Baby Harrison
Cat napping
Naps were tricky and Harrison seemed to only want to sleep during the day whilst being held by his parent or on the go in the pram. Naps in his bassinet were non-existent and he was averaging only 30 mins per nap. This was leading to lots of catnapping and Harrison being overtired and exhausted come bedtime. His parents were running out of ideas on what to do next.
Overnight wasn’t sustainable
At bedtime and overnight, Harrison was waking every 90 mins. His parents were trying everything to settle him back to sleep but were having to feed him back to sleep every time. As the days and weeks went okay, this wasn’t sustainable and they were becoming more and more drained and sleep-deprived, something had to change.
Solutions
An easy-going baby most of the time but when overtired Harrison was becoming fussier and clinger. We looked at all the contributing factors of why Harrison might be struggling. Overviewing his day, his awake times, feeds, making sure he wasn’t over or under tired. We put a bit more structure in Harrison’s day and adjusted his naps making sure he wasn’t overtired. This really helped and reduced his catnapping. Other things we did to combat his catnapping
Looked at age appropriate awake windows.
Ensuring that Harrison wasn’t napping when he was overtired.
Using an age-appropriate settling technique.
Making his sleep environment nice and dark.
We introduced an age appropriate settling technique and within the first week we saw some great changes with Harrison sleeping for longer overnight. As the days went on we began to see him learning to self-settle and beginning to link his sleep cycles for his daytime naps. We reduced his overtiredness and he began catching up on the sleep that his body was craving. It was a great team effort with his parents’ hard work and commitment.