OK, he's "sleeping through the night," but that's ALL he's sleeping

[blizzard_babe]

The good... at two months, DS2 "sleeping through the night" (five hour stretch), or close to it, most nights. Might not last past the four-month sleep regression, but it's good for now.

The bad... that's about it, at least in any real quantities. After that nice long stretch (that usually starts at about midnight), he'll fall back asleep for another couple hours, but ONLY sleeping on my chest. I'd be fine with it if I were a back sleeper, but I'm not. I wake up with nasty backaches. If I'm lucky, I can roll him off of me after a half hour of uncomfortably lying there, but most nights it doesn't matter how deep asleep he is, if I put him down on the bed or in his sidecarred crib, he starts grunting and wakes up.

He'll nap MAYBE 45 minutes in the morning, and then the entire afternoon is an ongoing saga of him falling asleep nursing/bottlenursing (DH stays home with him during the day) or rocking and waking up 15 minutes later. Whether he's held/worn or set down, he doesn't seem to nap longer than a half hour outside of that slightly longer morning stretch. And what's more, he doesn't seem to NEED it. He's generally happy, and really only gets seriously crabby right before his long nighttime stretch.

Mostly, it kind of confuses me. DS1 was a straight-up terrible sleeper at this age (a two-hour stretch was a miracle up to nearly a year), but it was clear he needed more sleep. Or, we needed him to be asleep, because the poor kid was just so disgruntled with the world he was a holy living terror to be around. DS2... I don't know. Is it possible that he just doesn't need that much sleep? It's frustrating now, because him being awake means nothing else really gets done (both DH and I work right now, but work opposite shifts, so it's not like one of us can hold the baby while the other works). He doesn't much care for being worn while he's awake, so we're stuck carrying his 14 pound floppy two month-old self around or just sitting on the couch.

And why the heck can he manage to stay asleep five hours at night and not more than 15 minutes in the afternoon?

Or should I just chill the **** out? He's happy, he's healthy, he's growing like a weed. Our house is a disaster, but that'll pass.

Edited by blizzard_babe - 12/30/10 at 11:14am

[onlyAngil]

Have you tried with out trying to get him to nap?

I mean you say he seems like he dose not need it, maybe he doesn't... or maybe he needs more going on, more play and input, to need a nap. My son was like this, I mean the times are off a little, but just about. I gave up trying to get him to nap and just added in doing more things and let him nap as he showed me he needed as he needed it. Some days there were no naps some days two that where short or one that was long. I was always thankful for the naps, but I only gave them when he showed me he needed them, i just gave up TRYING to get him to nap.

It drove me as batty as his first growth spurt where he was on me 24/7 but it worked in a nice rhythm once I stopped trying.... food shopping just about always made him nap, but only as long as it took me to put the food away! LOL

[Chloe'sMama]

I am sure you have tried this, but just in case.... nursing to sleep on your side?  DD1 did not like it if I had her asleep and tried to roll her off of me.  I was able to nurse side lying and then roll out of bed after a while (this is still how DD1 falls asleep for naps and sleep...)

Also, I think kids are different.  DD2 seems to sleep much more than DD1 at this age, but seems to take much shorter naps and through out the day rather than a big nap in the morning, afternoon and evening.

Good luck!

[onlyAngil]

Originally Posted by Chloe'sMama 

I am sure you have tried this, but just in case.... nursing to sleep on your side?  DD1 did not like it if I had her asleep and tried to roll her off of me.  I was able to nurse side lying and then roll out of bed after a while (this is still how DD1 falls asleep for naps and sleep...)

We also had luck with this, but I found out HOW I rolled away really mattered with DD. If I rolled top shoulder back almost pulling my nipple out (so on to my back), she would wake up as if she had had the worse thing in the world happen to her - what that is idk, but it apparently just happened to her - but if I rolled my top shoulder towards her, moving my lower shoulder back and away (so onto my tummy) my nipple just slipped/ slid/ fell out of her mouth like NOTHING happened, sometimes she even coo-ed or mmmmm-ed very happily.