Bedtime routine 1 year old

[TheGirlAtTheRockShow]

Something has to change with DD's bedtime routine but I'm not sure what. We haven't changed what we do, but she is refusing to sleep til 8.30/9pm, waking for the day between 6 and 7am, still tired! She used to go to sleep at 7pm.
Bed time is:
6.00 bath
6.20 massage
6.30 breastfeed to sleep then into bed.

She isn't falling asleep any more, she'll feed then wake up. I've tried rocking her, putting her in the cot etc. I put her down, she screams. I rock her and she just wants to play. DH tries - she screams till I go in.

Please talk me through your routines at 1, so I can see what could change. I'm fed up of being in a darkened room for 2 hours every evening!

I had this with my DS around that age. Turns out he was just ready for one nap per day. We started doing that and he falls asleep easily at 7pm and quickly extended his nap to 1.30-2hrs. Occasionally if he has had a busy day and we are in the car late, he will fall asleep for a 2nd nap, but won't go to bed until 9pm. However, this is maybe only once a week so we just deal with that. Could this be the issue for your LO?

She's only had one nap a day for about a month or so, this not falling asleep till 9 every day is for the last 2 weeks. We found before that if she had two naps she'd not fall asleep till late. Started only letting her have 1 nap and fixed the issue. Only for it to come back!

I was going to say adjust the napping to once a day but if she's already doing that I'm not sure! What time does she usually wake from her nap at? My DD has just turned one and seems to be transitioning from 2 naps to one, but I have to wake her about 3ish else she won't sleep later on.if she naps earlier then I'm not sure!

Maybe after 1 big nap in the afternoon come 6pm she's not ready for bed. Try and encourage more play til 6.30/7 and start your bedtime routine then see what happens

Sorry, I typed a post last.Might, but it didn't post! She's not napping in the afternoon, she has one nap in the morning, generally 10-11.30 or 11-1.30. We stopped afternoon naps about a month ago, she's been difficult to settle in the evenings for 2 weeks. She's tired at 6 - grumpy, yawning, rubbing eyes. She appears to fall asleep during her feed but wakes up when finished. Then she's fighting sleep till 8.30/9pm.

Are you feeding her before bathtime?

No, feed is after bath.

I would put her to bed at 7ish and move the daytime nap by 15 minutes a day until it is after lunch for a maximum of 90 minutes.

So the only food she has after lunch is a breastfeed?

No, she has dinner at 5!

Mine has evening meal at 5pm.
Taken up for his bath at 6.45
Into nursery for breast feed and story by 7pm.
Then I'm out of there by 7.15pm.

Sometimes he has two naps a day (10-11.30 and then 3-4ish) but other times he has just one long afternoon nap (1.30-3.30).

I had wondered about pushing bath later, but thought that may make her sleep even later than she already is.

Is she fed to sleep or will she self settle?

Up till the last 2 weeks she's fed to sleep, woken as I put her down the settled on her own. The issue now is she's waking after her feed then taking 2 hours to settle!

Oh dear

You have my sympathies. I used to feed my DS to sleep and it worked like a dream until he hit 9 months and decided he no longer wanted to play that game. He would fall asleep as usual but then wake as soon as I put him in the cot and then take hours to go back to sleep. This pattern continued through the night, every night, until I eventually had to get a Sleep Consultant involved.

Is she in her own room?

What happens if you just left her once you'd put her in the cot?

What happens during the two hours that you are in the darkened room?

She's been in her own room since 4 months old (I know, bad parent!).
If I leave her at the moment she screams blue murder! So I sit with her on the rocking chair. She fidgets around, plays with her comforter, claps her hands. Then starts to drop off and wakes herself up till she finally gives in. I'll keep trying to put her down but she tries to climb out.

Oh dear

Does she stay asleep once she goes to sleep?

If nothing else has changed in her daily routines could she just be going through a really horrible phase?

Yeah, once she's asleep she's fine till morning, but wakes tired.

We do:

Tea @5pm
TV 6-6:30
Into bedroom for stories 6:30-6:45
6:45-7 milk and bedtime

As long as she's been awake since 2:30 she'll go straight down but feeding to sleep stopped working for us about 5 months ago so we've been working on gradual retreat ever since. Now we can usually just put her in cot leave her and she happily drifts off.