How to make the 2 to 1 nap jump? Help!

[Obsessed564]

I’m now struggling to fit in 2 naps for my 12mo as his wake windows have extended so much, even with a late bedtime and capping naps. Current wake windows 3.25/3.75/4.25. But he also doesn’t seem ready for 1 nap. How do we make the jump?

Rough schedule:
7am - wake
10.15-11am - nap (always wake him by 11am, even if he falls asleep a bit later)
2.45-3.45pm - nap (have to wake him from this one too to stop bedtime getting ridiculous)
8pm - bedtime

So only totalling 1.45hrs of sleep a day max. If he fights any of these sleep times, he gets even less sleep. He often fights at least one of his naps and bedtime. He struggles to even get 10 hours at night anymore. He constantly seems tired.

His night sleep isn’t great - he still wakes on average 3 times but twice on a good night. Recently when he’s got really overtired on this schedule, he’s woken up to 6 times a night.

When I’ve tried the odd one nap day, he will only sleep a max of 1 hour 20-1.5 hours, so ends up even more overtired with the longer wake windows too.

I feel stuck between a rock and a hard place! I want to provide my baby with the opportunity to sleep what he needs but it feels like there’s not enough hours in the day!

help!!

I found the 2-1 transition much harder with DC1 then DC2. Stretch the morning out as much as you can, 7am is a good wake time so you should be able to stretch him out until 11/12. Then down for a nap. It might take a while for him to start sleeping longer stretches but just do early bedtimes. Also don't be afraid to have some days on 2 naps and some days on 1 to stop the over tiredness building up.

Can you just stretch out the morning window, not putting him down until 11:30 and pushing it later as he gets used to it.

I get more success when following the nighttime routine for naps - curtains closed, white noise on, milk etc.
becomes a bit limiting but it’s worth it for a tidy sleep at night

@Justbecause19 @SideProfile

Because his night sleep is so bad, he’s often shattered before his morning nap so I’m worried about stretching him too far. When he gets really overtired, he can wake after 30 mins crying because he’s still tired but can’t link sleep cycles. Did you find this would happen for your LO too?

Can you try and tackle his night time sleep first and then he should be more easily able to stretch until lunchtime nap? Is there a clear reason why he's waking (ie is he dependant on milk to sleep)?

I’d try doing one nap at 11 or 11.30 and then an earlier bedtime if he’s really getting too tired.

Also how does he go to sleep at night? Unfortunately my DS could only stay asleep all night once he’d learnt to fall asleep independently (sleep training).

If he's that overtired from waking at night then maybe you need to shrink his current WW right back down? Maybe try a 2hr ww to nap 1 then 3 to nap 2?

@purplejeanie @Hazelnuttella he can fall asleep independently. We sleep trained at 7 months as he was waking every 45mins-1 hour from birth and my mental health was in the gutter. We didn’t night wean as he had weight issues. But sleep training didn’t fix everything.

On a good night, he falls asleep independently but still wakes for milk.

I spoke to a sleep consultant about this and she told me to stretch out the morning so he was going down around 11 to begin with, then bring bedtime forward so that the afternoon wake window wasn't too extreme. Gradually you will find he can stay up longer and the nap will become more like the middle of the day.

I always tried to keep him busy in the mornings and sometimes would let him fall asleep in the car for literally 5/10 mins on the way to soft play etc and found that was enough to keep him going a bit longer.

The sleep consultant advised me to initially try 2/3 days a week doing 1 nap and the other days sticking to 2 and then gradually increase it and that worked for us, but I think it's inevitable that you'll have a few hard days where he struggles to make it to bedtime etc, but for us it didn't last long

Could you keep him awake in the morning by going somewhere, then get him in the car when you want him asleep? If he'll tolerate a transfer to you or cot then a few days of an almost enforced sleep might get him into the new routine?

We’re doing this transition at the moment and taking it day by day depending on what the night has been like, what time she wakes up and what has happened the day before. DD currently doing 1 nap two days a week when at nursery and it depends on the other days. If she’s really tired in the morning she has a morning nap, but we wake her by 11 and then only let her have a short afternoon nap. If she’s ok in the morning we push her until 12 and then if she doesn’t sleep for very long we just bring bedtime forward. She’s probably doing about 4 one nap days and 3 two nap days a week at the moment, using the 2 nap days to catch up.

I don't remember transitioning mine, they just dropped the morning one naturally.

Cut the morning nap by 10 minutes every few days. When it's only 10 min long, drop it completely and bring the lunch nap forwards.

You may have to temporarily bring it too far forward. My son struggled with the morning long awake window, so depending on his wake time I would sometimes have to put him to sleep at 11:30 or 12:00. After about a week, he adjusted to one nap. His wake windows got longer, and he has maintained a 12:30 nap time for almost a year.