Our 21 Month old doesn’t have a set bedtime and has never had set nap times AMA

[ToddlerMama27]

Our 21 Month old doesn’t have a set bedtime and has never had set nap times AMA

My 3 didn’t either. It worked for my family.

So you let your child sleep when they're tired? I'm not sure this is as ground breaking as you think it is..

I just book toddler classes (baby classes when he was younger) and he can sleep on the way there or on the way back if he wants to 🤷‍♀️
Days out are easy too as he can sleep on the way there or back or during if he wants/needs to

🤣🤣 I'm still trying to figure out what you think you have discovered? You are a stay at home parent who lets their child nap when they need to. They sleep well at night as you have no fixed bedtime. You take your child to toddler classes. I feel I've missed something!

Same here, I didn't think this was massively unusual? My little boy is 20 months. He has quite a late bedtime regardless of how long he naps and when. Occasionally we get an earlier bedtime and get to watch a bit of TV! 🙃

Id struggle to see how it doesn’t make a difference unless you and your DC are up and out the house by 7:30 or 8am every morning, which is usual for the DC of 2 working parents. Of course flexibility at bedtime and nap time is easier if you can entirely run to your own schedule.

I’ve read things about having to go home when it’s nap time ect. and I just don’t get it 🤷‍♀️ Prams and car seats and for naps here 🤷‍♀️😂

All babies are different. I was lucky and both of mine slept on the go (although they were terrible night sleepers) but some babies need a set routine and to sleep in a cot etc.

The difference it makes is that with no SAHP you have to get them up at a set time for childcare.

Mine are 16, 14, 13, 3 and 2! Never have I done routines, they are too restrictive.
I don't have to rush home for nap times and can enjoy days out, go about my business, they have or do sleep in buggy or car when out and about.
We can enjoy holidays, including evening entertainment. The big ones can attend evening clubs abs still be picked up.
I don't think they'd ever have or will fit my lifestyle

This sounds quite smug. What you actually mean is like the OP you got lucky and your children all slept on the go or in the car. If you'd ended up with one that didn't you'd soon be singing a different tune.

I appreciate some people may like the excuse to go home for nap time but most parents of children who hold nap time at home in their coat sacred do so because naff all else worked. Although even that didn't work for my DS. However I'm not foolish enough to think he's like he is because I didn't expect him to fit in and just roll with my routine.

Tbh it's really easy for people to say they didn't need a routine for their kids, until they have a child who absolutely needs a routine.

All kids are different, and some very much need and thrive from having a routine.

@MuffinToSeeHere no my youngest and 2nd oldest were dreadful sleepers. Youngest still is but if I had to rush home, it would have too much impact on the rest.
I'm not meaning to be smug, just saying routine doesn't work for us.

So what did you do with the 2 dreadful sleepers because trust me no amount of having to rush around and pick other kids up or be elsewhere would have led to them sleeping on the go.

Did you just put them in the pram and let them scream as they were overtired? I don't mean it to sound harsh but if your kids slept on the go they weren't bad sleepers.

Mine never had a routine. My eldest slept when he saw fit which meant rarely. My youngest can sleep on a chickens lip. You could go anywhere at any time and he'd have still have had 12 hours sleep somehow

Erm...this!

Are you going to answer this OP?

I'm interested too

I didn't have 'set' times for naps or bedtime, like this poster says. But as they were little children, they fell asleep around 7 - 8. It wasn't that set, just what they did & a routine formed around them.

I'm curious as to what your 'no routine' really looks like.

@MuffinToSeeHere yes sometimes that had to happen. If I'm driving for a few hours, have appointments to attend or school pick ups or after school activities then yes it did have to happen.
Same as on an evening. I can't tell my older ones they can't do anything after 7pm, as my little ones need to be in bed, that's just not fair.

I was the same with my son. Do you think what you are doing is really unusual? Am a bit puzzled by the thread. I've never done routines and do naps when children seem tired and bedtime after we finish dinner which varies.

Is child dependent what works - with my DD she sleeps much better at home so on the go naps aren't so great for her.
Although she doesn't have set times either.

Of course it makes a difference.

Mine has to be at nursery by 8 at the latest every morning so we can start work on time. That means he needs to be awake by 7 so he's in bed at 7 every night to ensure he gets enough sleep.

Of course it's easier to go with the flow when someone is at home with the baby and you don't need them up, awake, fed and dressed by certain times so you can work.

My first was like this. We enjoyed lots of sunsets on the beach from a young age, dinners out etc.

My current toddler… he has to have his dinner at 6pm and then he will point blank refuse to do anything other than bath and into my bed. I find this way more frustrating as he isn’t actually tired yet and I would rather take him out to tire him out but he just screams. He’s like a little old man set in his ways already and he’s only 18 months.

Mine have never had set bedtimes either and I never thought of daytime sleeps as “naps” per se, but just did normal life with my dc with me, and sometimes they fell asleep.

Please note, this does NOT mean they were or are good sleepers, one in particular did not sleep through for many years and none of my DC have ever slept in a pram/pushchair when out somewhere.

I was never a SAHP and all of the above comes from the fact that I had to be up and out and at work or equivalent with very little babies, and then I couldn’t be pinned down the rest of the time or I’d have gone mad.

My sons been in a routine since 6 weeks. Babies thrive on a routine

@InTheFutilityRoomEatingBiscuits this is exactly like me.

This is me too. We started at 2 weeks. Love a routine.

Is this that unusual? My 4 and 5 year old have never had set bedtimes and set nap times.
My kids go to sleep anywhere from 7pm to 9pm depending on how tired they are and whether they've slept in the day (they sometimes sleep in the day if they've been in the car).
They get up between 7 and 8 every day. The 5 year old gets up earlier than the 4 year old and is sometimes awake from between 6 and 7 but he stays in his room until his clock colour changes. Clock changes at 7:15 for school.
Nap times were basically whenever they were tired and it fitted with our day. Sometimes it would be after we had been out somewhere and they would fall asleep in the car and then I'd transfer them to their beds. My 4 year old still often falls asleep if he's been in the car after around 2pm. He now just gets transferred to the sofa rather than his bed.
I can't understand why anyone would have set times for naps and bedtime. Our friends/family that are like this are so restricted by their kids routines. They can never just stay out a bit late or go out at certain times of the day. We find we're always the ones agreeing to their schedules so we can see them.
We've had "routines" for nap and bedtime since they were tiny. So they knew that when we went upstairs, did PJ's, teeth, story then it was bedtime. They've always gone to sleep easily.
Ds2 did have some sleep issues until 18months but that was frequent waking and needing to feed back to sleep rather than struggling to go to sleep in the first place. Ds1 has always been an excellent sleeper.