Baby Harrison
Cat napping by day and waking every 90 mins overnight.
When Aprilla first met Harrison, he was an 11-week old cat napper by day and frequent waker overnight. His parents were at their wits end and looking for a bit more structure during the day and some age-appropriate settling techniques. They were exhausted and spending long nights in desperation trying to settle him back to sleep but nothing was working. All they wanted was for Harrison to be well-rested and healthy.
Cat napping
Naps were tricky and Harrison seemed to only want to sleep during the day whilst being held by his parent or on the go in the pram. Naps in his bassinet were non-existent and he was averaging only 30 mins per nap. This was leading to lots of catnapping and Harrison being overtired and exhausted come bedtime. His parents were running out of ideas on what to do next.
Overnight wasn’t sustainable
At bedtime and overnight, Harrison was waking every 90 mins. His parents were trying everything to settle him back to sleep but were having to feed him back to sleep every time. As the days and weeks went okay, this wasn’t sustainable and they were becoming more and more drained and sleep-deprived, something had to change.
Solutions
An easy-going baby most of the time but when overtired Harrison was becoming fussier and clinger. We looked at all the contributing factors of why Harrison might be struggling. Overviewing his day, his awake times, feeds, making sure he wasn’t over or under tired. We put a bit more structure in Harrison’s day and adjusted his naps making sure he wasn’t overtired. This really helped and reduced his catnapping. Other things we did to combat his catnapping
Looked at age appropriate awake windows.
Ensuring that Harrison wasn’t napping when he was overtired.
Using an age-appropriate settling technique.
Making his sleep environment nice and dark.
We introduced an age appropriate settling technique and within the first week we saw some great changes with Harrison sleeping for longer overnight. As the days went on we began to see him learning to self-settle and beginning to link his sleep cycles for his daytime naps. We reduced his overtiredness and he began catching up on the sleep that his body was craving. It was a great team effort with his parents’ hard work and commitment.
“After 3 weeks of Aprilla’s constant support and reinforcement, our little man is now sleeping soundly giving his body time to focus on growing - which he his! We cannot speak highly enough of Aprilla! Her support was non stop and incredible. Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
“Looking back 12 months ago we had a very different little boy, he still sleeping like a superstar thank you.”