afternoon naps for a 2yr old - good or bad idea?

[StripyMouse]

I have a 2 yr old DD with appalling sleeping patterns and we are now nearly at the end of our tether with it. I am starting to wonder if she is over tired and would benefit from an afternoon nap - but how on earth do you implement this? I have tried the usual approach - busy morning, lunch, quietening her down with a story and curtains closed etc. but with no success. Difficulty is that she is often over tired by early eve. and will drop off often by 5pm not waking for her dinner for any amount of persuasion, only to wake up at about 8.30pm full of beans until midnight, snacking on a small amount of food if parent pressure is strong enough to get her to stop running around for 2 mins! To make it worse she is in the awful habit of coming into our room and bed halfway through the night and staying there until very early morning when she is full of life again wanting to play by 6.30am AAAAGH. The sleep she gets in our bed (and hers for the first few hours of being there at all) is terrible (as is ours)- constantly waking up and wriggling, demaning a drink etc. She used to be great until we moved house and was forced to have her sleep in our room for 6 months while essential work was done on the house. At this point she learnt to get out of her cot and get into our bed often without us noticing. She is so strong willed and stubborn that the usual methods of returning her to her room is still not working despite several weeks of consistent effort - she gets more and more upset and determined not to fall asleep that night time is just a total mess of tears and sleeplessness f followed by odd pockets of snatched sleep. She isn?t ill or teething, not over heating and a happy secure girl during the day...Sorry this is long and rambling, if you have been bothered to read this much so far - thank you and hope you have some advice....

Sounds to me like you are doing all the right things. What time is she up in the morning - is it worth waking her at 07h00 in the hopes that she will then be tired by lunchtime?

go to sleep with her at lunchtime - pin her down with you. 2 year olds definitely need a sleep

It sounds to me like you know the answers but just need to implement them.

ps 6 30 am is the norm I would say..

ps I would not run araound trying to get her to eat. She eats at the table or goes hungry.

Agree with the eating at the table codswallop - eating on the run isn't really ideal is it!? Stripeymouse -perhaps eating at the table would also calm her down a bit more before her sleep?

My dd is 2.5 and still has a nap. I find she is too irritable otherwise. She doesn't really want to sometimes but I put her to bed and promise that if she has a little sleep we will do something nice afterwards (bribery). She has also got a stair gate on her bedroom door so she can't get out. I find that she will go off eventually. I would keep trying for a bit yet before you give up, I think you are being tested! We went through an unsettled phase and it took about 2 weeks to get her back into it but as I am now 40 weeks pregnant I was determined!

I had a similar problem to this with my dd2, then 2 1/2 ish (now 3). And getting a regular nap pattern back again really helped. It was like her lunch sleep induced more sleep at night. My dd2 has never napped in her bed (despite my trying) she would always go off if I rocked her for 5 mins or so in the buggy.Then she'd have 1-1 1/2 hrs at lunch and still go off at 7/7.30. Would your dd sleep in a buggy? HTH, good luck, trust me, I know how it feels!

you know the answer... you need a routine.
definitely a nap, absolutely eat food at the time it is offered (5.30 or so) and nothing offered later, bed at the time you decide (7pm?) and no questions. If she is in a bed you need to put her back in a cot so she can't escape at naptime and bedtime.
you also need to explain all of this to her as you do it - and reasons why - even at 2 they understand an awful lot. something like "from tomorrow we are going to have different rules. we are going to have a nap after lunch every day, you are going to sleep in your cot by yourself like a good girl and can have a cuddle in bed with me when it is morning and not nightime, and we are going to start tomorrow". and perhaps combine all of this with a star chart - star for nap, star for supper, start for going to sleep well and not waking in the night - and reward for three stars. of the chocolate variety probably.
it will be a nightmare for about 3 days and then your life will be immeasurably easier! good luck!

I was wondering if the star chart might help - I have seen them mentioned on other threads (though I haven't tried them myself). Do you think your daughter would respond to this?

My dd is 3.5 a still has the occasional nap/rest, 2 or 3 times a week. If she gets too exhausted she wont sleep at night. I get ds (21 mo) off to sleep and then put a video on and lie on couch with her - I am the one who usually benefits most from an afternoon nap(!). Sometime she doesn't sleep but an hours quiet time is what she needs.

If I let her fall asleep at 5 o'clock she is a nightmare like your dd Stripymouse. If she hasn't had time for a rest and is absolutley knackered I let her use the computer or if I feel up to it make cakes. Then let her fall asleep after 6 o'clock for the night.

To stop her falling asleep late afternoon you could also give her a bath about 4 o'clock or an early tea if she wont eat when she is really tired.
HTH

good tips RR

I agree with princesspeaheads post (great name!) - 2 year olds really do understand alot and just by you setting the rules and sticking to them you will feel more in control of the situation and she will get the message - it will probably be really hard for a few days but stick with it.

You may need to comprimise a bit and stay with her for the afternoon nap - and even if she doesn't sleep, a bit of winding down in the dark with no stimulation would probably do her the world of good. My ds really needed a nap till he was nearly 3 and he still falls asleep in the car if we go out on some days.

There is a really good book called 'is my child overtired' by this american paediatrician which may be worth a quick read.

I am very strict about my 2 year old's afternoon nap - he always goes to bed after lunch (doesn't matter if lunch is early or late!) and sleeps for 2-3 hours - and still goes to bed at 7pm (even if he only wakes at 5pm - like today!) - he always has a busy morning - playgroup, swimming or similar and then I insist on the afternoon nap even though it means I can't go out in the afternoons - but that suits me!! Friends laugh at me, but I am relaxed & so is DS!!

Ds tried to abandon his afternoon sleep when we moved him from a cot to a bed at about 2 years old. We put a stair gate (as someone has laready mentioned) on his door so he could see out but couldn't get out. I kept explaining to him that he needed to have a rest (somehow he thought that was better than a sleep!) and that we would play fave game/have milkshake/watch Bob the Builder etc after he had rested. It did take a few days to get him back to sleeping (a few hellish days!) but it was worth it in the end. Ds is now 4 and still has a "rest" most afternoons when he is at home with me (4 days each week). On most of these days he does actually sleep (about 3 hours, usually) but even if he doesn't he can sit quietly in his room from 2:30-5:00pm and play with his toys/read/do puzzles etc. This gives him some quiet time away from me and his little sister and gives me a break as well. Afterwards we are all rejuvenated and mummy gets to keep her sanity!

Good luck with it!

Chelle ... just wondering ... isn't 2.30 to 5pm rather a long time for a small child to play on their own in their room? Does he have to stay there for that long or is it up to him?

Like Lindy I was very strict about day time naps with my DS ... always had 2+ hours per day ... that is until he was 2 and a half and it took him longer and longer to go to sleep at bedtime. By the time he was going to bed at 7pm but not going to sleep until 9 or 10 we knocked the daytime naps on the head.
StripyMouse ... I think that if your DD is too tired by 5pm to carry on until bedtime she DEFINITELY needs a nap. I think the advice given so far is good ... (I also used to lie down with DS once he was in a bed and could get out ... it really works ... I used to pretend to go to sleep ... DS would doze off and then I would get up and have 'me time' or sometimes I would fall asleep too and DS and I would have a cosy 2 hours together )
Having said all of that I can't claim to be an expert having recently started a thread about my son's appalling middle of the night antics!!!!
Hope you get some joy soon!!!

Thanks to all of you who have responded - so many sensible ideas and suggestions. There is plenty of food for thought here and from all your responses I think that the afternoon nap must be the way to start a better routine. I am going to try the idea of napping with her in the afternoon - sounds so sensible I don?t know why I haven?t done this before (well, I do actually - I always saw it as valuable ironing/tidying/cooking time but can see that my sleep has to take priority at the moment as I am so exhausted...)
If I am really honest, I am dreading starting to enforce a routine as it is going to be very tough - she is unbelievably stubborn and has a stronger will than me, probably why we have found excuses to put it off - illness etc. However, I can see that we just can?t go on like we are doing for any longer as it is putting strain on all of us. It is amazing what a vicious circle this is - the more tired we all get, the more we need a routine and yet the harder it becomes to stay firm and consistent and keep her in her bed/out of ours...
Thanks again - nice to know that we aren?t the only ones having gone through this. (TBH I feel like a real wimpy parent at the mo as I have such strong rules, standards and routines for DD in most areas of her life and yet am completely all of the place with this one.)Will let you know how I get on with the afternoon nap routine and how it affects the evening pattern...

Stripymouse a trick that works with DS (although we have nothing like your problems with him) is to prepare him for it eg we'll feed the fish then its sleep time. The promise of something afterwards (as mentioned by others) as the effect of making him less likely to sleep...

Good idea Bozza but not sure how effective it would be for us- we have been doing bathtime followed by two stories in bed and lights out as a general evening routine . The problem has been that she is a clever little monkey and has worked out that bathtime means staying upstairs and going straight to her bed afterwards so is reluctant to get into the bath at all anymore - even the promise of stories isn?t enough to encourage her.

I must admit that I am so tired and emotional about it all now (partly due to pregnancy hormones) that I am ready to give anything a go. Life coping with her feels harder now than those first few weeks of pure exhaustion after she was born. DH was so frustrated last night that he seriously lost his temper with her- first time ever. I was stunned when he shouted at her to lie down and shut up. She was fine and didn?t seem to be upset by it - but I was and so was he. It took him several hours to cool down and a tub of Haagen Daz to calm him down enough to admit that he felt terrible about shouting and had just had enough. Not what I needed at the time as the eve was tricky enough with her misbehaving... AAAAGH. Maybe today will be better - just off to make her lunch and wind her down ready for an enforced nap....
sorry for going on and on - as you can see I just need to get it all off my chest so that I don?t let it all bottle up and get out of control.

Oh dear Stripymouse it does sound tough. i wouldn't worry too much about your DH losing his temper - it must be getting to all of you. We have a similar thing at bedtime and I have noticed DS trying stalling tactics before his bath (even to the extent of tidying every last toy away).

I just posted the previous post because I've found that if I say that he has to have a nap and then we'll go to the park - he gets so hooked on the idea of the park he won't go to bed. Are you planning on napping with her today? If so, enjoy.

I would start tackling the bit that's easiest, adn I think that I would physically prevent her going to sleep at 5pm! I take ds for a walk, to the park, put him in the bath - anything to keep him going if he is tired. There is no way he'll sleep until 7.30pm! I would bounce her up and down - whatever it took. If ds had a three hour sleep at 5pm there is NO WAY he'd got to bed until late either.

This is going to sound awful - but the only way I can get my DS to sleep during the day is to strap him down! Seriously though, that only means putting him in a buggy or his carseat, and then the movement is usually enough to get him to drop off.

Princesspeahead - unfortunately if the reason you put them in a bed is that they could climb out a cot (and mine could do it even in a grobag), then just putting them back in a cot isn't really going to help matters.

I'm the same Gill W. The only way to get DD off for the day time nap she needs is to take a drive in the car. I don't have to kid her that we're going somewhere, I just say "shall we go for a drive so you can fall asleep?". In fact it has always been like this. Even at night time when she is shattered she can take an hour to fall asleep - luckily she is still "contained" in her cot though.
If for any reason she doesn't have a nap she too is ready to flake out at 5pm but, like Aloha said, I put every effort into keeping her awake until bed time.