The Baby That Wakes Every 10 Minutes

[jenboo]

I have never experienced this before and want to see if its normal or if there is anything I can do.
I have a 5 month old dcb. He naps 9-11 and 1-3. He is tired for each nap. during the 9-11 nap he wakes up about 2-3 times. He screams for about 30 sec then is back to sleep. During the 1-3 nap, it happens about every 15-20 minutes. His eyes are still closed while he screams. I usually don't go in the room when he is screaming since it only lasts about 30 seconds and then he is out again. The first few times it happened, I got him up and he was falling asleep in my arms so I put him back down.

He is in a separate room from the other kids but is waking them up. I have very light sleepers even with music on and the doors closed.
It is starting to get frustrating.

[Heidi]

I've had kids do this periodically. Like you, I discovered really quick to wait before I went running in. He's self soothing, so I say live with it until he outgrows it. Add another white-noise barrier.

Edited to add: I would not use music as a white noise barrier myself. I find music of any kind to be stimulating (even "soothing" music) and would therefore say it causes light sleeping vs. hindering. Fans or other benign sounds would be much better for me, personally. Any kind of music would "invade" my dreams.

[permanentvacation]

It didn't used to be normal. However, I have gotten a few babies like that in the past couple of years. Personally, after a few days of it, I would do everything in my power to keep the child awake longer before putting him/her down for a nap. I found that the more tired they were, typically, the better they slept. However, I would still have some babies that no matter how much I kept them awake and how tired they were, just simply wouldn't stay asleep for more than 20 minutes.

I've actually had parents who literally told me that the baby slept for a 20 minute nap. It's just the oddest thing to me. But it does seem to be the way a good bit of babies are nowadays.

Now, thinking about another thread where we were discussing how parents nowadays don't want to be parents and they want us to raise their children. Now that I think about it, many of the babies that I've had that won't nap well, their parents said that the baby would sleep a good 12 hours straight through the night. So, maybe the parents are not getting up with the babies in the middle of the night to feed them at 2 am like my generation did, so the babies are now sleeping all night long, therefore are truly not as tired during the day.

[jenboo]

I've had kids do this periodically. Like you, I discovered really quick to wait before I went running in. He's self soothing, so I say live with it until he outgrows it. Add another white-noise barrier.

Edited to add: I would not use music as a white noise barrier myself. I find music of any kind to be stimulating (even "soothing" music) and would therefore say it causes light sleeping vs. hindering. Fans or other benign sounds would be much better for me, personally. Any kind of music would "invade" my dreams.

I have fans already and they don't seem to help.
I'm the opposite... Soothing music makes me fall asleep instantly. White noise makes me want to smash my head with a brick. I cannot stand it.
Do they make white noise CDs?

[jenboo]

It didn't used to be normal. However, I have gotten a few babies like that in the past couple of years. Personally, after a few days of it, I would do everything in my power to keep the child awake longer before putting him/her down for a nap. I found that the more tired they were, typically, the better they slept. However, I would still have some babies that no matter how much I kept them awake and how tired they were, just simply wouldn't stay asleep for more than 20 minutes.

I've actually had parents who literally told me that the baby slept for a 20 minute nap. It's just the oddest thing to me. But it does seem to be the way a good bit of babies are nowadays.

Now, thinking about another thread where we were discussing how parents nowadays don't want to be parents and they want us to raise their children. Now that I think about it, many of the babies that I've had that won't nap well, their parents said that the baby would sleep a good 12 hours straight through the night. So, maybe the parents are not getting up with the babies in the middle of the night to feed them at 2 am like my generation did, so the babies are now sleeping all night long, therefore are truly not as tired during the day.

He sleeps about 10-12 hours at night and wakes up once and is up for usually an hour.
He is legitimately tired at nap time. It has taken me two months to get him to stay awake in between the naps. If I try keeping him awake too long, then his nap is even worse.. I'll try stimulating him more to see if that helps.
I'm not even sure he is actually waking up during the screaming.

[permanentvacation]

In one of the centers that I worked in, each teacher all but blared the music for nap time. It was an open floor center with one big room that was divided by chalk boards and wall dividers like that to create 4 'classrooms'. Since each teacher blared their radios with different music cd's in, it sounded like 4 concerts going on at once! It gave me huge headaches every day, but the kids slept like rocks!

Maybe you need to make the music in the baby's room louder so he doesn't hear any other noise.

Could it be that he is dreaming and wakes up from that? When one of my personal children was a baby, but I don't remember how young, she would wake up just for a few moments then go back to sleep. Her doctor said she thought my daughter was starting to become aware of the 'pictures she was seeing in her sleep' (dreams) and wasn't sure what to make of them, so she would wake up just long enough for the visions (dreams) to go away, then she'd go back to sleep.

Babies are so hard to figure out sometimes! Often, it's a big guessing game.

[jenboo]

In one of the centers that I worked in, each teacher all but blared the music for nap time. It was an open floor center with one big room that was divided by chalk boards and wall dividers like that to create 4 'classrooms'. Since each teacher blared their radios with different music cd's in, it sounded like 4 concerts going on at once! It gave me huge headaches every day, but the kids slept like rocks!

Maybe you need to make the music in the baby's room louder so he doesn't hear any other noise.

Could it be that he is dreaming and wakes up from that? When one of my personal children was a baby, but I don't remember how young, she would wake up just for a few moments then go back to sleep. Her doctor said she thought my daughter was starting to become aware of the 'pictures she was seeing in her sleep' (dreams) and wasn't sure what to make of them, so she would wake up just long enough for the visions (dreams) to go away, then she'd go back to sleep.

Babies are so hard to figure out sometimes! Often, it's a big guessing game.

That could be it because it will be complete silence (minus the ocean sounds in his room) when he started screaming. And it's not a cry... It's a scream.

[Leigh]

My own child started having night terrors at 5 months. If he's too tired, that could be causing this situation, and it COULD be night terrors, as well (since he settles quickly and doesn't open his eyes-though open eyes are not uncommon during terrors). Do you feel that these 2 naps are enough for him? At 5 months, kids often are taking 3 naps during a daycare period (or one longer than 2 hours). They spend twice as much time asleep at this age as they do awake. A 10-hour daycare day, I would expect a baby that age to sleep more like 6 hours than 4. No judging here, just a suggestion on something to try. I would stop trying to keep him awake and just let him sleep when he wants to at that age.

[Unregistered]

I have the exact same issue here. 6 month old, goes down for nap awake and falls asleep with little to no problem. 20 minutes in, wakes up screaming! It is so frustrating, because I either have to listen to him scream or go get him and then he is exhausted and miserable till next nap. I think a lot of it has to do with how his naps are handled at home. Just like a previous poster said, his mom says he took a 20 minute nap and I ma like, that is not a nap in my book, but she rocks him to sleep, lays him down and at the first hint of a cry, she gets him up and rocks him again. In the case of the baby I am caring for, his sleep issues seem to be habits, rather than an actual problem like night terrors and whatnot. It is making me consider termination if nothing changes soon. I have him tomorrow and changed his sleep area to the back bedroom where it will be quieter and honestly, where I won't hear his crying so clearly, because it is just getting so stressful to hear him cry all the time

[jenboo]

My own child started having night terrors at 5 months. If he's too tired, that could be causing this situation, and it COULD be night terrors, as well (since he settles quickly and doesn't open his eyes-though open eyes are not uncommon during terrors). Do you feel that these 2 naps are enough for him? At 5 months, kids often are taking 3 naps during a daycare period (or one longer than 2 hours). They spend twice as much time asleep at this age as they do awake. A 10-hour daycare day, I would expect a baby that age to sleep more like 6 hours than 4. No judging here, just a suggestion on something to try. I would stop trying to keep him awake and just let him sleep when he wants to at that age.

He is here for 8 hours a day. He sleeps 10-12 hours at night, sleeps in the car to my house and then sleeps for 4- 4.5 hours while he is here. I'm not keeping him awake anymore (since he seems to finally have adjusted to having some awake time). I could see if he sleeps longer for the naps. I have to wake him up by 330 in the afternoon so I can feed him before mom comes. They have a long drive home.

[Shell]

[QUOTE=Unregistered;517502]I have the exact same issue here. 6 month old, goes down for nap awake and falls asleep with little to no problem. 20 minutes in, wakes up screaming! It is so frustrating, because I either have to listen to him scream or go get him and then he is exhausted and miserable till next nap. I think a lot of it has to do with how his naps are handled at home. Just like a previous poster said, his mom says he took a 20 minute nap and I ma like, that is not a nap in my book, but she rocks him to sleep, lays him down and at the first hint of a cry, she gets him up and rocks him again. In the case of the baby I am caring for, his sleep issues seem to be habits, rather than an actual problem like night terrors and whatnot. It is making me consider termination if nothing changes soon. I have him tomorrow and changed his sleep area to the back bedroom where it will be quieter and honestly, where I won't hear his crying so clearly, because it is just getting so stressful to hear him cry all the time[/


I always have trouble with kids that are picked up at the slightest wimper. Then, the parent usually holds the baby for the duration of the nap, or rocks until the child is totally asleep and puts baby down for nap. I simply don't have this kind of time to provide the 1:1 this creates.

[jenboo]

DCB was very tired when we showed up this morning. I fed him at 8 and put him down for nap at 815. Usually he eats 830 and naps at 9.
we shall see how this goes.

[Unregistered]

My 6 month old that I posted about yesterday is here too. Had bottle at 9:15, played, and went down at 1030...up screaming at 10:50 This ****s! He has been in his crib crying for the last 20 minutes. I went in once and gave him his paci, but I am just trying to ignore and keep busy. Hoping he will fall back asleep, otherwise this is going to be a miserbale day.

[KIDZRMYBIZ]

[QUOTE=Shell;517527
I always have trouble with kids that are picked up at the slightest wimper. Then, the parent usually holds the baby for the duration of the nap, or rocks until the child is totally asleep and puts baby down for nap. I simply don't have this kind of time to provide the 1:1 this creates.[/QUOTE]

That is probably what is creating OP's problem. Just be consistent with how YOU want naptime to be, and hopefully baby will learn better sleeping habits from you.

[jenboo]

That is probably what is creating OP's problem. Just be consistent with how YOU want naptime to be, and hopefully baby will learn better sleeping habits from you.

I honestly believe the parents when they say they dont rush to is every whimper. I have had him for a couple months and this crying every 25 minutes thing is new. Like i said, he dont seem really awake when he does it and he goes back to sleep. Its just annoying and waking the other children.