Do I jinx us if I say that Olivia’s sleep issues peaked this week? Call it 4 month wakeful, 4 month sleep regression – whatever it is/was kept us on our toes with 1h 30 min wake-up intervals at night and naps that didn’t last more than 45 minutes. Olivia started breaking out of her swaddle and rolling on to her tummy to sleep, so we experimented with putting her to bed un-swaddled, which worked a couple of nights but mostly just resulted in her waking herself up even more because she was tossing and turning trying to get comfortable. The few times she fell asleep on her tummy, she slept pretty soundly. But we didn’t!
I’m pretty sure we’re also in the middle of a loooong Wonder Week stretch. Wonder Week 19 starts at around 14 1/2 weeks, peaks at 17 weeks, and things get a lot better at around week 20 (only to start up a few weeks later!)
The perceptual world your baby enters after the next leap is the world of ‘events.’ Until your baby has gone through this leap, he can only perceive smooth transitions. After he has gone through this leap, he is able to perceive a short, familiar series of ‘smooth transitions’ with all his senses – seeing, hearing, feeling, smelling, and tasting – and also when it comes to interactions with those around him. Examples include the perception of a bouncing ball, or grasping something with a hand. – The Wonder Weeks
Olivia is getting better at grasping objects, and this week she started practicing rolling over to her tummy on her left side AND rolling 
from tummy to back. She actually enjoys hanging out on her tummy and staring at or playing with toys now. She drools a bit when she’s been on her tummy for a while, and she loves gnawing on everything! She smiles when I sing Itsy Bitsy spider.
This week seriously went by in a blur. We went to yoga, went for lots of walks and got our family photos taken. Olivia may have a future as a model! She was so cooperative and sweet during the session.
Sunday was also Daylight Saving. I tried to extend O’s bedtime by 10-15 minutes each day leading up to it, but failed miserably since she started getting tired even earlier (probably due to the short naps). She actually slept pretty well that night – perhaps because I took her out for a walk in the Moby at around 6:30 pm, and it was so dark out that she fell asleep.
Incoming search terms:
- wonder weeks olivia
- wonder weeks 16 weeks
my daughters done the exact same thing right down to breaking out of her swaddle :/ glad to hear its not just her or that im doing something wrong 🙂
no, no – it’s definitely not you!! she’s just stating to develop a mind of her own 🙂
How long until Olivia went back to sleeping through the night? My LO just turned 16 weeks yesterday and for the past week it seems (especially the last 2-3 days), he’s been waking up every 2 hours exactly. I’m so exhausted. He was such a good sleeper before this, so I was baffled by it, and then I remembered the wonder weeks and the 4 month sleep regression. I’m just not sure how much longer I can subsist on such little, broken sleep. 🙂
Hey Kristin! It took until week 19 for us, but it may not take as long for you!! That was BY FAR the toughest 3 weeks so far, but once it passed, it was so incredible how much O’s personality and skills had developed. Hang in there, you’ll be back to getting your sleep before you know it 🙂
Thanks! He went back to “normal” last week, but now this week it was back to the same thing of waking up every 1.5-2 hours. He’ll be 18 weeks tomorrow, so I’m hoping we’ll be back to “normal” soon. But I’ve definitely noticed that he’s learning new things, etc, and it’s so cool to see!!!
Awesome!! Keep us posted 🙂
curious, feed him when he wakes up every 2 hours,or is it more for coddling?
Hi Anna! It really depends – he could still be going through a growth spurt around this time and may genuinely be hungry. When Olivia was going through this Wonder Week leap and waking every 1:30 hours at night, we fed her every other time or so. Sometimes it was clear that she wanted to go back to sleep, so we just patted her gently and shushed while she was still in the crib, and she would fall asleep. Other times, she was more awake and we’d feed her.
Hello mums and dads.
My boy is 19 weeks today, and since he was born we had no problems with his sleeping patterns. He seems to require more sleep during his wonder weeks. When he snooze a lot we know he will wake up after one of his naps with a new skill(s).
I just wanted to write and say thanks for all this info on the Wonder Weeks! I have been visiting your blog since my son was born back in October. So nice to look this up and often see that Olivia was experiencing the same things that my son is now. I have your website saved on the home screen of my phone!
Wow, thank you SO much, that really means a lot! I’m so glad that keeping track of these Wonder Weeks help reassure other mommies out there that this is totally normal!!