Am I the only one who doesn’t revolve my day around nap time?

[shineonyoucrazydiamondd]

I’ve got a group of mum friends I met through a baby class, they will not meet if it’s within babies nap time, and they spend hours trying to get baby to nap and if they don’t the day is just a disaster and they won’t meet up at all.

I go out whatever time and don’t really plan around nap time much. She normally sleeps roughly around 10 and 2 which is what became her natural nap time and if I’m out I think well she’ll sleep in pram or car.

if my baby won’t nap I go out anyway and she will sleep in the pram or the car or she won’t. She’s never been a great napper and I don’t fancy battling it every day to get her to nap. I’ve had ups and downs getting her to sleep at night so it’s not perfect but I do have a bedtime routine.

I guess my question is - am I doing it wrong? I’m the only one out of that group that doesn’t do this so militantly.
Should I be persevering with getting the naps at home or is it okay to not have my life dependant around when baby naps?

How old is your baby? Babies nap times and older toddlers are completely different issues in my experience.

My ds never slept in the pram or the car, I can't remember him ever doing it ,it might be that your friend's babies are the same.

Depends on the child. Some need a strict routine or very particular conditions to nap. They're often the shit sleepers overnight as well, so yes when you have one of those their sleep is an absolute priority for your own sanity.

Other babies are more flexible and will sleep as and when, or don't do the overtired thing so if they miss a nap they're a bit grumpy rather than screaming for ours.

As you can tell, I had one of each and had very different ranges of what I would agree to with each of them!

It's very much luck of the draw, and you may find that you need to be rigid about routine with a subsequent baby. If this baby can cope with flexibility, then embrace it.

Wow that is a lot of sleep for an 8 month old. My little one is 9 months has 2 naps a day at an average of 90 minutes so has 3 hours of daytime sleep and then sleeps 7 til 6. Will Soemtimes wake for one feed as still breastfeeding I can’t get him to go through the night consistently , sometimes he does sometimes he doesn’t.

A nap 1-3pm at home in the cot simply isn’t going to happen when you’ve got school pick up at 3. My second naps in the pram or he doesn’t nap at all because the alternative is leaving his sister at school 🤷‍♀️ I was stricter when I was a FTM and realise now it was all a bit pointless.

I am not the routine type and my first child was the same as yours so I thought similarly to you. I thought everyone was being ever so silly.

Karma came for me with my second baby, who is generally a delight but she simply wont sleep in the car or pushchair. She's only very little still so I'm hoping she grows out of it, but when she gets tired she screams. And I've tried everything to get her to sleep in the pram or car but she really won't do it. So it does make life a little tricky!

We don’t either- it just wouldn’t work for us. I have 5 kids all ages 9 and under so we need flexibility for things to work. My youngest has naturally fell into a pattern round about the school/nursery run but she is very much just put into the baby carrier and goes along with whatever we have on that day.

It definitely depends on your child. DS was a nightmare sleeper, no routine, but actually, was quite likely to just casually drop off while out and about so I was happy to just go places.

DD on the other hand NEEDED her sleep, and would only sleep at home in her crib. If she didn't sleep, she was cranky and unhappy and miserable, and so were we. As a result, we were irritatingly tied to her schedule.

No you are not that unusual. I had the first grandchild in the family and my sister the second 2 months later. Half the family was horrified that we went home for nap time and the other half horrified that my sister just carried on her day, baby or no baby.

its a parenting technique, my sister always looked frazzled and my nephew still has sleep issues 5 years later while my two are currently napping upstairs at 3 and 5 years old and are nearly flawless sleeper at night too, i have no idea if the early sleeping strategy had that effect or its just a coincidence. she is being much more routine based with her second though.

Mostly i did it for myself, i needed rest and predictability and so we prioritised everyone sleep. If you want to prioritised your social life/running errands etc then that isnt a bad thing.

I might have been more rigid with naps if either of mine had ever actually slept in their bloody cots! Friends used to talk about the 12-2.30 nap time where they’d get all their jobs done, prep dinner, have a cuppa etc and I’d weep with envy. Neither of mine would ever go to sleep just lying in a cot and on the few occasions I managed to put them down once asleep, they’d wake 30 mins later anyway 😐 so they only ever napped in the buggy, in the car or in the sling explains why my house was always a state

If I'd had my difficult baby second it would have killed me! Much nicer to be dreading the difficulty of it all and then get a pleasant surprise - I took a photo every single time she fell asleep in the pram as eldest literally didn't do that once after about a week old. 😂 Hope you're hanging in there

You'd know if you're doing something wrong as your baby wouldn't be happy!! As long as it works for you both, keep doing it. I've never really kept to a routine - if I am at home I put her down the same time but I'll go out whenever I need to. She will sleep in the car or pram if she needs to

Aw thank you @JenniferBarkley - the thing is, my second baby is the one I regard as my easy baby 🤣😭 the refusal to sleep in the car or pram is her only real difficulty. My first baby, whilst he would sleep any time any place, is a much more demanding character overall, bless him.

So in answer to your question... I think I'm hanging on by a thread 🤣🫠 x

this is really interesting, my baby will not go in her cot. I can just about get her to go in there at bedtime after months of her wanting to sleep in my bed and even then she cries at first. It’s frustrating because I’ve never had the “getting on with stuff while baby naps” so I go out because it beats trying to battle her to go into her cot at nap time because she just won’t. I’ve tried so many things.

She will either not sleep or sleep on me, or tire herself out and sleep next to me on sofa if we are in, in pram or car in daytime. She’s 1.

It depends. A lot of it, for me, was because nap time was also my precious time to just 'be' and do whatever I wanted. I didn't want to really waste that time by being out shopping or whatever unless it was something I really wanted to do.

By the time my youngest was a baby, my eldest wasn't napping anymore so it didn't matter so much.

if my baby won’t nap I go out anyway and she will sleep in the pram or the car or she won’t.

Babies are different. One of my daughters sounds like yours. The other one would scream bloody murder if she hadn't slept. The idea of putting her in the pram and just thinking "if she sleeps, she sleeps, if not, doesn't matter" was laughable because if she didn't sleep, she screamed and screamed and screamed. My life revolves around naps because I couldn't take the screaming if she didn't sleep. It drove me insane, she was a nightmare sleeper and once something worked no way was I risking it. She literally drove me to the edge of my sanity. I tried taking her out on walks with friends with their babies, and they'd just fall asleep while mine howled for the entire time. I felt like the world's shittest mother.

The other daughter - I could do whatever, she's pretty chilled, doesn't really get overtired, generally much more relaxed child.

If someone's life seems ruled by nap time, remember that they probably didn't go into parenthood thinking "ooh I hope I get to a point where everything I do revolves around sleep". Maybe they could have done things differently earlier on, but who knows. If your baby doesn't need a strict routine, I definitely wouldn't force one at all!

My DC wouldn’t nap out and about, some won’t and it ruins their sleep/eating patterns. I personally loved the 2 hour nap at lunchtime, got to fit down or catch up on chores etc

I did with my first, it definitely meant I missed on things as I was fearful of my DS being very upset when we were out or being grumpy later that day.
With my second I don't have a choice as I have the two on my own, it's not fair on my DS to be stuck being quiet in the house.My DD will nap in the car or pram or sometimes on me if we're able to sit down at a bench/softplay. TBH I don't think it makes a massive difference however it may depend on a babies temperament. my first was quite high needs and unsettled so didn't want to take the chance. If yours can sleep on the go, embrace it and enjoy it

I have 4 kids, they nap when they're put down and sleep through the night. I wasn't lenient even with my first. They don't control my life though, they nap in pushchairs/in restaurants/in car etc

Sounds like your situation is due to that then, rather than not ‘planning your life around naps’.

My DD was like this from around 4-10 months or so, just had to go with the flow rather than warring with naps. I then started to ignore the ‘drowsy but awake’ nonsense and did what felt right. I started to feed to sleep and lay with her then down then transfer to cot, or sometimes rocking and shushing.

Once something clicked and she started nice long naps, you can sure as hell bet i was planning my life around naps. She’s on one nap a day now at 14 months, and those 2-3 hours are my time for exercise, relaxing and any jobs that need to be done. I’d much rather be at home with a sleeping baby doing my own thing than pounding the pavements or at crusty soft play when I don’t need to be.

Well then surely that answers your question? Your baby won’t nap in her cot so you go out and about. Mine wouldn’t nap out and about, so I put her in her cot.

You sound a tad judgmental. Congrats your baby has no structure for nap time.

My DS is 2 and still naps after lunch. I try and be at home so I know he'll have a nice long nap. Why, because sleep is so important.

My DS1 was a terrible night sleeper - waking every 1-2 hours until about 1 year 😫 so I remember daytime naps being pretty sacrosanct at the time. We planned our days around them and I tried wherever possible to make sure we were home so I could nap with him/ or at least put my feet up with a cuppa! So I think every baby/ families sleep patterns and needs are different.

Depends entirely on the baby.

God no. Tbh I make sure I have a vague awareness of nap times in the back of mind but I normally just go on baby cues. My baby sleeps fine in the pram walking so we go to baby classes all various times but always walk there. Plus the classes tire her out!! Maybe I’d be more inclined to stay in if my baby actually napped in her cot (no chance) 🤣