HOW can my DD take exactly 45min. naps each time

She is a grumpy mess and never gets long enough naps anymore. I do not understand how her naps can be EXACTLY 45 min. every time for the past week.

Amy

 

DS almost always takes 45 min naps! It's like he has an alarm clock in there.

How long do your babies stay awake at a time? Being up too long will make them grumpy. I always put mine down about 1.5 hrs after DD wakes up (she is MUCH pickier about how long she can stay awake at a time).

 

My daughter does this whenever we're driving in the car. I know that is contrary to what everyone says - kids sleep non-stop in the car - but it is true. From careful observation at home I found out that she wakes briefly at this same time interval, but if there is nothing to arouse her senses (i.e. something has changed in what she can see, hear, etc.) she will go back to sleep. I don't worry about the phone ringing at any other time during her nap, but if it rings at 45 min - 1 hour the rest of my day is trashed. In the car as soon as her eyes pop open there's a new view outside, a new song on the stereo, whatever, and she's alert. Anyway, you might try adding some white noise to her sleeping environment that would mask extraneous noise, and by all means don't make eye contact with her as soon as she "wakes." Hope this helps.

 

How old are they now? I know my girls went through shorter nap spells around 9 months, 10.5 months and then 12 months.

 

Ha! My DD does the SAME thing! I always joke she has a built-in alarm clock! I haven't figured out anything yet either. Sometimes if you let her fuss long enough she'll go back to sleep for another 45 minutes...sometimes not. And sometimes she'll go longer than 45 minutes, but it is 45 minutes the majority of the time. I don't have a solution either!

 

It has something to do with the first stage of sleeping(REM). They have to learn to go back to sleep after that first stage. Mine did it for the longest time( or so it seemed), and it drove me crazy. They do better now, so there is hope

 

my girls went through the same thing. i think it is probably just a phase and one of those sucky things that you gotta kind of just deal with until it passes. my girls started doing that around 5 or 6 months and it lasted several months. my girls were never really good sleepers but i would say it wasn't until around a year or so that they really started to nap longer and more consistently.

 

Yep, it's a sleep cycle thing. My DS will occasionally do the same thing, so I will try to soothe him back to sleep w/o taking him out of the crib. If that doesn't work, I'd put him in his swing, and he ALWAYS fell back to sleep.

If they are going through a growth spurt or working on a new developmental milestone, they may be more likely to wake up as they go through the "lighter" phase of sleep.

Just stick with it. I know that 45 minutes it not a long enough nap, so I just won't settle for it!! (Easier said than done, I know.)

Good Luck,
Suzi

 

My two do this as well. Sometimes it is less than 45min.... The morning nap on average is less than 30min and I could leave in there for an hour more and they will not sleep they chat and scream and cry and play u name it they do everything but sleep. Afternoon naps seem to be no better.... This has been going on for the past couple of weeks really bad. The odd day they may have a longer afternoon nap but not usually. And they are up about 2 hours in between except for the longer stretch in the afternoon which is from anywhere around 2 till bedtime at 7. So they are up about 5 hours and there is no getting them to sleep I have tried everything for that long stretch....... I am hoping it is a phase that will pass soon.

 

My boys were doing the same thing last week. It was 40 minutes on the dot every nap. I realized they were suddenly having trouble getting into the next cycle of sleep. Like pp said... I wasn't going to settle for it! My guys need a good nap at least once or twice a day or they won't sleep well at night. I was going crazy because I couldn't get them to sleep longer than 40 minutes. I would try pacis, rocking, patting backs... nothing worked. So I decided to let them wake after the 40 minutes and cry for 5-10 minutes, then they would go back to sleep for an hour or two. After a few days of them waking, crying, going back to sleep they figured out how to slip into the next cycle of sleep without waking and crying. Now they're back to 2 hr naps. So my advice... if you know she can take longer naps... try leaving her alone after she wakes and see if she'll go back to sleep. It may take a few days but it was worth it to get those 2 hr naps back!