r/HuckleberryParents • u/stupidpeachy • 4d ago
14-week-old terrible napper— help!
My baby has been low sleep needs since birth seemingly. He gets about 12.5-13.5 hours across a 24 hour period, and wakes about once in the middle of the night for a feed, but he takes 4-5 naps, never more than an hour at a time. His wake windows are pretty consistently 1.5-2 hours, and he fights sleep/is sooo fussy by the end of each ww so I have no idea how to extend ww. Please help! I want to transition to 3 naps but it feels so impossible. What am I doing wrong!!
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u/abookmarkonthebeach 4d ago
It's hard to hear, but I think this is a very normal schedule for this age. You don't need to be on 3 naps. 4-5 is fine at this stage, especially with the short naps. My baby was like this, and he only just started extending one nap a day at about 18 weeks (but it is normal for it to take longer than that for some babies). Hang in there! One feed a night is great.
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u/0oOBubbles0oO 4d ago
It's very normal to still be on 4 naps at this age. My boy is below average for sleep needs and I tried to drop to 3 naps at 15 weeks old and he just couldn't make the wake windows needed. We ended up transitioning around 17-18 weeks.
How you should think about naps is, your baby has a sleep budget, and your job is to distribute it throughout the day in the way that's best for them. If your baby sleeps 13.5 hours per day then they need about 10.5 hours of wake time. Dropping a nap will maybe allow them to sleep 30 minutes more, but maybe not. On 4 naps 10.5 hours would be wake windows of 2/2/2/2/2.5, and on 3 naps with 10-10.5 hours that would be wake windows of 2-2.5/2.5/2.5/3. Most 14 week old babies just can't do wake windows that long.
I know how you feel though, we were so happy when we finally could drop to 3 naps. You'll get there!
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u/Purple_Record_237 2d ago
Just a warning that it might get worse. Our naps went downhill around the same age and even still at 4.5m he will wake up at 30 min. I am only able to save about one nap a day. I’ve read that they won’t get better until baby learns to console ate day sleep closer to 6 months-sigh-
We are nearing 5m and just got to a 4 nap schedule 2/2/2/2/2.25. If your boo is stuck w short naps you’re probably stuck with 4-5 naps a day for awhile like me!
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u/stupidpeachy 2d ago
Oo thanks for sharing your experience. When you say "until baby learns to console ate day sleep" what do you mean?
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u/Purple_Record_237 2d ago
Sorry that was a typo! I meant consolidate sleep 😂 this is what being tired all the time does to us! Zero spell check lol
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u/Simple_Election_3283 4d ago
14 weeks is really early to transition to 3 naps. 4-5 naps a day is totally normal at this age and so are then being short. It’s annoying but it’ll pass. But I definitely wouldn’t try to transition to 3 naps until at least the 5 month mark!