So I thought I had it figured out: two hours after waking up (usually sometime between 9 and 10am), Savannah would go down for her morning nap. I would read her a book, nurse her, swaddle her, give her a paci, and then she’d sleep for 2+ hours. Repeat for afternoon nap. Bedtime at 11pm. All good.

Then this week something changed. This week Savannah decided that napping is for sissies and she wasn’t going to partake. I don’t know if this coincides with her ear infection – last Monday was the first day she stopped napping and also the day we saw the doc and started her on amoxicillin.

Now the routine is: she gets fussy. I put her down for a nap, following same routine as before. She usually falls asleep but wakes up anywhere from 15 minutes to half an hour later. Then she’s wide awake and in a fairly good mood until the afternoon when she gets fussy and we try again with the same results. Then she is SO cranky in the evenings. But any attempts at nap repeats are met with the same results. She doesn’t have problems GOING to sleep – she has problems STAYING asleep. Bedtimes are still completely normal, she doesn’t seem to have a problem there.

The weird exception is last Wednesday, we went to a friend’s house. I laid her down, same routine, and she slept for 3 hours. That was the last nap she took.

I’ve tried swaddling and unswaddling her. I’ve tried laying her in the pack n play, on our bed, and in the co-sleeper. I’ve tried laying down next to her (you can imagine my disappointment when I realized that I wasn’t going to get that nap!). I’ve tried getting her to go back to sleep after she wakes up.

Also frustrating is the past few days, she’s decided she hates her bouncer and she really would prefer to be in our arms. And she likes us to be walking around. Which as you can imagine gets old reaaaaaally fast.

Oh and if possible she would like to take all naps in our arms. Cuz she will sleep there. But once you put her down you have 15-20 minutes, tops, before she wakes again – and that’s assuming she didn’t wake up when you laid her down.

In short, I’m exhausted. And stressed. It’s hard to get things done when she is awake all day and wants to be held. And I am about to go crazy with this lack of alone time (my introversion coming out).

Any ideas on keeping baby asleep once she’s down?

Oh and another reason for my tiredness – I can’t seem to sleep at night. I am so exhausted when I fall into bed, but then insomnia takes over and I lie awake until 2 am or later.

So… tired…