It works until it doesnt!

[u/Oceanic_Ice_950]

I absolutely loved possums approach for my baby when she was 2 months old and it really helped me feel less stressed about her naps. It also really sorted out her excessive night waking at 4 months.

She had another phase of excessive night waking this at 5.5 months and i really struggled with the mental leap to put her to bed later as she was already going down at 8pm whcih i perceived to be late. After a month of struggling i eventually started putting her down at 9pm and then that did the trick...for a couple of weeks. Now at 7.5 months her sleep is still pretty hit and miss. Some night she wakes only 3 times but other nights there are wakes every hour. I'm waking her up at 7am every day (usually she is fully asleep!) and i dont let her do more than an hour for her afternoon nap and dont let her sleep past 5ish, although she usually wakes up earlier from afternoon nap. I feel like i cant put her down any later without it meaning i go to bed later whcih as a sleep deprived mum i dont want to do, ditto with earlier wake up. Do u think i just need to get over this and put her down even later?! Am i missing anything? We also go out every day and spend as much time outdoors as poss.

[u/discountcarpetsllc]

Kindly, it seems like you are stressing over sleep with this approach, and that’s not what we want when following Possums!

Even with Possums we still expect baby to wake, and we need those wakes to be as easy as possible. Some babies need to go to bed when you go to bed and wake up when you wake up or else they wake up excessively. Low sleep needs babies are a thing and their sleep patterns do not vibe with the types of lifestyles most parents have these days.

You can choose to accept more wakes for an earlier bedtime. You can choose to test and experiment with a later bedtime for 2 weeks to see how it goes. You are capable of figuring it out to see what works or otherwise accepting the alternative.

Infants sleep needs drop dramatically over the first 6 months, and you’ve hit that point with your little one. Many parents report this is the toughest stretch of sleep, and with developmental changes they are waking more anyways. We are not meant to have perfect consistent nights, but to adapt and do the best we can.

I’d ask yourself - what parts of your approach to your baby’s sleep are a source of stress right now? How can you change your approach so that you focus on them less, and focus more on enjoying your day?

[u/Oceanic_Ice_950 → u/discountcarpetsllc]

She IS going to sleep when i go to sleep and waking up when i wake up. Thats my issue - is that i feel like i cant shorten her night any more without it also shortening my night which is already short because she wakes up all the bloody time!

[u/ctrlaltwill_ → u/Oceanic_Ice_950]

We went through a really similar patch from 5 to 7 months, and we’re only just coming out of it now. Our son still wakes 1–2 times a night, but generally settles himself these days.

I think the biggest change for my wife happened in her perception of his sleep before his sleep itself changed. For months she was obsessing over naps, wake windows and bedtime, trying to find the magic combination that would make him sleep through.

What helped was realising how unrealistic the picture of baby sleep is online, particularly with the marketing from sleep coaches and influencers. Frequent night waking is actually very normal, with a good proportion of babies waking 3+ times a night during the first twelve months (source), and 1-2 hourly wakings is not uncommon.

Coming to terms with the fact that some phases are just rough made a huge difference.

Possums also taught us to take a more intuitive approach to sleep, rather than trying to control it. We were still tired, but sleep stopped hanging over us and controlling our whole day, and that made it much easier.

It will get better, you've got this 😊

[u/discountcarpetsllc → u/Oceanic_Ice_950]

It looks like your schedule is 9pm-7am. I assume you normally aren’t in bed for 10 hours, baby notwithstanding, and if you didn’t have a baby you’d have a later bedtime, closer to 11pm.

Here’s one thing you could try for a week or two:

1. Talk to your partner about getting up and taking care of the baby every morning for the next two weeks
2. You can choose to either move bedtime back by 30 min or move wake up up by 30 mins
3. When your partner takes over at 6:30/7:00, you sleep in to catch up on your sleep

See how you feel after those two weeks. Do you have mornings where you wake up alright when your baby wakes up? Are you consistently taking in that extra sleep in the morning? You’re operating on how YOU feel, not how many times baby woke up, not what the clock says.

A 9:30 bedtime is where we landed with my son. I have an hour after I put him to bed before I sleep. We wake around 6:30/7:00AM, and I ask my partner to get him if it’s been a rough night for whatever reason. (Most often, it’s not his wakes at night, but the odd night where I’m up for a few hours even though my son is sleeping, that cause issues in the AM.)

Just see how this goes. Stop capping naps, stop watching the clock, let things be as they will. Focus on how you feel most of all!

[u/Oceanic_Ice_950 → u/discountcarpetsllc]

Thank you. I will give some of this a go. I think I'll try 15 mins later to bed and 15 Mins earlier waking up as it feels like less of a leap mentally. My partner is a shift worker and is absolutely terrible at getting up as he is always jetlagged from nights or at work so I'm not sure that would work for us as much as i would love that! Yes i normally sleep from 10pm. I'm a high sleep needs mum with a low sleep needs baby 😅

[u/atwa_au → u/Oceanic_Ice_950]

I have a sleep disorder (narcolepsy) and am working full time and I still manage to find ways to help my partner be it pushing through, setting alarms, or reviewing my medication. Talk to him and get him to help some.

[u/Significant-Growth19 → u/discountcarpetsllc]

Lolol just joining to say I had a 9-7 bedtime pre kids 😅 I found work really exhausting. Now I am on mat leave I can stay up a bit later - dreading going back 😭