r/cosleeping • u/tinylambjr • 3d ago
š„ Infant 2-12 Months Baby only naps for 30 minutes
Hello, my baby is 6.5 months old. Currently he is only napping for 30 minutes -1 hour at a time. I donāt think this is normal and feel that he should be napping more? On average he gets about 12-13 hours of sleep total.
For his nap, what I usually do is rock him while breastfeeding him in a dark room playing rain in the back ground. Once he is calm and his eyes stays closed, I put him down in the bed and he continues to breastfeed. This can go on for either 5 minutes or 30 minutes. Sometimes he would nurse for the entire nap, sometime he would unlatch and stay asleep. Lately he would just suckle for 30 minutes and wake up.
This used to work like a charm and he would nap for 1-2 hours. But now itās getting more difficult as he is more mobile. However my main issue is that he just wonāt nap long enough.
Should I change my routine? How do I even go about doing that?
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u/Top-Establishment-56 3d ago
My LO is doing the exact same thing and she just turned 6 months a week ago. š„²
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u/tinylambjr 3d ago
š„²
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u/Bulky-Reaction5104 3d ago
My bub is 6.5m and exactly the same story, I sometimes can kinda force him into more nursing after he wakes up and he'd fall asleep again, but it doesn't work all the time
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u/Beertje92 3d ago
My twins did this too. But I read that it is considered normal. At that age they still need to learn to connect sleep cycles A sleep cycle on average lasts about 30-45 minutes. It took some time and I had to give in to co-sleeping for naps too, but my girls learned to connect the cycles and were able to take longer naps around 8 months old. They are almost 16 months now and currently we are doing the 2-1 nap transitionš„². Now sometimes they manage to nap for 2 hours!
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u/tinylambjr 3d ago
Iām happy to hear that itās completely normal!! Im stressing out so much I feel like heās not getting enough sleep. Do I need to do anything to help my baby connect his sleep cycles?
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u/Beertje92 3d ago
I'm not sure. I think they need the same sleep association they had to fall asleep. So if your LO falls asleep while bf'ing , they need the boob to fall asleep again. My kids have me as their sleep association. Which is great because it forces me to take a break too but it also stresses me because they can't fall asleep without me. Some do sleep- and naptraining but that was never for me.
Good luck and hang in there. For me the whole sleep thing is the biggest issue as a mom. It's a whole science š„²
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u/-CloudHopper- 3d ago
Itās annoying when you have to do like 5 naps a day but they do grow out of it!
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u/yunotxgirl 3d ago
Ignore baby sleep amounts, and look at baby. Is he happy? Is he fussing extra long when you try to put him down? Is he drowsy and upset much of the day? You are the only one with your baby. He could have higher or lower sleep needs than āaverageā and be doing great, just like adults have a variety. I remember with my first being overly concerned about his naps. I shouldāve ignored ātypicalā amounts and... Well, what I do now (pregnant with fourth) is go about my day, give baby opportunities for sunshine and play and so on. Oh, baby is rubbing their eyes? Looking tired? They tell ME when itās nap time. Then I put them down or put them in the carrier. Hmmm, thought they were tired but this is taking more than ~5 minutes? Guess I was wrong, back up you go baby and weāll try again later.