Hey y’all! We’ve been cosleeping since baby refused the bassinet at 2 months old. Sleep has never been amazing but when LO’s 4 month regression hit it was brutal and we went from 2-4 wakings per night to hourly wakings for 10+ weeks. He’s almost 7 months old and since about the 6 months mark things have started to turn a corner (thank GOD). Though there’s still bad nights, we’re starting to see 2-5 hours stretches (yay!). The only thing is the longer stretches are RARELY in the first stretch of sleep. The first few hours of sleep he seems to wake every sleep cycle and it’s not until the middle of the night when maaaaybe we’ll see those longer stretches of sleep. I’ve played around with longer and shorter wake windows before bed. Also with early (7pm) to later bedtimes (10pm). Also with more/less daytime sleep. Nothing seems to work or make a difference consistently He seems to sleep better overall with a later bedtime but still has a couple of false starts/hourly wakings until a later stretch comes. I would love the first stretch to be longer so I can roll away and spend some time with my husband sans baby or just to have to myself. Any advice or tips greatly appreciated! Thanks!
@snowbunni This is probably not what you want to hear but after trying all the things and still getting false starts, what helped me the most was just to embrace and expect it. That way I'm not disappointed and on the odd night she doesn't have a false start it's a wonderful surprise. I typically try to get ready for bed, get her to sleep, then use that first sleep cycle to either read in bed by myself or have time with my husband to watch a show, snuggle, etc. Then after the false start I typically go to bed too. It's not a perfect system and there are still nights where I can't get away but it's definitely (slowly) gotten better with age
@paultheplatypus That definitely sounds like what I’m doing right now except hoping each night it won’t happen lol so the mindset shift sounds helpful and should just embrace/expect it Thank you!
@paultheplatypus Same here.. she is 9 months old, first stretch (30-40 min) is our “me-time” with daddy.. after that struggle until midnight. Even when we are there with her, she is struggling.. even in our arms..
@alicekijala There have been lots of ebbs and flows for sure, it was hard for a while. But I'd say around 1 year or so is when it got easier to sneak away. She went down to just 1 nap around then and that definitely helped.
@snowbunni I don't have advice, but my son was like this and nothing helped except time. Once he hit 12 months he started sleeping longer at the beginning of the night (about 1 hour) and then it turned into 3-4 hours, with some odd nights still having an early wake (30-45 minutes).
We are unfortunately back to lots of waking at the beginning but we just went through the 2-1 nap transition and he's currently getting 4 teeth.
@robwebb Thank you. Good to know I’m not alone He is also in the 3-2 nap transition so that could have something to do with as well. It’s always something .
@robwebb That’s another post in itself I’m finding it super hard to create a consistent bedtime with this transition. It’s tough to squeeze in 3 naps cause he is staying awake longer but sometimes his naps are still short so bedtime ends up being 10pm. Then on those nights he sleeps in until 8am, naps get pushed later then the 2nd ends at an awkward time where it’s too late to have the 3rd nap so then we stretch to an earlier bedtime around 8pm. Then he wakes up early around 6am and we’re back to 3 naps and later bedtime again. It keeps flip flopping !!!
@snowbunni I’m on the other side of the transition now as my baby is 9 months but we had a similar issue where for a while 3 was too much but 2 wasn’t enough.
What seemed to work was making the first nap long eg 1.5 hours, then the second nap shorter eg 1 hour and the third nap started at 45 mins then by the end of the transition the nap ended up being like 15 mins just to get him over the line. We would wake him from his last nap by a certain time as not to mess with his bedtime too much so if we think he should go to bed at 8/8:30, we would wake him by 6 or so depending on how much sleep pressure you think your baby needs.
He also might wake up early just for a little while as you transition! So don’t be disheartened if going to bed at 8 has him waking at 6 because that actually happened for us too! They just have to get in the rythym.
Idk just thought I’d chime in in case you hadn’t considered doing that because it made it relatively painless for us
@lostchild77 Hi again! Based on what you said, I’m curious what you would do in the scenario that the baby woke up from their 2nd nap around 430-5PM? It’s too soon to put them down for a cat nap 545 to 6 but it’s a stretch to get them to a 8-830 bedtime. I’m assuming bump up bedtime to be in the 7-730 range or do you do a cat nap a bit later and have a later bedtime? This is predicament I find myself in. I typically go for later bedtime cause of the false start scenario BUT when he wakes from the catnap he’s super grumpy the whole rest of the WW so I think he’s telling me he prefers an earlier bedtime
@snowbunni In that case we’d push to bedtime! I would aim for 8 or so but if he gets too tired or resistent I’d just stayer the bedtime process then eg bath etc, which usually did end up in sleep time being about 30 mins from that point anyway. If that led to him waking earlier so be it, I’d do 3 naps the next day. I would aim for 2 naps but knew that sometimes you needed to throw a 3 nap day in there and that’s fine! Eventually it’ll drop away.
If he’s waking grumpy it’s very likely he’s overtired so just go from 4:30/5 until you know he’s tired if he likes a bit of an earlier bedtime anyway
@lostchild77 Ok I’m picking up what you’re putting down. He woke at 410pm today from his second nap so we’re gonna push as much as we can. His WW’s are 3-3.5 so hoping he can make it to 745/8 and if he wakes early so be it! Thanks again!
He seems to sleep better overall with a later bedtime but still has a couple of false starts/hourly wakings until a later stretch comes. I would love the first stretch to be longer so I can roll away and spend some time with my husband sans baby or just to have to myself. Any advice or tips greatly appreciated! Thanks!
but after trying all the things and still getting false starts, what helped me the most was just to embrace and expect it. That way I'm not disappointed and on the odd night she doesn't have a false start it's a wonderful surprise. I typically try to get ready for bed, get her to sleep, then use that first sleep cycle to either read in bed by myself or have time with my husband to watch a show, snuggle, etc. Then after the false start I typically go to bed too. It's not a perfect system and there are still nights where I can't get away but it's definitely (slowly) gotten better with age
Thank you!
He is also in the 3-2 nap transition so that could have something to do with as well. It’s always something 
I’m finding it super hard to create a consistent bedtime with this transition. It’s tough to squeeze in 3 naps cause he is staying awake longer but sometimes his naps are still short so bedtime ends up being 10pm. Then on those nights he sleeps in until 8am, naps get pushed later then the 2nd ends at an awkward time where it’s too late to have the 3rd nap so then we stretch to an earlier bedtime around 8pm. Then he wakes up early around 6am and we’re back to 3 naps and later bedtime again. It keeps flip flopping 
