When to drop afternoon nap?

[SheldorAFK]

Dd is 2 and yesterday massively resisted her usual 2.5 hr afternoon nap. Lots of crying. Eventually we got her up but she was cranky all afternoon.

She usually does 12.30-2.30pm, sometimes til 3pm, but lately her night sleep has gone from 7pm-5am with 2-3 wakings in between. Tried cutting her nap back but made no difference.

S she ready to drop the nap. Seems very early and yesterday afternoon was hell, she was so tired, plus she's still waking at 5am.

When you say she's 2 - is that just 2 or closer to 3?

(Just saw you on another thread by the way. Big hugs. You're having a really tough time).

I think they usually drop their nap slowly rather than all of a sudden. DS3 dropped his at about 20 months but previously it had only been for half an hour and he was then up until 10pm. Is there a chance she is either unwell or teething rather than needs to drop her nap?

She's not ready. When they are ready, it won't be a sudden thing. It will likely be a gradual reduction in the duration or longer to take to drift off. Or it affects when they go to bed for the night i.e. takes longer to drift off.
My ds went through similar patches. I persisted. He's now 3.2 and still naps most days for at least an hour and bed at 7. My lifeline!
Try and introduce something different to the afternoon nap i.e. maybe one plain biscuit that may be eaten as you read one book?

sock she's 21 months, so not quite 2 yet.

Thank you all, yes she does seem very young to not nap. sock thank you...things are rough at the moment.

this yes is is both unwell with a cold and teething at the moment so guessing that's the reason?

My daughter did stop suddenly at 2.5. Would do story, milk and sleeping bag ok and then just want to get straight up. After several days of this I realised she wanted to give up naps! About a week of adjusting and the odd nap if we were in the car and that was it.

I missed it!

There's no right time as such. Ds napped until he went to school, not everyday but half the week at least. He's always been an early riser though.
I'd probably just go with the flow at this age rather than trying to stick to regimented naps.

Okay, thank you all for the advice. Going to try again today when she gets back from nursery and see what happens.

DS started out on 4 short naps a day he's 19 months and doesn't sleep now at all. Each time I found he would resist the naps and when he did go to sleep bedtime would be a fight and his night sleep would suffer, so i would stop letting him nap first it was his late afternoon nap then early morning then late morning and we have just dropped the after lunch nap a few weeks ago it takes him a week or 2 to adjust each time and can be a super grump for a week.

I don't know if not letting him sleep would work since she has one long nap DS was only sleeping 40 mins a day so it wasn't such a shock for him, He does get a rest at about 2 where he will chill out on the sofa watching TV with some milk for 30 mins or so without that re change he'd be a crying mess

DD did that in phases (3 or 4 days of nap refusal, then back to normal). When she did actually drop the nap for good, it was over a period of about 2 months - napping 2 in 3 days, then every other day, then every third day, then twice a week, until we realised that not napping was the norm. She had definitely given up before she started nursery on her 2nd birthday (only napped there 4 times in 2 years!), but I couldn't say for sure how old she was.

DS, otoh, is still trying to get in two short naps a day at 19m. Total PITA. And yes, he wakes up before 5 as well.