Parent has asked for 2 year old to have no sleep during 11 hour day with me

My just three year old dropped her nap about six months ago. I don't stop her from sleeping if she falls asleep, but she is a total mare at bedtime if she does. I asked her CM to stop trying to force her to sleep in the afternoons - I understand that it's easier for them if all the kids nap at the same time, but I also pay them to look after my daughter whether she's asleep or not. They still tried to make her sleep and then complained because she got upset. We're not really using them any more, as the forced nap was the last straw on a strained relationship.

It's a difficult age. If mine slept in the day when they were 2yo, they would then stay up until 11pm or later. It is easier to achieve not sleeping in the day when they are with mum/dad at home. I don't think they can insist that you forcibly keep the child awake but you can offer to encourage the child to stay awake.

Do what the mum asks you for a week and see what happens - ie will prob fall asleep on school run / tea : or even worse on way home with parents

Then suggest an am sleep

I wouldn't advise lying to parents but what a friend did was to put charge down for a sleep 11/12 and not tell parents they slept and child went to bed 7pm happily as parents relaxed more / sometimes children pick up on parents emotions

Is a small white lie bad if parents nanny and child are happy with the outcome??

As I said in earlier post often children that have nannies will settle better for them if babysitting then parents

A nap durng the day would balls up my 2 yr old sleep pattern. She would be up until really late.

She dropped her nap at 18 months.

I can't believe those figs provided by the sleep clinic! My little one has never required that much sleep.

That said, if your mindee is really tired and normally has a nap, it's going to be tricky for you. Especially of he has a full on day of fun at yours. I would let him conk out at tea time then hand him over to the parents! Then they can see that he needs a nap.

You are wrong to feel bad about waking a sleeping child and if he does have a nap with you then you must wake him up and keep it short, to be fair to the parents. He may be grumpy in the evening, if he is it will only be for a short while and they may well prefer it to being kept up all night.

Surely a 1.30pm-2.30 PM won't affect night sleep for a two year old.
oh yes it does for us...

The problem with doing as she says is that if you try, and fail, then the nap that does happen will undoubtedly be at 5/6pm which WILL affect his nighttime sleep! Surely a 1.30pm-2.30 PM won't affect night sleep for a two year old.

I'd just do it I think and say he fell asleep and you felt that if you woke him he would be unhappy which would be unfair on him, and upset the other children. It's a hard one though.

Are you quite busy with him? I ask because when my mum looks after my little girl she is constantly entertaining her - reading books, painting, playing on the floor, interacting all the time. When i look after her most of the time, i do play with her of course, but i also have patches of time when i am not interacting with her and she is playing alone. After a day with my mum she is soooooo tired. With me she just has one short nap, with my mum a longer one. Maybe these parents are not so 'full on' with their child so he is not so tired when with them, whilst you are more playful and activity based with him so he does get more tired?

I think they are being very unreasonable for what its worth. If he needs to nap, he needs to nap. And loads of children that age have night wakings. Its part of being a parent. And 11 hours is a very very long day with a small toddler to keep them on the go.

I could make other judgements but i will hold back

I don't think I've ever had more night wakings due to naps, not going to bed at a reasonable hour I've had in bucket loads, but waking is usually due to being ill, uncomfortable, bad bedtime habits which they then want in the night too, needing to do a wee once potty traininng has started, teeth, sound of heating going on/off, when dd picked up worms at preschool that woke her up, but not nap times.

Why not suggest that they keep a sleep diary. They are probably knackered working all day and then up half the night. Working out the triggers is probably the most useful thing.

Sometimes parents are wrong.

I have read through this thread thinking I bet he falls asleep at school run or at tea time.

One of my mindees still needs a nap some days at just turned 3. His old CM used to let him sleep for 2 + hours at 3pm which did affect his sleep at night.
I listened to parents request and his naps are shorter. I don't prod him awake I just move him from the buggy if he falls asleep on school run. Or if an earlier nap during quiet time wake him to get him ready to go on school run.

we struggle with this. DS2 is 2.5 and sometimes can cope without a nap and then goes to sleep at about 7ish. He really does enjoy his nap though but then stays awake until 9pm or later. He has a cold and napped for 3 hours today, so late to bed. I don't think you can stop a child napping if they ned to. DS2 fell asleep in his dinner a couple of months ago, quite literally

You should work with the parents, but not if it is to the detriment of the child's welfare.

Surely you have to try what the parents ask? If our DS who is nearly 2 has a nap in the day he is awake until ten pm. DD was totally different and gave up her nap only because she went to preschool at three and a bit.

The parents are probably at their wits end and willing to try anything.

Can you try it at least once and see how it goes? If he falls asleep in the buggy or is really difficult then at least you can tell the parents what happened. My 3yo will not go to bed til 9pm if she naps at all, I agree 2.2 seems a little young but children are all different.

Oh and she was always far worse going to sleep with someone else!

DD has always been a clockwork sleeper. She needs 12 hours sleep every day - pretty much whenever she goes to bed, she will wake 12 hours later. And by choice she will always be in bed by 1930. From 15 to 18 months she slept every day without fail from 1330 to 1500. Then she stopped sleeping during the day - and believe me, as I was at home with her then I would have loved it if she had carried on napping!

When she first started nursery at 22 months she started napping again on those days, but then got into the swing of nursery but they kept her in the routine of napping during the day, with the result that she would be up until 2030, 2100, even 2200 one time. She just didn't need the nap. Eventually nursery got the message and stopped putting her down and she is back into her routine of sleeping 12 hours at night. It was sooooo frustrating that they didn't have to deal with the fall out of her having a daytime nap but got the benefit of having her asleep for an hour or so!

OP, lots of two year olds don't nap any more, and you have to respect the parents' wishes on this, but they should understand that you can't guarantee no sleep at all eg if you are out and about and she falls asleep in the buggy. But please don't encourage her to nap because you think it's what she should have, or not tell the parents about her napping with you.

I'm glad none of you encountered dd1 when she was little, she never slept, 10 mins in the morning and 10 min in the afternoon were her maximum, from 2 months old! Nursery were convinced that we were wrong and they would get her to sleep, strangely she wouldn't sleep for them either, whatever they did. Some children just don't need much sleep, she still doesn't.

Ds however is 3 and he still usually has a sleep, he didn't today so probably will tomorrow. It is almost impossible on a school run for them not to fall asleep in a pushchair if they are tired. I would raise the issue of the school run, if it is not their children whom you are collecting then maybe they need to find alternative childcare. I find with ds that any sleep before 4pm has little impact on him, but after 4pm and it will be a problem. Maybe highlight that skipping the morning sleep will make it more likely that they sleep later in the day. I would maybe try to limit the sleep a little bit, or try and encourage a sleep just every other day.

'sometimes i think children play their parents up as havnt seen them all day'

This is defintely true in some cases (not all, BigFat). Children go to bed easily and straight to sleep with nanny, but up until midnight with parents. It's not the sleep that's changed, it's who is putting them to bed!

There is a huge variation between 2 year olds in terms of sleeping needs etc.

I agree that you need to try to respect the wishes of the child's parents - my ds was a terrible sleeper at 2 and it really, really isn't pleasant to be up a few times in the night then up for the day at 5.30am with a full working day ahead...

If the child isn't able to cope, then you need to talk it through with the parents.

I would agree if we weren't talking about dropping a nap at the age of 2. Something that, in some cases, actually BENEFITS the child. The child has a right to get as much sleep as they need to be happy and healthy, sometimes a nap actually interferes with that. To imply that a parent is cruel or acting against a child's rights to want to drop their nap at the age of 2 absolutely smacks of hysteria to me.

If the parents would like the nap taken away due to sleep issues of an evening, I would ask the parents to kick-start the new routine over the weekend, or the time he isn't with you. The parent can then decide if it's working ok or if he needs a much smaller nap (40 mins) to keep him going until bedtime. It's a very tricky time with nap dropping as some children only adapt to the loss of a nap over a period of time, and not going cold turkey, which I don't feel is any good for a child. Also, I found in the early weeks of a child dropping their nap, they are exhaused by tea time and they're really hard to keep awake (which is ok when they are home and in PJ's), but some children don't leave their childcare until 6pm. Hope you can work through the change without too much of a problem.

I don't think that reminding practitioners that the rights of the child should be at the heart of their practice is hysterical

Oh blimey, some slightly hysterical responses here. Cruel? Against the UN convention on children's rights?! Look, some kids actually DO sleep better without a nap and I think it's up to a parent to decide whether their child falls into that category. My DD dropped her nap at that sort of age. I didn't want her to and persisted with it for as long as possible, but for some wierd reason even 30 minutes daytime sleep seems to knock around 2 hours off her night time sleep resulting in a permanently miserable and exhausted little girl. Since I stopped her napping altogether she does a solid 12 hours every night and is much happier.

I don't think it's unfair or cruel of the child's parent to ask you to try this as a solution to their sleep problem.

I DO appreciate though (as a childminder) how hard it is if you have to get out with the 2 year old in the buggy so they then fall asleep and if they are so tired and grumpy that it makes it hard or impossible to do your job. I'd give it a good try for a week and see how it goes.