Naps - do you let them rule your life?

[Cm17]

FTM, Lo is 18 months old has 1 nap a day and when we are home they are pretty consistent.
She does go to a childminder full time and has a nap during the day there.

However i feel like I let nap time over rule our weekends together as a family and plan things around being home for naps like visiting parents/popping to the shops/soft play etc

Swimming is a big one for me, we took her swimming for the first time when she was 5 months old and she loved it straight away! We took her every week but since we've both been back at work she has only been maybe twice due the swim times falling on her nap time.

Now that summertime is approaching and we both work full time, I want weekends to be about us getting out and doing things as a family, especially now she understands alot more things.

I know its probably me overthinking it more than i need to but how do/did you work things around nap time?

being 18 months old now would you just do the things you want to do with your lo and let them nap when it happens around it?

@Ablackcat , I remember once dc1 feel asleep in the pushchair. It was raining so had the rain cover on.
It was so unusual that I panicked and though I had made me unwell with the rain over etc….

The only place he slept was his bed.

I think them being able to nap out and about is a good skill for them to learn.

My two DDs were never put down for a nap at a specific time. They would have slept in their buggy,on the sofa beside me or if I was out and about in the car. Its just not practical to have a set nap time in a certain place every day. You need to be more flexible.

If mine got overtired they would scream for hours while we then tried to get them to sleep. Messing with their naps really wasn’t worth it.

So would mine but mine just slept wherever we were. It’s the getting them used to napping in a cot and then them only napping in a cot that gets me. Idk why anyone would do that!

This is the same for my 2.5 year old. We occasionally miss her nap but most of the time it’s really not worth it

@ForestFae that's a v interesting approach - both ADHD kids and high needs babies generally thrive on routine - the predictability tends to be very reassuring for them!

Yep. And I also have adhd and a life without routine and structure for me is utter chaos! And as for not having routines yourself @ForestFae - do you not have to turn up for work at a certain time? Pay bills by a certain date, make sure kids are in school on time? Make sure they have dinner at a reasonable time? Get to bed at a reasonable time so they can function? All these things are routines - the human body is one giant biological walking routine so I'm fairly sure you DO have some kind of routine - albeit flexible and adaptable according to need. Because otherwise all you have is chaos!

I have ADHD myself as does DH I hate routine, I hate feeling obligated to do things at certain times and it makes me feel claustrophobic and constrained. Kids are similar. One of them prefers some routine, in that he likes to know how long things take (think how long a movie is, how many hours has he been asleep, how fast did he eat his food etc) but other than that none of us really like it. It just feels oppressive in my experience

I’m a SAHM so no re work, and I home educate which means we change what ours we do and when we do it. So it’s a bit different regarding work and school for us. I have my bills as DDs so I don’t think about them and I have them set to come out the day after DH gets paid, it doesn’t take any input from me though past setting it up. We eat when we are hungry and go to bed when we are tired, we don’t have “times” for doing those and it can vary by what time we do it each day. It probably looks like chaos to an outsider but we all seem to thrive on taking things day by day in our house. DH has flexible hours and WFH half the time too so again he doesn’t have to work at certain times either

What hours* my screen is cracked which is making me make loads of typos, sorry!

Interesting @ForestFae - I dislike routines too and hate being pinned down to times and dates but without that structure things get missed/forgotten/lost and it's chaos (I might have mentioned that already lol!) I'm intrigued as to how you get things done as an adhd-er without systems in place to make sure things don't get forgotten etc? What's your secret??

We had to be quite strict tbh at that age otherwise he would be overtired, grumpy, moan and that was far worse for everyone involved.
Some happily nap in a buggy out and about we were lucky sometimes but on the times it didn't work it was hell!
Plan activities for morning and/or afternoon.
There is no way my son would enjoy swimming when he should be napping.

Probably reducing demands! Because I don’t work and I home educate, while more demanding in some ways, it reduces some external demands in others - I have no parents evenings, no uniform to get ready, no forms to get back on time. If we forget something, it’s no big deal we can just do it when we remember.

Sounds like it works for you @ForestFae

It also means I can do the harder work at the times that suits me - I am not a morning person. If I had to do the school run I’d probably be perpetually late or forgetting stuff. But because I HE, I can start at 10am when I’m more engaged and able to focus. So I think having the complete freedom to structure the day around my adhd helps a lot

I have friends that do this and I just find it so so bizzare. If I'm at home then my DS will nap in his bed but if I'm out and about he'll nap in car or pram. Simple

I think being able to nap anywhere is great for them. I remember going to a farm with my NCT group and one of them literally packing up after 90 minutes because it was time for her DCs nap.

My 8 month old is on 2 naps, I try to have one good nap in the cot and then it doesn't matter if the other one is in the pram/car seat. Swim time falls during morning nap time for us too but we work around it and I try to get him to sleep earlier than usual in the pram for half an hour while we're walking to the lesson, if not then he's normally good to power on and have a late morning nap on the way home.

Naps don't rule our life, but DD does need one, even at 3. Her behaviour when she doesn't have one is awful.

But, when it's a family birthday and the party starts at her nap time, we suck it up and she goes without.

I do enjoy the downtime of her nap, but I never stay at home just so she can nap, IYSWIM. If we want to go out, she naps in her pram, with a snoozeshade. We may juggle the timings of things a bit if we need to. Sometimes we arrive a bit early or leave a bit late so the times work better for us, but it's no big deal.

Actually, it's a massive benefit to going out for lunch with friends. We have a starter while she eats her meal. Then she goes to sleep in her pram and we have a glass of wine with our main and an adult conversation. Win win.

It really isn’t this simple for all children.

My DS isn’t a particularly challenging child but there’s no way he’d sleep in his pushchair now. He would as a baby but not at 18 months. Car journeys only work as long as the engine is running which isn’t ideal given the costs of petrol.

Why can’t you go swimming? If we have a day out my 18 month old naps in the car. But usually we do a morning activity 9/10am - nap around midday and something else afternoon- we aren’t staying at home all day for 1 nap

How does it even develop that a child won’t sleep in a pushchair? Asking our if curiosity because as I said earlier I had high needs kids that went on to have adhd, but when tired they’d just drop anywhere! DS2 will still just K.O with no warning (mine don’t show they’re tired until suddenly just dropping. They don’t wind down as such)

I suppose in the sense that all children are different! He’s definitely way too alert and interested in the world around him to sleep now. I don’t have a child that drops - he’ll keep going and going and seemingly full of beans but really is exhausted.

To be honest I’m lucky if I can get him to sit in his pram for any length of time these days!