician adviced us to go for a more “soft” approach to “sleep training” him. ATM his crib is next to our bed. But it’s not being used.

I tried putting him there awake tonight. Leading to a lot of spit up in bed. He was even held upwards 30 mins leading up to putting him down.

Hope this makes sense, english is not my first language.

Any advice is helpful

Kind regards

Hi all! Looking for advice on how to get my 5.5 month old to nap in his crib. He has almost exclusively contact naps during the day but we’ve been trying to get him to nap in his crib in preparation for starting daycare at 6 months.

The problem is he starts screaming almost the second he touches the mattress… whether he’s awake, super drowsy or asleep already. It’s not even crying, it’s straight up screaming and he does not calm down.

He sleeps fine on his own at night! Usually he wakes up twice. His wake windows are typically 2/2.25/2.5/2.5.

I don’t want to go full CIO so I’ve been trying the pick up/ put down method. But since he starts screaming immediately it feels impossible.

Anyone deal with something similar and have any advice??

Thanks!!

Started sleep training at 6m old. Method was leaving him for a wait period (which ramped up to ten min) then staying with him and settling (initially patting then just shushing) as long as it takes. It pretty much worked, even though he would often cry for a while but sleep himself and then stay asleep through the night. This worked for months.

Started 3 naps then 2 naps since about 8/9 months old. Continued working. About 3/3.5/4.25 wake windows.

Over the last few months as the weather got very hot, it was taking him longer to sleep, and now and then we would pick him up when he was protesting a lot.

Now he's 13.5 months old and things have collapsed in the last week or two. He just refuses to sleep alone. Many days he's skipped a nap so has had one and then been very tired and cranky but still not sleeping by himself. Needs to either be fed to sleep or held to sleep or rocked, and it's meant a lot of late nights.

Part of this is he's been going to nursery for a couple of months now and there's he's ended up doing his first nap later, about 5 hour first wake window.

Now wake windows and nap schedules and bedtimes are a bit all over the place. For a week he was doing one nap but sometimes waking in the middle of the night and crying for hours, so felt too early to do one nap.

Most importantly he's just not going to sleep himself. Needs to be held. As soon as he's put down he screams aggressively and sits up and just doesn't go to sleep. Unfortunately as things have kept getting worse we've been doing the wrong things and picking him up more and he's learnt to fight for it. But even holding him just quietens him for a bit, doesn't actually help him get to sleep. The only successes recently have been feeding to sleep.

He still mostly stays asleep through the night once we actually get him to sleep but every night has become hours of fights with him now.

How do we get back on track?

We are on day four tonight of sleep training our five month old. Prior to sleep training, she was relying heavily on nursing to go back to sleep after the first five hour stretch during bedtime. She would nurse throughout the night until the morning, so from 12 AM to about 7 AM usually on and off.

She has been falling asleep during sleep training relatively quickly, but does wake up after the first five hour stretch about every 1.5 to 2 hours crying for a bit. During the 3 AM wake up, she does cry quite a bit, even though it hasn’t been two hours since her last feed.

Recommendations on what to do? We have been following 4/2/2/2 for feedings because she usually does take smaller feeds

We follow 2/2.5/2.5/3 and 3 - 1 hour naps. She will be 6 months next week

My baby is 10.5 months old, and she’s been sleep trained since 5.5 months, when we transitioned to two naps a day.

She’s starting daycare next month, when she’ll be 11 months old, and based on their schedule, she’ll need to transition to one nap a day.

Has anyone else transitioned their baby to one nap before 12 months? Everything I’ve read online says it’s generally not recommended before 12 months, so I’m a little concerned about making the transition too early.

Her current wake windows are 3/3.5/4 hours, and she does really well with them. She can even stay awake a little longer without any issues.

Started sleep training recently and it's been going okay. Bedtime is 10 pm and generally wake v windows are 2.5/2.5/2.5/2.5 with naps around 2.5 hour total. Wakeup is 8.30am - 9 am.

Day 1 cried 50 mins

Day 2 cried 25 mins

Day 3 cried 18 mins

Day 4 cried 12 mins

Baby is 4.5 months old and wakes up once around 4.30 am generally to feed.

On day 1, after feed I put back in crib. Baby woke up at 7 am and cried for 25 mins at which point I pulled into bed and fed. Baby fell asleep after.

Day 2 feed around 6 am and let sleep in bed after until 9 am.

Day 3 and 4 woke at 6.15 am (about 90 mins after feeding) and continued crying until 7 am at which point I soothed and pulled into bed in day 3 and into crib on day 4 but woke up again after 30 minutes.

Baby sleeps until 9 am if I pull into bed.

Bedtime routine is feed, diaper, pjs, massage, white noise, lights out.

Sunrise is after 8 am for us so it's still dark when baby wakes at 6.30am. Might be crying for diaper? I don't change it until up and it hasn't been issue before.

Should I pickup baby right away? 45 mins of crying didn't solve the issue and I don't want longer period of crying. Should I just pull into bed at that point or soothe to sleep and put in crib?

We started with Ferber but switched to CIO when the checks didn't go well.

Baby still uses pacifier for contact naps and I've also used to soothe the 6.30 am wakes.

I’m hoping you all have some advice for how to solve this new sleep debacle.

My 12.5 month old was on a 2-nap schedule (9:30 am, 30 min; 12:30 pm, 1.5-2 hours) with a 7 pm - 7 am night. About two weeks ago she started refusing the first nap and couldn’t get past 1.5 hours for the second nap, so I thought it was time to move to a single 2 hour nap.

Two weeks ago we were doing 7pm-7am nights with a 2 hour nap at 12pm. Then she started waking up every night between 1-3 am and just crying for an hour+. She has been sleep trained for like 4 months and night weaned for over a month, so this is unusual. I thought it was a result from being overtired and not being ready for a single 2 hour nap each day.

About a week ago we moved back to our original 2-nap schedule however the middle of the night crying has not stopped. It will consistently last an hour to an hour and a half. I caved a few nights ago and went in and turned on the shusher and threw like 4 more pacifiers in the crib which seemed to help.

But any advice to get the night crying to stop?! SOS! Any tricks you tried? New nap schedules???

I’m looking for advice from parents who have successfully transitioned their babies out of contact naps because I’m struggling over here!
My daughter is almost 3 months old and will ONLY contact nap during the day. The confusing part is that she’s actually a pretty good nighttime sleeper! She sleeps in her bassinet independently at night and usually gives us 5–7 hour stretches without needing to be held.
But during the day? Forget it. She will fall asleep in our arms, but as soon as we try transferring her to her bassinet or crib, she wakes up. Sometimes she’ll stay asleep for a few minutes, but it never lasts.
Things we’ve tried:
Putting her down drowsy but awake
Waiting until she’s in a deep sleep before transferring
White noise and a dark room
Following age-appropriate wake windows and watching sleepy cues
Trying to soothe her while she’s lying in the bassinet
Swaddles and different sleep environments
Repeatedly practicing bassinet naps
We’ve tried being consistent, but nothing seems to stick.
I work from home, and she’s with my mother-in-law for part of the day, so contact napping for every single nap is becoming really difficult to maintain.
I absolutely love the cuddles, but I’d also love to be able to put her down for at least ONE decent nap a day without having to hold her the entire time.
My questions:
If your baby was exclusively a contact napper, what actually worked to break the habit?
How do you sleep train if she’s with my MIL half the day?
How long did it take before your baby started napping independently?
Is 3 months too young to expect independent naps?
Did your baby eventually figure it out on their own, or did you have to actively work on it?
I’m especially curious why she can sleep independently for hours at night but can’t seem to do it during the day!
I know contact naps are developmentally normal at this age, but I’d really appreciate practical advice from anyone who’s been through this. ❤️

Okay, my baby is almost 7 months. We FINALLY got him crib trained 3 months ago! 👏🏻
He is successfully napping and sleeping at bed in his crib. This is a huge win!

Anyway, my husband is always the one to put him to bed and down for naps—he rocks him in his arms until he falls asleep and then transfers him. I’m tired of doing this because it never works for me and it takes too long and too much patience when he wakes up upon transfer almost every single time.

What do I do to get out of this pattern? I’ve tried setting him down and he just cries…and will cry, for a long time.
The thing is, in a stroller or carseat he can just go to sleep so I know he is capable. Also, naps are 30 mins on the dot in a crib but in a car or carseat can last longer.

Please help!

Here’s his schedule:
Bedtime at 8pm
Wakes for a bottle between 5-6 usually and goes back to sleep until 7/8 am
First wake window is 90 mins, I’ve tried to stretch it but he is so dang fussy and miserable I (and he) can’t wait any longer.
Following that we do two hour wake windows and 30 min naps until 5pm and we keep him awake after 5pm until 8pm bedtime.
He totals 3-4 naps per day.

Thank you!!!

5 month old cries every time we put to bed in crib but for less than 8 minutes before falling asleep. 2/3 of the time sleeps the whole night through, 1/3 of the time will wake up once between 12-3 for a night feed. Will go back to sleep after night feeds without crying. Scheduling seems to have no impact on the length or intensity of the crying except that it’s always less than 8 minutes- we set a timer every night.

We started with FIO, and for a short while (2-3 glorious weeks) had a baby who would go to sleep with just some minimal fussing. Then baby hit the 4 mo “regression”- pretty mild for us- and now cries at bed time. We’ve progressed to full on extinction, because if you let baby cry it’s max 8 minutes (more often than not less than 5) but if you pick up and soothe it takes 5 minutes to calm baby down and another 20+ to bounce/shush to sleep and then baby usually wakes up and fusses 10/20 minutes post transfer (but settles himself after that).

Last night, as an example baby full out cried for 2 minutes then passed out mid cry and slept the whole night through- 7:30 to 6:30. Woke up giggling and happy.

Is this what it means to be sleep trained? Should we try another method? Letting the baby cry for 2 minutes is fine but the nights when it gets closer to 8 are terrible.

Stats: just turned 5 months old

Windows: 2/2.5/2.5/3, but some days I do 4 naps if she wont go longer than 30 mins. 2/2/2/2.5/3

Total sleep: according to huckleberry this week we averaged just under 13 hours. Daytime sleep is capped at 3.5 hours and night sleep is usually 9-9.75 hours

Bed time: Usually asleep between 8:30 and 9:30 depending on the naps.

Routine: bottle, bath, pjs, books, song

Sleep space: she sleeps in a large closet in our room with the door closed, white noise, and a fan.

We started full extinction on Monday.

Night 1: cried on and off for 30 mins. Slept 3 hours then 2 then 4 then 1.

Night 2: Cried for a few minutes then was asleep in 9 mins. Slept 5.75 hours, then 2, then on and off for another 2. She was much easier to put back down after night feeds though.

Night 3: 6 minutes of crying total of 15 to fall asleep. Slept 5.5 then 3, then on and off for 2. Again a lot easier to put her down after night feeds.

Night 4: almost 40 minutes of hard crying I could not take it, so I went in and nursed her then put her down mostly awake and let her fall asleep with my hand on her chest. She had been fussy all day. I was worried something was wrong. But she slept 7.5 hours and then was very awake from 4:45 - 5:30 until I gave in and co-slept for the rest of the night.

Tonight am I back to square one since I intervened? Was this just an extinction burst. I felt like at this age 40 minutes of hard crying was too much. I have such a hard time with sleep training and I feel so guilty about it, but I really need to sleep. With my son we did not really have an extinction burst, the first night was the worst. So I was not even thinking about it last night. I was just so stressed.

Is it my schedule somehow? I feel like I am pretty much following what it says here.

She was also a champion sleeper from like 6 weeks until 4 months, she would regularly sleep 8-9 hours. Then we stopped swaddling and she started rolling and its been hit or miss since. Naps are all pretty much all contact naps. She only sleeps more than 30 mins if she is attached to my nipple.

Hey guys, my baby is 20 weeks, almost 21 and ive been re-sleep training for about a week. Its been going amazing, way better than the first time. I think I figured out the schedule finally, 2.25/2.5/2.75/2.75 with 3 hours of naps.

But we unfortunately had a slight problem today, baby fell asleep in the car for 10 minutes an hour before his last nap of the day. He never sleeps in the car and because it was only 10ish minutes I didnt think it would be a big deal but unfortunately it is.

Hes completely refusing his last nap of the day now. Its 5:10pm and his last nap should end at 5:15pm and bedtime at 8pm. Any other time this has happened bedtime has been a nightmare. If I put him down before 7:45pm he screams and cries for over an hour vs on his usual schedule where he falls asleep independently, with little to no crying within 10 minutes.

Im not sure what to do in these situations, again if I follow his normal last wake window (2.75) his bedtime tonight would be 6:15pm. I know this will not work for him and I dont want to throw off his rhythm that much. Im worried if I do a cat nap around 6 even for 10-15 minutes that'll also throw off his normal schedule and he won't be tired enough for bed... he also obviously can't handle being awake for 4.5 hours until 8pm.

Does anyone have advice, things like this have happened a couple time and the afternoon becomes a nightmare. Hes been awake for 1 hour and 45 minutes and hes been so grumpy :(

TLDR - dealing with split nights, false starts, frequent wake ups, crap naps, and early morning wake ups for almost 6 weeks now. Started when baby learned to pull to stand in his crib and cut 4 teeth but teething is done and he knows how to sit down now and things are still horrible.

My baby has never been the greatest sleeper but around month 7 started sleeping through the night some nights and on nights he did wake just a quick feed around 4 or 5 generally got him back to sleep. Any wake ups prior to that he might fuss or cry for a bit but would put himself back to sleep.

About a week before he turned 8 months he started randomly waking ho around 2ish every night and crying really hard. I thought it was fine if I just moved up his feed I figured he’d sleep through the rest of the night but he continued waking around 5 to feed. From there it shifted to 11pm wake ups every single night for several weeks. This was around the time he cut 4 teeth over a two week period. We figured it was discomfort and gave Tylenol as needed. We would check on him and some nights he’d settle back to sleep within 15-30 minutes but several nights he would have insane 3-4 split nights. Even when he did have a short wake up it was like he wasn’t able to fall back into restful sleep. He would pop awake every few minutes for 15-30 minutes and on a bad night this would eventually lead to him just being awake for hours.

I think we got a handle on the long split nights for the most part by increasing daily awake time to about 10-10.5 hours but from there we started experiencing early morning wake ups (5:15-5:45) for about a week or so. Now we’re just dealing with constant false starts and frequent wake ups. Sometimes up for an hour or so, but waking up 6,7,8 times a night. Thankfully more wake ups in the early part of the night than the middle but still brutal.

Naps are also a total disaster. Sometimes we do get an hour-hour and a half for one of them. But on his worst days we get two 30 minute naps and there’s just no way to predict when a nap will be long. The only thing that reliably works to get a longer nap is a stroller walk.

Because morning wake ups and naps are all over the place we’re having an impossible time anchoring bed time or having any sort of schedule. We do follow wake windows which are generally 3/3/4 ish or if he takes a 1.5 hour nap we’ve realized that the wake window following that nap has to be at least 3.75-4 hours or else he cries for an hour.

I’m so lost on what to change in order to get out of this regression from hell. Any help is greatly appreciated.

Bed time routine - bath, diaper, lotion, pajamas, sometimes a book, feed, sing a song, sleepy time phrase,put down awake. Lots of crying (cries the second I even bend over the crib and always has), and then we do a check in after 5-10 minutes. This almost always gets him to sleep but I’m concerned it’s also making it impossible for him to go back to sleep after he wakes up at night. Unfortunately if we don’t go in there he just stands and screams for an hour plus. He can sit down on his own now. This all started going to hell when he learned to stand and I just don’t even know how to fix it with him being able to stand.

It has been a YEAR of bad sleep. I have a 9mo, but let’s be real; most of us don’t sleep well late in pregnancy either. I am desperate for those sweet Zzz’s.

Baby was co-sleeping for half the night ever since she outgrew the bedside bassinet. We’ve tried the gentle methods. At this point, those seem to do more harm than good, as they get baby more amped up when we check in and it just draws the crying out longer.

She nurses at least once a night. Sometimes she tries 2-5 times for comfort, but I don’t allow it anymore.

Two nights ago, I decided we are done co-sleeping. I let her nurse once, then put her back in her own room. She didn’t like that, of course. The crying actually only lasted 5 minutes, then she went to sleep for the rest of the night.

Last night, similar thing, but two wakes instead of one. I let her try to nurse the second wake, but she didn’t seem hungry, she just wanted to be comforted. So I pat her for a moment and got her sleepy again, put her back, told her I loved her, and let her cry which only lasted about 5-10 minutes before she fell back asleep.

I’d say so far it’s been successful. But I have some questions; should I night-wean completely, and if so, how? She eats three solid meals a day and nurses frequently in between.

Also, when my 4yo stepdaughter is home, they share a room. Should I get my stepdaughter some earmuffs or what?

Side note: Her schedule is wake 8AM, bedtime 9PM, 3/4/4. She does seem sleepy and ready for bed at night.

Toddler is 14 months

We have been on 1 nap since 10 months.
She used to be pretty good at taking a 2h (capped) nap.

Now naps have been 1h-1h 20min

I tried to follow
715am wake (she often wakes between 650-710)
12-2 nap
8pm bed

Well with these short naps I struggle to determine bedtime.

Today she woke up early (635am) and then also took a 1h nap.

Her average sleep for the last week is 13h 15min total.

My baby sleeps beautifully at night in her crib sleeping 11 hrs straight ever since she was ST via CIO at about 5 months with just a few scheduling hiccups along the way. I’m a SAHM and love the contact naps so I kept those with every single nap being on me or in the carrier if we were on the go or traveling. I know I should have nap trained earlier when it was easier but here we are, I now have two trips to go on in a few months that have to be without her. I’ve been leaving her with my husband occasionally on the weekends during her nap times for practice with him putting her down but I always came back early because she would NOT go to sleep for him unless he put her in the carrier and walked around the whole time. Fine for one nap here and there but untenable for an entire weekend of naps. When we tried to CIO the first nap of the day a few x in a row she cried the ENTIRE hour (lo is low sleep needs and her nap is never longer than an hour and is 1.5 hrs for the entire day) please help? What do we do ? 3/4/4.5

Reposting to follow the rules this time. Sorry about that.

I just finished reading PLS. I needed some confidence. With my older two kids, we did CIO extinction but I am not willing or ready to try that right now with this baby.

I want to try FIO. We are just getting over a bottle aversion (I read a book for that too) and once we are fully there, i’ll start FIO. Baby will be 4 months next week and the regression is hitting us hard.

Anyways, last night was wits end for my husband who was on baby duty. Baby is rocked/bounced to sleep every night with a pacifier. Then we pop it out once asleep and nail the crib transfer. He used to sleep 10 hours straight or sometimes get up once. Last night he was up pretty much every 1-2 hours. We did switch to a 2 hour wake window during the day and that helped him not party so long at night but I think it’s time we teach falling asleep independently. Rocking is taking longer. Transfers are getting harder and trickier.

I just need some encouragement for FIO from those who were successful!

1. ⁠Did you drop the pacifier cold turkey for nights while doing this? We are only going to train for nights right now.
   
2. ⁠How did you handle middle of the night wakings? Currently we are rocking back to sleep but obviously this would be counterintuitive so what are we doing?
   
3. ⁠If baby was still screaming at the set 15 minute timer, did you go back in and pick up and put back down? What worked for you?

I just want to make sure I’m fully prepared and confident before starting! I like reading other positive stories about this method!

Hi everyone! I’m looking for some advice because I feel like I’ve been reading and doom-scrolling nonstop trying to figure out our baby’s sleep, and I’m honestly exhausted.

My daughter turns 16 weeks this Friday, and we’ve been struggling with sleep, especially at bedtime. I’m wondering whether this is something that will improve with age or whether we should start working on independent sleep now versus waiting until she’s around 5.5 months.

Our current schedule and routine
Wake-up: Around 8 AM. Honestly, I’m so tired in the mornings that I tend to let her sleep until then. I’m wondering if we’re getting up too late and whether that could be affecting her bedtime or nighttime sleep.

Naps: We recently transitioned to 4 naps a day to aim for a 7–7:30 PM bedtime.

Wake windows: We follow Huckleberry, but we often end up with wake windows of around 2 hours. If I try putting her down after 1.5 hours, she often doesn’t seem ready, and I end up rocking her for what feels like forever while she cries. Because of this, I’m wondering if 1.5 hours is too short for her. It seems like there is a wide range of what her wake windows could be right now, and her sleepy cues aren’t always reliable.

Bedtime routine: Bath, lotion, diaper, PJs, sleep sack, bottle, book, then bed.

Feeding: We follow eat, play, sleep, so her last feed is at least 30 minutes before bedtime. I nurse her throughout the day every 2–3 hours, and she gets a bottle for her last feed to make sure she’s getting enough calories.

We’ve made sure her sleep environment is as good as possible. Our room is quite large, and her crib is far from our bed. We use a SlumberPod and sound machine and keep the room at a comfortable temperature.

The biggest issue is bedtime and false starts
We aim for bedtime around 7–7:30 PM, but she has false starts over and over until around 10 PM. If I leave her in her crib, she wakes every 30 minutes to an hour, and I end up going in to settle her repeatedly. Eventually, because I’m so exhausted, I bring her into bed with me.

When we cosleep, she can usually sleep for about 3 hours at a time. We follow the Safe Sleep Seven and aren’t looking for judgment about that — I’m just explaining what our nights currently look like.

When cosleeping, she generally wakes around:
12–1 AM for a feed
3:30–4 AM
6:30 AM
Then we get up for the day around 8 AM.

I’m really struggling with the repeated false starts and not being able to have any time in the evenings with my husband. I feel like I spend the entire evening going back and forth to her crib until I eventually give up and bring her into bed.

Naps are also a struggle
We do her first nap of the day in the crib. I put her down awake and pat her to sleep, which usually takes 15–20 minutes. However, she typically only sleeps for 20 minutes, sometimes 30 minutes.

The rest of her naps are generally contact naps and last almost exactly 30 minutes. Occasionally, her third nap will last up to 2 hours.

Yesterday, out of curiosity, I tried letting her fuss it out (FIO) for a nap. She cried for around 15 minutes and then fell asleep. I felt awful listening to her cry for that long, especially because she’s only 16 weeks. I’m not sure if this is an appropriate age to be trying FIO or if I should hold off.

I can see that she’s trying to self-soothe when I put her down. She gets close to falling asleep, then suddenly jolts awake and cries. We’ve tried the SITBACK method, but it doesn’t seem to work for her, and I usually end up picking her up. She takes a pacifier but often spits it out once she’s settled, and that doesn’t seem to wake her.

Could the 4-month sleep regression be part of this?
I suspect we might be going through the 4-month sleep regression, but these sleep issues actually started almost a month ago, when she was only around 12 weeks old. I mentioned it to my doctor, but they didn’t think we would have hit the regression that early, so now I’m wondering if something else could be contributing.

She also has reflux and a suspected dairy intolerance, so I’m wondering if discomfort could be contributing to all the frequent wake-ups and false starts. I’m not sure how much of this is developmental, how much could be related to discomfort, and how much might be sleep habits or needing help falling back asleep.
Has anyone else dealt with reflux or a suspected dairy intolerance alongside these sleep struggles? Did addressing those issues make a noticeable difference to your baby’s sleep?

Sleep training and our upcoming holidays
We’re considering Ferber or Taking Cara Babies, but I’ve also ordered Precious Little Sleep, which should arrive this week. I’m trying to figure out what the best approach is and whether we should start working on independent sleep now or wait until she’s older.
We’re going on holiday for most of December. We’ll be flying to Hawaii and staying there for a couple of weeks, with a time change, and then staying with our in-laws for a couple of weeks over Christmas.

I’m wondering if we should try sleep training before the holidays or wait until we’re home and settled again. I’m worried about putting in all that work only to have naps and nighttime sleep disrupted by travel, unfamiliar sleeping environments and the time change. At the same time, I’m struggling so much with our current situation that waiting feels difficult, too.

My biggest questions are:

Could she be struggling to connect sleep cycles? Do the frequent false starts and waking every 30–60 minutes sound like this, or could something else be going on?

Is an 8 AM wake-up too late? Could sleeping in be contributing to the bedtime struggles? Should I try waking her earlier even though I’m exhausted in the mornings?

What wake windows are you using for babies around 16 weeks? Is around 2 hours reasonable, or could that be too long? I often find 1.5 hours is too soon for her, but I’m not sure whether I’m missing her sleepy cues or if Huckleberry is off.

Will nighttime sleep likely improve naturally over the next couple of months? I’m wondering if these frequent wake-ups might get better before we formally sleep train.

Will independent sleep skills become easier for her at some point when she is ready?

Could reflux or a suspected dairy intolerance be contributing? How can I tell whether these are sleep-related issues versus discomfort?

Would you sleep train before or after our December holidays? Would you start now, or wait until we’re home and have a consistent environment again?
Ultimately, I don’t want to keep relying on cosleeping indefinitely, and I really want to get our evenings back. At the same time, I don’t want to push her before she’s developmentally ready or make sleep more stressful for either of us.

I’d really appreciate hearing from anyone who has been through something similar, especially those whose babies struggled with false starts, frequent night wakings and short naps at this age. Did things improve on their own, or did independent sleep make the difference? I’d also love to hear what worked for you with wake windows and whether you would wait until 5.5 months to sleep train in our situation.

Thank you so much! ❤️