4 1/2 month old sleeping less than 8 hours a night

B

bart

Registered User
My 4.5 month old daughter sleeps from around 10.30pm (either before or after her late night feed) and wakes up by 6am almost every day. That's less than 8 hours! She naps 3 times during the day totaling 3 - 4.5 hours and usually plays from 7pm - 10 plus with my husband and I until she gets tired and starts to get cranky and cry, then i hold her and pat her to sleep. She wakes up at least once throughout the night to feed.

She is very alert and active when she's awake though, especially happy in the morning when she wakes up. Her development seems to be on track. but from what i read, most babies sleep around 12 hours a night. Should I be worried?
 
I think for around that age, a total amount for 24 hrs is around 15 hrs. But as each baby is different, and your baby seems fine with the sleep that she gets, then I wouldn`t worry too much about it. as long as you`re all happy with the arrangement.
 
My 5 month old son has similar sleep patterns. We put him to bed around 10:15pm Mon-Fri after his last feed of the night and he wakes up between 7 and 7:30am each morning. As I work, I have to wake him up at 7:30am to breastfeed before I leave for work. Sometimes, he will fall asleep after I leave for work for an hour or so, but sometimes, he just stays up. During the day, he takes 2-4 naps for a total of 2-4 hours. On weekends, he probably naps less as we are out during the day and he dozes on and off in his stroller. I used to also worry that he wasn't sleeping enough as he only sleeps 9 hours at night. But since he is hitting all his development milestones and is an otherwise happy baby, I decided not to worry.

Plus I do notice that on Mondays, he usually naps for longer during the days as he probably didn't sleep as much over the weekends when we are out and thus is more tired. since he does this, I pretty much think he knows when he is tired and when he is not and if he is tired, he will sleep.

All babies (adults too!) have different sleep patterns and if your baby seems happy enough and is not uncomfortable, I wouldn't worry.
 
I think your baby is really sleeping less. I dont have any idea on why as i never faced this problem. My 4 month old sleeps 12hours at night and wakes up only once throughout the morning at about 5am for a quick feed and then wakes about 9-10am.
Then she will nap throughout the day about 7 hours.

Started her on fruit solids 2 days ago. Only a spoon full and will try her on farex tomorrow with breast milk.

Have tried yo-baby yogurt on my other children and its great....

Stage 2 solids are if babies can chew and gulp it down properly. At 3 months i dont think they can do that cause the food isnt as pureed.
 
I don't think you have to worry too much as she sounds fine. However if you still worry, perhaps try to cut 1h off her day nap time and also try to put her earlier to bed, say 8pm or 9pm.
The downside of this would be less play time for your husband with her.
I think it's better to put them to bed earlier so they don't get used to sleeping late when school time comes around.

I myself have been following Gina ford routine as my son was waking up too often at night. I started when he was about 2 months old. I was not really happy with the routine at first as it is a rather strict schedule but since it did help tremendously, I'm glad I followed it.
He's now 5 months and although he's not sleeping the targeted 7pm-7am pattern (I still have to wake and feed him at 10.30pm), I'm still happy that he gets his 14-15h/day sleep and that we get a decent sleep after his late feed.
 
Thanks all for sharing..

I have started putting her to bed earlier, she did put up a lil struggle in the beginning but I think she's slowly getting used to it. Funny that now she goes to bed earlier but still wakes up at the same time every morning.. ;p

She is going through a phase where only I can put her to sleep at night though. My local helper takes care of her during the day and she's ok with the helper, but when it comes to turning in for the night and if my hubby tries to put her down, she will scream and cry herself hoarse until I hold her. It is actually very hurtful for daddy and I really don't want her to be so sticky to one person.. what if i was away or sick one day! Hopefully this is a phase that she's grow out off.. any of you with similar experiences?
 
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