The Quest to Help a Struggling Baby Nap – Day 2
Hello! I’m back with day two of my quest to get baby to take real, meaningful naps. If you’re just starting reading here, we have been struggling with nap issues for months. Essentially, half of baby’s life.
Catch my intro post and day 1 to get caught up.
Here was my schedule for day 2:
19:40 baby sleeping on daddy, transferred over to crib
19:25 give baby to daddy to take care of kiddo, baby angry!
19:10 take baby to bedroom, nurse, read book in bed
18:20 dinner for both kids
17:00 both kids have snack
16:30 picked up toddler from school
14:30-16:00 napped in crib, short nursing
13:30 nursed and played
10:40-11:50 napped in cribbed!
10:30 had to give a small snack to fill tummy
10:10 sat in crib, nursed few minutes
08:30-9:00 toddler drop off
07:30 oatmeal for breakfast
06:30 morning nurse
02:50 nursed baby for 10 min, then slept – middle of night feedings…sigh
The first thing you should notice is that baby fell asleep late for the first nap, at 10:40AM. That meant she had to eat a snack to fill her belly. There’s nothing worse than a hungry baby that goes down for a nap. My mistake though, we had errands to run and got home too late. I should have given her snack while on the go or as soon as I got home before beginning the nap ritual.
Nap rituals:
Today’s nap ritual was nursing in my bed, reading a book (followed by eating said book), then going to the crib. I climbed in the crib with her for both the morning and afternoon naps. There is no leave baby in crib, let cry and self sooth, then visit every 5 minutes – that does not work for us. Baby needs to know that I’m there.
While in the crib I let her play for 10-15 minutes, she love throwing out everything from the crib – it’s a game. Once she’s done doing that and acting over silly, every time she stood up I took her and laid her back down. She was not happy, not totally angry, but crying for a few seconds. Every time she stood up, I laid her back down. Rinse, repeat.
She eventually had a breakdown that was not going to be controlled by anything else other than comfort nursing. I didn’t want to, but I also didn’t want the crying to escalate. I nursed her for a few minutes (less than five minutes ), then popped her off. She whined but calmed down. She did the stand up/lay her back down routine for a few more minutes, before settling in next to me and falling sleep.
At this point, I stay in the crib for another 10-15 minutes, moving a little here and there to ensure she is truly asleep. If she wakes, I begin the disengage interaction, lay her back down, stroke her back.
Day 2 was already one of the easiest days ever in laying baby down for a nap. Let’s see what day 3 brings us!
Ready for day 3?!