To stop my 2.2 year old from sleeping in the day?

[ThermalMittens]

I think he's too young to drop his daytime nap, and it's quite difficult to stop him from falling asleep around 1ish, but when he naps he just will NOT go to sleep at night, until 9-9.30pm. With no nap he's in bed by 7-7.30 at the latest. No matter what time he goes to sleep, he wakes up around 7am.

I'm feeling fairly conflicted...I can see he gets tired in the day, and I feel guilty for stopping him from napping. But the bedtimes are killing me. And with DS2 due in a couple of months, long naps and drawn-out, late bedtimes will become even less sustainable.

Gah, guilt. Am I being U/selfish from stopping him napping?

yanbu, we stopped putting dc2 actively down for a nap around that age.
we do have some quiet time after lunch, watching tv or reading books. about once a week she would sleep but I would wake her after 20 min or there would be a late night.

Try lying him on the couch with a blanket to sleep and just get on with stuff arpubd him - if he is that tired he will sleep, and the hustle and bustle may well stop him havibg too long or deep a sleep.

Or, wake him after two hours for a couple of days, then wake him at 1.45 for a cpuple of days, 1.30 for a couple of days and so on til he gets to a nap.length that suits.

I do long and short naps on alternative days.

Not that young to drop the nap necessarily. They are all different Ds1 dropped his at around this age. Personally I would rather have the dc in bed at a reasonable hour at night, but I know others who don't mind them being up in the evening. Every other day could work as others have suggested, or waking him up after a short time.

Can you not just let him sleep for an hour then go and wake him up?

Ds napped every day until he was 4 but went to bed at 7.30 -8pm