Day 28: Nap log day

I spent the day keeping track of Mari's naps and her daily schedule. It may not have been the best day to do it, since she didn't have a typical day for naps. But then, she doesn't really have a typical nap day, which is a big part of the problem.

She had three naps today: 9:10-10:30, 12:00-12:30 and 3:00-3:55. This totals only 2 hours, 45 minutes, when usually I like to see her nap about 3 1/2 hours. I consider between 3 and 4 hours acceptable, as does the No-Cry Nap Solution.

Because she napped so little and seemed overtired in the early evening, I put her to bed at 6:35, when usually she isn't sleeping until about 8:00. I didn't know what else to do, since she was clearly exhausted and it seemed too late for a fourth nap.

The naps themselves were full of Mari's usual bad habits -- or at least, habits I'd like to change. The first nap, she co-napped with me in our bed. I'm OK with this once in awhile but I don't like having to do it every day. Though that first nap was more than an hour, she seems to like to have two-hour naps in the morning and she was still obviously tired and cranky afterward, crying as soon as I left her alone to play for a minute.

She started showing tired signs less than an hour after waking up from her first nap, so I tried to get her down again right away. But despite her obvious fatigue, I had trouble. I tried to get her to finish the falling-asleep process on her own in the crib, after having rocked her to a very sleepy state. But she seemed wide awake the second she was in the crib and started to fuss. So I gave in and rocked her all the way to sleep. I stayed with her for the entire nap and tried to resettle her as soon as she showed signs of stirring, but she woke up anyway and I couldn't get her back down.

Despite the very short second nap, this time Mari seemed reasonably energetic and in an OK mood, so I waited until she started to seem tired to try to put her down. At first I thought it had gone well because she fell asleep quickly (actually too quickly, when she was still in my arms) and stayed asleep when I put her down. I stayed with her again to try to keep her asleep, but it backfired -- I was trying to read, a page rustled and my little light sleeper woke up. I rocked her to sleep again, held her for awhile, put her back down, and then the same thing occurred. So I ended up holding her for most of the rest of her nap. Maybe she would have napped longer if I hadn't had to go to the bathroom, but nature called, I put her down, and what do you know, she was up again.

Unfortunately all this is typical. My goals for the No-Cry Nap Solution journey:

- To not have to stay with her during her naps
- To get her to fall asleep on her own, in her crib
- To get her to nap longer
- To stop holding her during her naps
- To try to get her to nap at predictable times of day
- If she wakes up before I think she should, not to have to nurse her back to sleep as I often do
- To stop rocking her all the way to sleep

Today's nighttime sleep, since we're still very much on the No-Cry Sleep Solution: Last night Mari had a good 11-hour sleep. She cried out a couple of times but not long enough or loudly enough that I had to go to her; she apparently put herself back to sleep very quickly. However, I fear tonight isn't going to be as good. She has already woken up once (at about 9 PM) and sounded upset enough I went to her nearly right away and nursed her, though it hadn't yet been anywhere near five hours since I put her down. Her daytime sleep was more disrupted than usual so I guess I can expect the same at night. Sigh.