How to prepare baby for nursery naps

[Hann376]

Baby will start nursery at 1 year and currently (6mo) contact naps / feeds to sleep / naps in moving pram.

nursery have said they will sit with babies and help them sleep with patting/shhing if needed but this feels like such a big change for my baby and I’m worried they’ll get too upset and nursery workers won’t respond quickly enough to soothe them / pick them up and they will essentially just leave baby to cry / sleep train them for naps.

i know a lot of people say babies nap fine at nursery even if they don’t at home but is this just because they are left to cry to sleep?

and yes I know a lot of people wouldn’t see a problem with that but I try to be such a responsive parent and pick my baby up everytime they cry so I hate the thought of her not getting this support in nursery :(

My daughter always was & still is a contact napper at home, but sleeps absolutely fine in the crib at nursery (sometimes for 2 hours, which she would never do for me😂) and I didn’t really do anything to prep her for that other than sending her in with her little stuffy that smells like me so she cuddles into that.

All you can do is speak to the nursery and go by what they say. The reality is though that it is different at nursery to being with you 24/7, not just for sleep but for everything, when it’s just you & baby of course you respond instantly, they are your one and only priority, but that isn’t the case at nursery, the staff may have 2/3 children each to cope with. The only way around that would be for you to hire a 121 childminder x

I’m worried they’ll get too upset and nursery workers won’t respond quickly enough to soothe them / pick them up and they will essentially just leave baby to cry / sleep train them for naps.
I try to be such a responsive parent and pick my baby up everytime they cry so I hate the thought of her not getting this support in nursery.

Let nursery handle it. They have tried it
before. Baby will settle at naptime.
If you don't trust the nursery to care well enough for your child choose another nursery/CM or keep baby at home.
Don't expect 1:1 support the same level as yours 100% of the time. It's simply not possible.

So much will change in the next six months. Just because they contact nap now, doesn’t mean they will in September.

I found nursery actually solved a lot of our sleep problems, as they created a routine which my child fell into, and we could use at home too. They were much better at that than us!

Honestly don’t worry about this, nursery workers can work miracles in my opinion! Babies adapt pretty quickly to the nursery routine. Just do what you do at home as normal, and everything will fall into place at nursery.

I’ve had 2 babies in nursery and have never seen any kids being left to cry themselves to sleep. In the baby room I would often see staff members holding a baby for their nap while also playing with another baby on the floor. Send in a comforter or their own sleeping bag or blanket from home, even white noise if they use that. Our nursery was happy to stick to our routine initially as then as they got to know our babies they transitioned them to their own routine. They always slept brilliantly.

Honestly don't worry about prepping them for nursery. I found not matter if they are contact nappers or independent nappers at home, nursery can be a whole different ball game. Mine dropped to 1 nap at 11 months (both DC). It was hard to transisition but they got use to it.

No nursery will just let them cry to sleep. It comes across a bit of you don't trust the nursery. I think you need to find a nursery that you are happy with and trust to respond to your child in the appropriate way.

Still lots of time for baby to nap differently before nursery!

What I can say is there is no way (at my DS nursery anyway) they just leave them to cry to sleep - when he first started he was in a cot room within the baby room. There may have already been other babies in there asleep when he went for a nap, so they wouldn't leave him to cry at risk of unnecessarily unsettling the other already asleep babies!

They always just shhh and patted his pat to help him to go off to sleep, however he did already go to sleep independently for naps at home, so it was never much of an issue.

He's 16 months and just transitioned from sleeping in the cot room to on a mat with the other older babies/toddlers and is doing just fine still.

Nursery workers have seen it all before and will help support your bub if needed.

Nursery will pat them, rub their back or rock them on a mat, yes they will probably cry and not be picked up as you would at home but they are unlikely to leave them alone to cry it out.

The best thing you can do is make sure your baby has props and comforters they can take from home to nursery to ease the transition - dummy, muslin, comforter etc. Anything the nursery staff can easily give them or put in their cot.
White noise or music isn't so helpful as other babies won't have it on.

Personally I would definitely get your baby used to being patted and shushed to sleep in a cot or even just not in your arms or being fed. Nursery staff absolutely can do it for you but I think it's nicer for babies to learn some independent sleep at home in a safe and familiar place than have to start childcare, meet all these new people and sleep train all at the same time.

It’s way too early to worry about this now as a lot can change between 6 and 12 months.

Mine contact napped until 9 months and still needed cuddling to go to sleep if not in the pram (and still does at 2.5 years!) but has slept fine at nursery.

It’s likely your baby will settle for naps a lot better at nursery than at home. Mine both did/do, they contact napped right until they went to nursery then napped fine in the cribs there. But you do have to get used to the idea that nursery won’t be able to respond immediately every time your baby cries, they will have a room of babies and don’t have 1 to 1 staff. They won’t leave to cry for ages and won’t sleep train like that but there will be times they can’t respond immediately. You’d need a nanny instead if you want that.

Thank you :) a nanny would be ideal but too expensive unfortunately haha

Between and and then start putting baby into their cot or pram just at the point they are almost asleep but still aware. Then finish them off getting to sleep by just being there, rubbing their back or hand so they learn to sleep in bed rather than on you. You will likely get more protest than the nursery staff but it sets the scene that bed is where we drop off.