17 month old split nights
Hey everyone! I’ve done a bit of research on this but I’m not finding my exact situation and I’m at the end of my rope here. I have a 17 month old who has been splitting her nights for 3 months. She has always been lower sleep needs. On really good days she sleeps from 8pm to 6am (10 hours) and she takes a 2 hour nap from noon-2pm. 5 out of 7 nights she will wake up at some point and be awake for at least 2 hours. She was sleep trained with a modified Ferber at 11 months and falls asleep independently with no sleep props for both her bedtime and naptime. When she wakes up at night, she is happily awake in her crib. Most of the time I don’t even need to go in there, she’s just content to talk to herself until she finally falls asleep. If I do go in there, it’s because she’s been fussy and I want to check her diaper or her room temperature. If she is awake in the middle of the night, I never let her sleep past 6:30. We live in a small house and our bedrooms are right next to each other, so if she’s awake then I’m awake.
I understand that split nights means undertired. I really do. However, the rest of the day she is incredibly grumpy and acts overtired. She crashes for her nap and I always have to wake her up from her nap. I can’t take her in the car or in her stroller anywhere because she will fall asleep. She’s crabby after her nap and from 6-8pm she’s almost unbearable.
She eats AMAZINGLY. She isn’t teething. We’ve tried different pajamas, different sleep sacks. I have a Bluetooth thermometer by her bed so I know the temp of her room at all times. She sleeps with a hatch with brown noise and a VERY low red light. The time is pointed to the wall so the brightness doesn’t bother her. Weather permitting, we spend lots of time outside. She’s still crabby and acts super tired after the nights she sleeps the whole night.
All of our adjustments have been slow. We moved her bedtime back to 8pm and waited a week, then we started waking her up earlier in 30 minute increments.
So, after all of that - does anyone have any tips? Our next step would be to cut down her nap. But she’s soooooo tired during the day. I know 12 hours isn’t even the lowest she could go, but I’m not sure I could keep her awake longer during the day. We can’t even go anywhere to do fun things because she will fall asleep in the car immediately.
Co-sleeping isn’t an option. Our bed is too small and we sleep with our pets. My husband takes sleep medicine for insomnia so he sleeps very heavily.
It’s been 3 months. Please help 😭