To think I won't need to plan our lives around naps?

[AnUnoriginalUsername]

We have a 7 week old baby. Just saw another thread and though "shit, nap schedules!"
Does everybody have set times and places for naps? Is it really important?
DS currently sleeps mostly on me but also in his rocking chair and sometimes in his cot. We cosleep.

Am I being insane to think he can just nap when he's tired wherever we are?

DS would just need to look at a car seat or pram or cot and nod off. Huge afternoon naps where I'd worry that he'd never sleep that evening (he did).
DD was incredibly stimulated by movement and needed darkness, her cot and silence. And never napped longer than 45 minutes.

Down to the individual child.

It depends how n your baby but also on opportunity. If you are heavily involved in school runs for example, the baby has to slot in.

It just depends, sometimes you really want to do something that clashes with a nap and you know it will wreck the evening but it's still worth it so you crack on.

Nope. It was never worth it with my two! There was nothing I wanted to do that much that I couldnt easily fit around our routine. The routine fitted into the school run which wasn't flexible either, so it was a no brainer to prioritise it.

We stick to the nap routine. You might not care now but everyone in our house is significantly happier when the 2yo has her nap, we get a break abs the older one gets some 1:1 time without a destructive toddler getting involved in her stuff. It is a comparatively short period of time that it’s a pain. I found it quite restrictive when both of mine were on two naps but once they went to one nap the rhythm of taking a beak after lunch just works well for us.

I had the same routine for all 4DC, and maintain it now during school holidays.

Out the door after breakfast. Have a great morning, and nap/quiet time after lunch.

My youngest is now 6, so we can finally go for whole day adventures if we want but DC are perfectly used to a bit of quiet time in the afternoon (and I get to chill).

I thought the same as you but my DD completely disagreed. My friend’s second baby will nap anywhere tho. Literally anywhere! It’s a wait and see.

I did what you do OP. Never had a nap schedule. Never organised my life around my DC's day time sleeping. Just let them sleep on the buggy if we were out. Worked well then.

They are the world's worst sleepers now they are all in primary school.

You get to a point where if they don't nap, they fall asleep in their dinner then won't go to sleep at night. It can be torture because they still wake up at 5am. Routine works best.

you can do pretty much anything with your first.
I didn't bother trying to set a routine because I'm naturally shit at that.

I was up when he was up, I slept when he slept.
I made the mistake of listening to some judgey twat when he was 8m old and let him cry it out at bed time for 2 nights in a row.
it was a total disaster, I regretted every horrific second and never ever did anything like that again with him or any of the others.
he'd wake up at 9 or 10am, have one or two naps and go to bed at midnight when he was 1.
this worked for us and he still had 14-16 hours of sleep/day.

so do whatever you want, whatever suits you/baby/lifestyle.

if/when you have a second your first will have a routine by then so new baby will have to slot into existing time table. there will be less wriggle room.
so make the most of having the freedom to do whatever you want!

I have to say that I do. But that's because, for me, there's nothing worse than an overtired child (discovered that quite quickly!). When mine are well rested they are generally happy and content and when they're tired they're the opposite! They both nap / napped well in their own beds so I do stick to being at home for nap times. I do sometimes cut naps short or manipulate morning wake ups etc... to fit nap time around plans and generally, doing this once in a while has been fine as long as I let them make up the sleep later and get back on routine the next day. For me, it's to totally worth it. I have two great sleepers and I do think a good nap routine has helped with that.

It’ll depend on what sort of baby he is and what he gets used to. Some nap everywhere; some need it quiet and dark.

My DS put himself in to his own routine which I just went with, but he only ever napped in his pram, cot or Moses basket.

Some babies will sleep anywhere...my DD however only ever slept in her cot in a dark room, that's it, not on me, not in the car, not in the pram, it didn't matter how young she was / how long she'd been awake / how long she'd slept etc etc, that was it. At 9 months old I was at my mother's trying to get her to sleep, she ended up in her pram watching the entire Wizard of Oz film.
After that there was one person (mother....) that would back me up when I insisted that no, actually she wouldn't sleep if I tried x,y,z.

Moral of that story is, if your kid is going to want a specific nap schedule then it's going to have one regardless of your thoughts on the matter 😂

Mine were (and still are) great sleepers - I loved nap time as they slept for 2.5 hours every day so I had that time to myself. Every morning we did something (playgroup type things/ music group etc), then lunch and long nap. It worked well for us and I love a routine. They are now teens and have never had trouble sleeping. My (completely made up) theory is that they learned young that sleep is important and thus prioritised. (Or maybe they take after me as I love sleeping too 😅)

@PandasCatsWolves

I'm laughing at the posts here.

The "I'm so laid back- my baby just nods off when he needs it" camp - clearly never had the kind of baby that leads to insanity!

LOL yes. If I'd never had my oldest I'd probably have been one of the 'I'm so laid back' team. My second and third were pretty easy.

But no, oldest screamed for hours every evening unless she'd had her scheduled naps during the day. Broke my heart until I worked out that what she needed was a schedule.

It depends on the baby and your expectations, as well as whether you need or want to do anything else while he naps (eg shower, read a book, rest) to make your own life easier. Right now it suits your life to have him nap wherever whenever, but that can change - for example when he’s too big to comfortably sleep on you or when you want to do things while he sleeps or if he just hasn’t napped and you need to do something but he gets overtired and upset as a result. If you need other people to care for him it can also cause problems and as he gets older he may not sleep for long enough to be well rested if he is just dropping off wherever. He may also end up overtired/fighting naps.

But none of that is really a problem unless it becomes a problem - you can change things when you need to, it may just be a bit more challenging and take more work to change his sleep habits if he’s used to dropping off on you/wherever. Do what works for you both. For what it’s worth, my ds1 was 100% a routine baby and napped in his cot like a dream so I had loads of time to read, rest etc from around 7 weeks (he did 1.5hrs in the morning, 2hrs at lunch and about an hour later in the day until 6 months and had 3-hour naps until he was 3.5!). He could also sleep for 1-2 hrs in his pram if we were somewhere with consistent noise or out for a long walk. Ds2 preferred multiple shorter naps - nothing more than 30 mins until he was 6 months and then gradually did longer naps. If we were home his naps were always in his cot once he was over around 8 weeks as I needed to play with his brother and get stuff done (or just have some alone time!). I didn’t want to have to stop every time he needed a quick nap. He did nap in his pram but not for as long as his brother. He could nap for England in his sling though, but that required me or his dad to be walking around which wasn’t always an attractive option.

Mine always napped in the pram, which worked well for us. We went everywhere on foot/bus, and there were groups we could go to most days, so she'd fall asleep on the way home, and on other days a trip to the shops would suffice. It did mean that there wasn't a problem if we were away from home or anything, When she got older, she would only nap if the pushchair (by then) was on the bus - she was down to only needing a nap about once a week by then, so if we hadn't been anywhere by Friday we'd do a return trip to the next village!

No I don't. I've only met a few
Parents like this and they're usually stressed.

3 kids and they napped when they wanted. Sometimes in a cot but more often in the pushchair.
I found the parents that had a routine were quite uptight and restricted to when they could go out.

Mine would nap wherever we happened to be. I had a friend who never left the house or had nights out on holiday as her kids routine was so regimented

We got ours napping in pram and often enjoyed lunch relaxed lunch out. The parents with the nap schedule were stressed as another poster just said.

DS napped at pretty much the same time every day, with a routine that evolved over 3.5 years, but slept anywhere.

DD barely slept, anytime, anywhere.

@hulahooper2

Mine would nap wherever we happened to be. I had a friend who never left the house or had nights out on holiday as her kids routine was so regimented

Weird, my first had a regimented nap schedule and we left the house every day, and had some great nights out on holiday, and indeed when not on holiday. In fact the best thing about her nap schedule was that we could guarantee she'd be asleep by 7.15pm, so we'd get in someone to sit downstairs and watch TV while we went out.

No, but when DS was a toddler I knew when he needed a nap by before he got overtired and hellish. I wouldn't plan around a particular time, but it was a case of need to be back by x time. When he was a baby he slept in the pram, sling or wherever we were. Didn't bother to book babygroups for late morning though as knew he'd be asleep

@Notavegan

We got ours napping in pram and often enjoyed lunch relaxed lunch out. The parents with the nap schedule were stressed as another poster just said.

Possibly they were stressed because they know what happens to their child without the routine though. If you have a 'happy sleeper' then you don't tend to get stressed.

Once made the mistake of making a short trip in the car at post lunch nap time with DN2. I was quite relaxed about it at the time. Never. Again. Bunch then home in plenty of time for nap or lunch out with nap or long journey doable. But long nap at home definitely preferable for stress free afternoons and evenings.

5 kids, none have ever had a nap schedule. If they fall asleep, they fall asleep. I was sick of hearing of people who were fighting to get their toddler down for a nap after lunch. Seemed too much hassle to me. If they have a late nap, they just go to bed later.

My 2 year old often doesn't go to bed until after 10pm and I've been slated for it on here, but it works for us. Once they grow out of needing a nap in the day and are old enough to understand they need to stay in bed, then they'll get a proper bedtime.