2yo taking 90 mins to fall asleep at night - time to drop nap??

[WhyTheHeckMe]

Posting on 2 boards as not sure which is best
DS was 2 last month. For over a year he's slept 7pm-7am every night with a 1-2 hour nap in the cot or at nursery over lunch.
The last few weeks we have been putting him to bed at 7 as always, it usually takes him 10/15 mins to drop off. But now at 8.30 pm he's still awake every night. He's not upset he just chats and sings and plays in his bed with his teddies.
He's still waking at 7am
I'm wondering if this means we should start dropping his nap?
I'm due dc2 in 6 weeks so really don't want him to not sleep in the day, however I feel that his bedtime is quite late.
It's currently 8.40pm and tonight he is still up singing twinkle twinkle!
Any advice will be appreciated :)

What time is his nap? I would cut right back to 30 mins max or move super early in the day. I didn't with mine and dc ended up needing a LOT of comfort and reassurance to go to sleep. And still does a year later.

My nearly 2yo is exactly the same so following. She’s not upset, just chats and sings to herself but I feel bad just leaving her in her cot (lucky OTOH as her older brother needed someone to lie with him for hours sometimes...)

Thanks for replying. His nap is usually at 12.30 till around 2pm. He's not tired before this. I've tried putting him down earlier and will often put him to bed at 12 straight after lunch but he still won't fall asleep till at least 12.30.
The fact he sleeps so long makes me think he still needs it and I feel mean waking him but you reckon 30 mins will help?

Getoffthefrog what is it that makes your do need a lot of reassurance to go to sleep, what changed for you?

Meant to say he's very active. We rarely stay in, today he's been at soft play with dh and his cousins for 2.5 hours this afternoon and still isn't tired!

Lorelaith let's hope it's a phase :)

This happened with us. Dropped his nap and he fell asleep straight away at bedtime and slept through. Sometimes he'll sleep in the car if we're traveling at nap time but most days he pushes through. Is yours fighting his naps? Mine would but then sleep for ages! Life is better without the nap hassle despite not getting that break at midday!

We are going through the same thing. DS is 2.8 but this has been on going for months. Basically he doesn’t nap every day. If he does nap then it’s a late bedtime as you describe. If he doesn’t nap then he’s in bed at 6pm. He probably does about 50/50 at the moment as he does struggle in the afternoon without the nap. I usually do “quiet time” regardless, which is essentially nap time but he doesn’t have to sleep, just stay in his room.

I'd drop the nap.

DS did this but not napping meant he would be hysterical by 5pm and dinner/bath/bed would be hideous. Shortening the nap didn’t make any difference and just meant less overall sleep. We just let him have a later bedtime for a while and eventually he stopped napping on his own. He was about 2.9 when he dropped it and to be honest he still struggled in the evening and for a while I had to do dinner at 4.30 and have him in bed by 6.30 latest. I was in the same position with a newborn so neither the later bedtime nor not napping was ideal but it’s a relatively short phase in the grand scheme (about 6months for us).

My DS dropped his nap at 2 for the same reasons. Like PP we had quiet time for a while instead (cuddling watching CBeebies). If he didn't get his quiet time we knew about it, but he didn't need an actual nap anymore.
I found it much harder without that gaurenteed down time but it was worth it to have my evenings!

Also DS would maybe not nap for a week straight and then nap again every day for a month. At first I was devastated to lose my guaranteed break in the day (and with a newborn too) but now I prefer the earlier and more flexibility during the day.

I tried cutting his nap short, but it didn’t make any difference to bedtime and so he was getting much less sleep overall

Earlier bedtime that should say

We just cut nap down to 30-40mins max so that we could keep it for an extra 6 months!
She could cope without the nap but tantrums were a lot more frequent when she didn’t get one at all and I would rather wake her early than put up with even harder toddler times...

Op to answer your question, I think because we didn't work out that dropping naps would mean going to sleep earlier, she got very agitated about being left on her own. What started off as quietly chatting to herself ended up with us having to cuddle and sing to her or shed lose it. Still have to stay with her until she's asleep now but thankfully it's done in 5 minutes. Definitely give cutting naps back / dropping them a shot and see how yours reacts.