Daytime naps

Daytime naps

Daytime sleeping is one of the biggest concerns for clients that I work with, even with very little babies. The problem may be short naps, struggling to settle baby for naps, or even baby refusing to nap at all. Whatever the issue, there are things we can try to help.

It is worth keeping in mind that very short naps or refusing to nap at all can be signs of some kind of tummy discomfort, eg wind, colic or reflux. Research says that short and broken naps can be normal for newborns, but in my experience, there may well be another factor at play.

Setting up daytime naps for newborns takes practice and time. Some babies will fall beautifully into a very strong daytime napping pattern, even without trying – they will need to be woken from naps and fall asleep easily. Other newborns will struggle to switch off, need to be helped to sleep and often only do shorter naps.

Here are the things that you can do to help encourage daytime napping: 

  1. Follow the awake windows suggested for the baby’s age. Once overtired, the body produces cortisol which puts baby in a more alert state, making it very hard to switch off. This is often when a baby might seem “wired” – they are actually overtired. 
  • Could baby be hungry? A full tummy creates a sleepy baby! Sometimes hunger is the root cause of not being able to put a very small baby down, or for them not staying asleep long enough. Working on breastfeeding and active feeding, or offering a top-up before a nap may help. 
  • Self-settling to sleep is not something that a newborn needs to be able to do in order to sleep well – if comfortable, a newborn baby will go down to sleep and sleep for as long as they need to. However, if baby is over 12 weeks of age then the way they fall asleep (e.g. with a sleep prop), can start to become a reason for shorter naps. From 12 weeks onwards, you may want to work towards baby being able to fall asleep on their own. This is also the focus of the “preparing for the 4 month regression” section later on. 
  • Wind is a HUGE factor in being able to link daytime sleep cycles and I cannot emphasise enough how important it is for a baby to be well winded. Often, if a small baby wakes after just a short nap, you may well be able to pick them up, wind them and then settle them back down. Do not always just assume that a nap is over, just because baby wakes up – try where possible to resettle them back to sleep, to help elongate their naps. 

Lengthening naps pre-12 weeks 

These are still very early days and I encourage parents to take things slowly. If baby is only doing short naps before 12 weeks, there is no need to worry as this may well just come with time. However, some parents are desperate for longer stretches of sleep in the day, perhaps so that they can play with an older sibling, check emails, or just have a break. Here are the tactics I suggest to help baby lengthen their naps before 12 weeks: 

· Use a dark room and white noise to put baby down in. As mentioned earlier, from 6-8 weeks of age babies’ sleep can be more disrupted by being in a daytime environment. A darker room with white noise can really help baby to sleep for longer stretches during the day. 

· When baby wakes, pick them up and try re-settling them. Resettling can be in any way: feeding baby, rocking them, or just holding them. Allowing baby to lengthen their sleep on their parent, with a little help, is no bad thing. It should help their body clock get used to this longer sleep, making naps easier in the future. 

· Do naps wherever baby finds it easiest to sleep: for example, if baby only does short naps when put down but will sleep for two hours in the buggy or the sling, then do their longer naps there for now.

Remember, we can change any of these sleep habits once baby gets closer to 4 months, so there is no pressure to have perfect cot naps in the first few months. 

Lengthening naps post-12 weeks 

Between 3-4 months of age, the focus is on prepping for the 4 month sleep regression, when sleep often becomes more broken, both during the night and for naps too. Day naps can become short if they weren’t already, with more waking.

At this age, it can help to start slowly helping baby learn to:

  1. Fall asleep on their own
  2. Link their sleep cycles

The two are linked and will really help to elongate naps if baby is able to resettle between sleep cycles.

Note: If you feel that a family has set up all of the right conditions, baby is well fed and seems fine, but still will not be put down at all or only sleeps for 20-30 minutes even with the correct awake window, then it could be that something else is affecting the baby. We pass off a lot of broken sleep for babies as normal and whilst this may be so in research, my experience tells me that there is often a root cause behind this – but not many people have the knowledge to be able to help.