9-12 Month Baby Sleep Guide
This is it parenting peeps, the last few legs of the race. Enjoy these last days of being a parent of a BABY because in mere seconds you will be the proud parent of a TODDLER. Your older baby is no longer a screaming mess of short naps and blowout poops. Your baby is NOW a delightful smiling, laughing, ball of cute baby chub and tickle toes. Seriously, there is nothing better than a 9 month old baby. Absolutely nothing.
Things That Are Normal for 9-12 Month Old Babies
- Bedtime is pleasant and happening at a reasonably consistent time each day somewhere near(ish) to 7:30 PM.
- Baby is taking 2 consistent long(ish) naps a day.
- Baby may still need a 3rd nap although this may vary from day to day. It’s generally short, maybe as little as 10-20 minutes. Also the 3rd nap is unlikely to happen in the crib so you may need a stroller walk/baby wearing/car ride to make it happen.
- Baby is enjoying solid food and finger foods – YAY!
- Baby is sleeping ~11 hours a night – YAY!
- Baby is eating 0-1 times at night.
- Baby is falling asleep on their own at bedtime and naptime.
- Baby is sleeping where you would like them to sleep (crib or co-sleeping).
- Baby is done with most sleep aids (swing, swaddle, pacifier) but is still happy with a dark room, loud white noise, and possibly a lovey.
This may not describe your baby which is OK. Baby sleep is not like a race. What matters is that you DO cross the finish line, not WHEN you cross the finish line.
If your older baby is still up all night, taking short crappy naps, and struggles to go to sleep at bedtime, then start reading here:
How to Get Baby to Sleep Through the Night – Part 1
How to Get Baby to Sleep Through the Night – Part 2
How to Get Baby to Sleep Through the Night – Part 3
If your baby is 9-12 months old and sleep is still a misery (20 minute naps, bedtime battles, baby up all night, unwilling co-sleeping, only sleeps on Mom’s boob, etc.) then it may be time to consider sleep training. If you’re curious and want to learn more you can find everything I’ve written about cry it out here.
Further Reading
How and Why to Use and Loose the Paci
Weaning Baby OFF the Swing
When Night Weaning isn’t Working
Bedtime What Time?
Why Your Baby Hates the Crib
What to Do About Short Naps
Are You Keeping Baby Awake Too Long?
Why You Need White Noise
And of course the ever popular – Baby Sleep What is Normal?
{Photo credit: Lisa Stout}
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My son is 11 months old today, and has been a great sleeper from about 3 months old until a few weeks ago. He still sleeps great at night, and usually takes 2 naps a day, but for the last 8-10 days, he has been fighting his afternoon nap (ie-he’ll play in his crib for an hour, or just fuss for about 30 min), or he will take a very short one, and then wake up very fussy. Unless, however, he is in the car. Then he will sleep for about an hour. My question is, how do you know if your baby is ready to do the 2-1 transition, and how do you do it? Here is what his schedule looked like before the nap fighting:
WU: 6/630
Nap1: 830/9-930/10
Nap2: 1/130-2/230
Bed: 5:55, ASLEEP by 6:15pm
NOW, it look
He still seems tired for his morning nap around 830/9, so I’m having trouble extending it. Any tips for tricks? Also, once you transition to 1 nap, what happens if he wakes up for some reason around 530(he still tends to do that occasionally), and needs a nap earlier than usual? Do you try to get 2 naps in there?
*sorry, 11 month old fingers hit the button too soon…
NOW, his schedule looks like:
WU: 630/7
Nap1: 9-1015
Nap2: 115 in crib, but plays around until 215
Bedtime: 545pm
I know he’s not getting enough daytime sleep, and his wake time between the nap and bedtime is too long, but I’m not sure what to do. Can you help?!?!??!
Hi Alexis,
Thanks again for everything you do here and all your hard work! It’s been really invaluable to me over the past several months!
My son is almost 9 months. He’s always been a good napper but never a great night sleeper. He does put himself to sleep for both naps and nighttime about 98% of the time. Occasionally if he’s restless or something we may have to go in once to help him get in a comfy position, but we never stay for long and it happens rarely now. However, he still wakes up at least twice a nice, sometimes more, between bedtime at 7-7.30pm and wakeup at about 6.30am. A few times he’s only woken up once, but that’s rare. I try to only feed him once a night, but sometimes I have to do more, when it’s the only thing that will calm him after we try other things.
I guess I’m just not sure if this is something he’ll figure out on his own, particularly if I try a bit harder to night wean him or if there’s something else we should be doing. I’ve read a few of the sleep books (Pantley, Weissbluth, Mindell) and they all stress that the beginning of the night is the most important. I’m not against letting him cry a bit, but I also don’t really want to just ignore him either when he calls for us in the middle of the night. If you have any thoughts or suggestions on if there’s something else we should be doing to battle these night wakings, I would very much appreciate it!
Thanks!
Ashley
I am in the same boat as Ashley, who commented above. 9 month old baby sleeps fine for naps and goes to bed without assistance. But between 9 and midnight she typically wakes up 2-4 times. Sometimes she just wants her paci. Sometimes she wants to be rocked. Should we use CIO for these nighttime wakings too?
Hi Alexis, I have the same questions as Allison regarding the dropping of the second nap. My 10 1/2 month old has been a pretty good sleeper since we started a bedtime/naptime routine at maybe 5 months old, based on your advice back then. (Thank you!!) Bath is 6pm, asleep by 6:30 or 7, and she’ll sleep until 7 or 7;30 with one or two small night feeds. She used to have 3 hours of daytime sleep, spread out over 2 naps. Recently she started sleeping 2 to 2 1/2 hours in her first nap instead of just one hour, and now she’s wide awake all afternoon. I still try to put her to bed in the afternoon but she fights it so much that there’s no chance. If she DOES sleep in the afternoon, it’s for a good 90 minutes, waking up at 5:30pm and pushing bedtime back until 7:30 or 8pm. And she still wakes up at the same time in the morning!
So, do we stop trying to force the second nap?? Being awake from 1 til 6 is a long time but it seems to be working for her (although I can see a lull about halfway through where she does get tired, but refuses to go to sleep). Should I take advantage of this tired lull and take her for a drive to put her to sleep for an hour?
Thank you in advance!
Hi Jessica- our daughter dropped to one nap at 11 months. Schedule had been 7 am wake up, 10-1130 nap, 230-400 nap, 7 pm bed. We ended up pushing back the morning nap- so now she sleeps from about 1200-200. For the first week she was a little fussy before nap but she adjusted quickly (and if we tried to put her down earlier to give her time for two naps would just play in her crib). She still gets b/w 14-15 hrs of sleep a day, which is on the high end. And it varies- sometimes she wakes up before 7, or is ready for nap at 1130 (even after waking up at 730), or sleeps for 3 hrs, or wants to go to bed at 630. We just try to roll with it and adjust if she seems like she needs more rest that day.
Good luck! We are loving the one nap thing. We feel like there is actually time to go places
I am also trying to get my 10-month old to sleep better so thought I would chime in with the above comments.
With respect to Jessica’s post, I just wanted to point out that Weissbluth recommends waking the baby from the first nap IF necessary to protect the second nap. We went through a phase where my guy would sleep too long in the am, and after gently waking him a few times (after about 1.5 hours of sleep) that seemed to steer his second nap back on course, which helped the overall sleep schedule.
Anyways, I wanted to comment because nighttime sleep is still such a mess. We used CIO with great success at 8 months, but it didn’t stop his night wakings. Even though he learned to fall asleep by himself at the beginning of the night (at 7 pm), he still wakes to eat at least twice a night.
Here is the kicker -he used to just fall asleep after a quick nurse, which I could live with, but NOW… torture. He wakes and can’t (won’t?) fall asleep for about an hour, no matter what we do to sooth him (nursing, rocking, singing, pacing). He’s been a little bonkers the past few weeks (a cold, teething) so maybe we’ve let some bad habits creep in? or maybe he still has a strong nurse-sleep association? Also, I started to gradually weaning him to the bottle this past week, and I am worried that the weaning process is blowing up his sleep. We are exhausted. At our nine-month visit, the pediatrician suggested just leaving him to cry when he wakes, but I am unwilling to do that.
This blog has been such a great resource, and really helped convince me to try CIO. I can’t thank you enough for that!
Kate, I am in the same boat! I have an 8 month old and she would take 2 great naps a day, in bed by 7:30, up once for a bottle, back to sleep until about 7. NOW….still naps, still in bed by 7:30 but when she wakes up she does not want to go back to sleep!! A couple nights it’s been 2 hours! We did CIO around 5 months and it was great for us and she was starting to sleep through the night and we were finally on track! Well now she started to crawl and refusing a bottle at night, which is great. But then she started refusing the bottle all together. We ended up taking her to our ped and he said she is teething really bad right now and also with her crawling, she is basically having a regression. He said it should pass and she is probably waking up in pain too at night. I hope he is right.
I am going to give it another week and possibly CIO during the night. Did you end up doing that? I am also afraid because if she is hurting…how can I let her cry?
We ended up losing sleep for two weeks or maybe more, but it passed! I decided that our little guy needed some extra soothing, for whatever reason, so at his night wakings I would rock him for an hour or even more. He would not fall asleep while I rocked him, however, so I did have to eventually put him back into his crib and he would cry himself to sleep. I tried to do as much for him as I could without just letting him stay up all night – the bottom line was, he refused to fall asleep in my arms, so he had to cry some to get to sleep.
Hang in there! If you stick with it I bet you can get her back into that crib. Have you tried Tylenol? In retrospect, we probably should have used some pain relief medication.
So my 9 month old falls asleep on me while feeding and I put him down in his crib and this is usually around 9 he will not sleep any earlier than this and for me this is a good bedtime for the little guy. He wakes at 2 for a feeding and diaper and is back to sleep no problems and is asleep til 7am when his daddy gets home from work. And then normal naptime around 930/10ish and has another in the afternoon between 2/3ish. The problem is he won’t go to sleep alone in his crib without his bottle nor will he at 2am at his normal feeding time. I have neighbors on each side of my apartment and can’t just let him cry like I do during the day. These ppl have lives and need to sleep too. So I give in and just give him his bottle and let him fall asleep with it. I would love to work on getting rid of the bottle before he falls asleep then work on the 2 am waking. What would be the best way of going about this? Any comments are very welcomed! Thanks Jessica
Hi there. Thanks so much for this site!
I did CIO with my son when he was 5 months old (he is almost 11 months old now) and he now gets up once per night for a feed and then back to bed usually until 7ish – though there are phases when this changes. His naps are a bit hit or miss.
Lately he goes to sleep between 7 and 7:30 and usually sleeps til 4:30 or 5, then nurses and goes back to bed until 7 or 7:30. Is this considered sleeping through the night, or should he be able to sleep right through until 7 now? How would I go about cutting out that middle of the night feed? If I go in and sooth him, he flips out unless I nurse him. He also isn’t attached to any blanket or stuffed animal, and doesn’t suck his thumb, so doesn’t seem to have any way to sooth himself. He either goes to sleep or he doesn’t. I don’t plan to breasfeed much past a year, so I am worried about what I would do when he wakes up in the middle of the night. I guess I’d just let him CIO again?
Also, his naps are kind of hit or miss. He has been sick and I have been nursing him to sleep before naps because I felt bad letting him CIO. Probably not a great idea. Should I just avoid nursing him before naps period? I find that if he doesn’t fall asleep, and I take him off to put him in the crib, he gets really upset. I feel like he will just cry forever for naps for some reason. What is a good routine for a nap, and do you apply the same principles to naps?
Sorry if this is a bit jumbled!
Hi, thank-you so much for this site.
I am on night 6 of sleep-training my almost 11 month old daughter. I really appreciated the sleep training two part story because it felt like I was reading about myself. I was sure attachment parenting was for me. We have bed-shared with our daughter since she started sleeping poorly at about 3 months. I actually enjoyed it for most of that time until about the 9 month mark. She started to wake up more and more often to nurse and I was just not getting any sleep. Something had to be done. I knew after spending hours researching different sleep-training methods that full-on extinction was the only thing I could do. I know my daughter…she is a taurus!
Things went better than I thought they would. 30 mins crying night #1 and then slept from 7-3. I fed her without her falling asleep (because I was not planning on night-weaning yet) and she did cry for 10 mins and then slept until 7am. I was very happy with that. The next night was even better. 15 mins of crying and slept straight through from 7-6. I don’t mind waking up early so we do start the day at 6 if that’s when she is up.
So, today we have just started night #6 and although things have been ok I do feel like her intensity of crying is quite…well, intense. She cries pretty hard. Not really just a protest but VERY loud and screamy. Having said that, that is kind of her cry.
So, I guess I am happy that she is doing so great as far as sleeping through the night. Last night she went to bed early because her naps sucked and she slept straight through from 6:30 to 6 am! But, will she ever be ok with going to bed? ie. not screaming? Is that normal after 6 nights? As soon as her bedtime routine is winding down she knows what is coming and she starts to cry before we even put her in the crib. It’s breaking my heart. Am I doing something wrong? Is this not for her?
Thoughts or experiences greatly appreciated!
AmandaB
Amanda:
I read your post and I can offer some input although I am no expert just someone who’s done a lot of reading.
First on your 11 month old stopping the 5 am nursing session- I think it is quite common for babies even over 1 to still want to nurse once/night. But I hear what your saying and I’m sure there are ways to start to stretch that feeding later…it could totally just be his habit now. I’m sorry I don’t know much about that. I am just thrilled that my lo can make it until 5 without a feed at this point!
I think naps are a lot trickier. I did start nap training today as well. I have always nursed and then rocked my lo to sleep and she usually napped fairly well that way. But since we started night sleep training I have found it isn’t working anymore. I had planned to wait a few weeks to nap train thinking she needed as much nap time as possible so the night would go well but she started to protest when I was rocking her and she just seemed to not be able to get comfortable and then when she would fall asleep her nap was too short. So, this afternoon I just bit-the-bullet and put her in her crib. It was getting to the point where I could tell she was getting overtired and so I just put her in her crib. She cried about 10 mins and then slept for about 40 so I went in and let her know I was still here but then I left again. She cried again for 8 but then slept for 45. It was so hard. This whole process is so hard. From what I’ve read, for naps you do your preferred method: extinction or leave and check. You do this for the total amount of time that you want them to nap for so at least an hour. Dr. Weissbluth the author of “Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Baby”, says to let them cry for an hour but no more. I could not have done that but thankfully I did not have to. You may just have to try it because I was surprised it only took her 10 mins.
Oh, back to your question about the 5 am feed. What I did for the first night of sleep- training was when she woke at 3 am I waited about 5 mins before I went in and then fed her and put her right back in crib awake. Yes, she did cry for about 10 mins but then she slept until 7am. And for the next 5 nights she has not woken up once during the night. So, it may just be a habit you have to break. You should probably try and do some reading on nap-training before jumping into it. I found the above mentioned book to be quite useful.
I hope that makes some sense. Like I said, I am no expert I’ve just done a lot of reading.
Thank you so much for this site and your wisdom! It was key to ourcsurvival and getting things right when we had a newborn. Fortunately , we have had a happy baby who’s been a great sleeper more months and months. She’s 11 mo and just started waking earlier and earlier each day. We’ve tried everything– her rm is dark, earlier bedtime, later bedtime, etc. She follows the 9-12 mo schedule with two good naps at the right time… So I’m stuck! She just started walking this week and has been having tooth pain but I don’t know that that’s it because she doesn’t wake at all st night. I’d be so grateful for any insights. Thank you!
My baby isaac is 9months he used to sleep during the day from anywhere around 1/1/2 to 2 hours now its only 1 hour, he does sleep during the nights but at times he wakes up but eventually puts himself to sleep.
Usually I feed him formula at 7am then breaky at 8:30am -Nap at 10:30am with milk 2pm lunch 3pm nap dinner at 6pm bath 7 then 7:30pm sleep time…
How do I get him to sleep longer during the day as he wakes up after an hour crying when his naps used to be longer!!!
Hey Alexis, and everyone!
I just wanted to leave a comment/question. I have a 9 month old daughter and we did the Ferber method when she was 7 months old thanks to this site! I did nights and naps all at once because she was a paci addict lol. Well after two weeks everything came together and we had 12 hr nights and slowly we moved to 2 naps the first being 1- 1 1/2 hours and the second being 45 to 1hour. I was happy with that but within the last two weeks her naps have been hit or miss and somedays she only takes 30 min naps even though I leave the whole hour hoping she will fall back asleep. Then that throws off our whole day and she’s super cranky.
Anyone know what this is all about??? I feel like I’m going crazy!
Thanks for any advice. On a side note its not teeth or illness
My daughter is 9 months old and has been a poor sleeper since 2 weeks old. She is #3 for us and we all live in a tiny house, so crying it out at night is not really an option.
She naps great during the day….morning, mid/afternoon, and sometimes a late afternoon nap. She goes down great for all naps and for the beginning of the night. Then 1-3 hours after bedtime it starts…the screaming/waking. It goes from around 9/10pm until 4am. Sometimes she will go 1 hour without waking, but usually it is 15-45 minutes at a time of sleep. She doesn’t just fuss, she screams. The doctors have labeled it “colick” all the way up to her 6month appt. They say that some babies are just really colicky for a long time. I have tried co-sleeping, but she does not sleep if she is near me. She just “talks” and pats my face/back/arm. She used to fall asleep if I nursed her during the night (I know, bad habit) but now she even stays awake through that.
I have 2 other children and do not get to nap. My husband works hard manual labor during the day and cannot help at night. I am losing my mind over the lack of sleep. Any thoughts?
Bedtime and naptime with my 9.5 month old went from a happy extremely predictable time where he was always happily going to sleep on his own (for months) to changing over night! He had been pulling himself up on all kinds of things for a while now but just starting doing it in his bed this weekend. Immediately stands up when I put him in bed and SCREAMS! Won’t sit down. I know he is exhausted because as soon as I pick up him he lays his head on my shoulder and goes to sleep. But then try to put him down, it starts all over again! I am wary of starting bad habits that didn’t exist before but its very hard for me to leave him standing and crying! I am really afraid he’s going to hit is head! Is this something to ride out and the novelty will wear off for him? Any tips are appreciated!
Hi, great site! I have learned so much!
We’re having an early morning waking problem. The last 4 am feed dropped around 8 months and things were great for a few weeks but then baby would start waking up at 6 am or earlier. I would go back in to feed him so that he would go back to sleep until the desired wake-up time of 7am (after 8pm bedtime) but at around 9 months that stopped working too. These days (at 10 months) he has regularly been waking up between 5 and 5:30. For the last few days we have been trying to consistently do the following: if wake-up is before 6 am, go in and give him a pat and leave the room. He’s usually standing in the crib and gets upset for about 30 seconds but doesn’t cry for very long. He then tries to sleep but has not succeeded. At 6am, we grumble, go in and start the day.
We feel there are a few possible contributing factors. One is he’s been napping crappy in his new mobile infant room at daycare, and so he often falls asleep on the way home around 5:30ish. The late nap doesn’t affect bedtime too much (some times we push back to 8:30) but we feel may be substituting for some of the early morning sleep. He also tends to fall asleep in the car on the way TO daycare at 8ish on days that he wakes up before 6. We’ve been trying to talk to him or even reach back and nudge him to keep him awake in the car but it’s impossible! The second is a possible eat-sleep association, so we’ve moved the bedtime feed to be before bath time and added a book before putting him in the crib (at which point he falls asleep easily).
I feel like I shouldn’t be complaining since he sleeps fine from 8-5ish but he’s only getting about 10.5-11 hours a sleep/day and it’s really hard to make it through the work day with the early morning wake up! Help!
Hello!
I am an avid reader of your website and have learned so much about sleep this past year. Yes, I said year! I thought I was pretty much done with worrying about it, as everything was great (in bed awake, no more nursing, etc). BUT these last few nights/naps my little guy (he’s almost 15 months) screams like he is dying. Right now, he is still standing up screaming 30 minutes after I left his room. He has never done this before. If I go in and pick him up, he will cuddle and fall asleep within minutes. I know this because I did it last night and at nap time today. This morning, he threw a tantrum in his crib. After he sat down, he laid on his back and his arms and legs were flailing. I’ve never seen this before! I’m pretty sure he’s teething, so I gave him advil before bed. I don’t want to start any bad habits, so I’m hesitant to go in and hold him again tonight (though I can put him down asleep and he’ll stay asleep all night-at least he did last night).
Does anyone have any experience with this? Is there a 15 month sleep regression? He has been clingy lately. Just bad teething pain?
Thank you in advance!