By Emily Pitcock, Certified Pediatric Sleep Consultant
I remember crying on the kitchen floor because I couldn’t figure out how to make my baby follow the schedule.
She was about three months old, and this was right before we went to the beach in July. I was doing everything I knew to do. I had a schedule to follow, but when she didn’t sleep when she was supposed to—or when a nap ended after her usual 36 minutes—I didn’t know what to do next.
How was I supposed to shift the rest of the day? Should I keep trying to get her back to sleep? Move the next nap? Change bedtime? I felt like I had no way to make sense of what was happening.
And I needed that nap, too.
It wasn’t one difficult afternoon. It had been weeks of trying to make the day work, then feeling lost when it didn’t. I wanted a sign that there was a light at the end of the tunnel—that we could have what I always crave: order, routine, predictability. Instead, every short nap seemed to leave me with more questions and no clear next step.
Finding a way to adjust
What began to help was learning about wake windows: the stretches of time a baby is awake between sleeps. I started using them as a way to understand what might come next, instead of expecting the day to unfold exactly as planned.
If she woke after 36 minutes, I would try to help her go back to sleep. If it didn’t work, I would call it and start the next wake window. Then I’d pay attention to her. If she seemed tired, I’d shorten that window by 10 to 15 minutes. If she didn’t seem tired, I’d keep it the same. Some days, because she hadn’t slept well during the day, that meant bedtime came earlier.
It didn’t make every nap longer. It didn’t make sleep predictable overnight. But I wasn’t left with the feeling that a short nap meant the whole day had fallen apart. I had a way to respond and a better idea of what to watch for.
I still love order and routine. I still want a rhythm that helps our family know what to expect. But I didn’t need every nap to match the plan in order to have one. I could adjust as the day unfolded.
Sleep wasn’t perfect, but it wasn’t falling apart anymore.
That experience is part of why I care so much about helping tired parents understand their baby’s sleep. Sometimes what a family needs isn’t a promise that every nap will go a certain way. It’s a clearer picture of what may be happening, and a next step that feels workable for everyone.
If you want the practical side of what I do now with short naps, I wrote about it in Why Does My Baby Only Nap for 30 Minutes? What to Do Next.
If you’re staring at a short nap and wondering what to do with the rest of the day, a Sleep Clarity Session can help you make sense of your baby’s sleep and decide what to try next.
