I'm not sure what the little one is doing these past few days, other than driving me out of my head. I thought, at first, that he was trying to drop a nap since he's about that age. But honestly, he still needs (and takes without trouble) his morning nap at 9 or 9:30 like clockwork. And he's out for about an hour, sometimes an hour and a half. It's not a lot of time, but it gives me a chance to shower and do a few quick pick up type things around the house and it jazzes him up until about 1:30. Here's the problem though. He used to go down at 1:30 like a happy camper and sleep another hour, hour and a half. Now he's still acting tired (eye rubbing, cr-ank-y, yawns) and when you go to put him down he snuggles in. For about 5 minutes. Then it's bang bang bang on the crib, which escalates into full-scale meltdown over the next 20 minutes. You can try to reset him at any point in there and it'll work...for 5 minutes or so. Then the bang bang bang starts again.
I've tried keeping him up longer - but honestly anything after 2 and he's just miserable. You can't set him down but he doesn't want to be held. He won't play but he doesn't want to rock. He needs to nap.
Now, my mom would say to just put him in his crib, turn off the monitor and go get him when I feel it's time. But I'm not quite ready for such drastic measures. So...any thoughts beyond what I'm already doing? I'm not sure what's caused this, either, which is part of the frustration. He is teething...so maybe when the teeth are done he'll go back to his previous schedule? I just don't know.
I really wish babies came with instructions.
22 hours ago
It's going to be rough. He's in the transition phase. Try, if you can, to keep him up until 11:00 a.m. Feed him lunch immediately and put him down for a nap. It will take time, but eventually, you'll get him to nap from 12-2. Mine still gets really really sleepy around 9:30 or 10, but then he gets a second wind if we do something he likes, e.g. grocery shopping. Hang in there. This, too, shall pass.
ReplyDeleteThe transition is tough.
ReplyDeleteMichelle's advice is one option.
I'm kind of in your mother's camp - put him in the crib for the afternoon nap and leave him to play. Eventually he will lie down to sleep.
We did this with Jesse when we moved him to the regular bed. He still will get out of bed to play for maybe 10-30 minutes, but then when he's ready he will crawl back into bed for the sleep he wants/needs. He even does it at night - he goes up to bed quite happily, but once we close that door he hops down to play for a bit before getting back up to lie down.