So confused about naps/night sleep

[mummyPhD]

Hi everyone,

I’m looking for a bit of advice. I have two boys, one 2.7 years and one 18 months. I’m really struggling with nap times for my 18 month old.

My older boy is straightforward. He wakes at about 7-7:30am naps 1pm-2:30pm and then is asleep by 8pm-8:30pm. If he has an earlier or later nap, then his bedtime will be earlier or later - usually about 6 hours after waking from the nap. Easy to figure out!

My younger boy had the same routine, until over the last two weeks it has been all over the place! I can’t figure out where I’m going wrong/what the routine needs to be. He’s napping at random times of the day, or not at all, and waking at random times in the morning.

For example this week:
Monday - woke 8am, napped at nursery 10:30-11:30, refused another nap later in the afternoon, went to bed about 6pm and fell asleep by 6:30pm
Tuesday - woke at 7:30am, napped 1:30pm-3pm, refused to go to sleep until 9:30pm
Wednesday - woke at 8:30 am, didn’t nap AT ALL, went to bed and asleep by 18:30pm
Thursday - Woke 8:30am, napped 12pm-2pm, refused to sleep until 9:30pm
Friday (today) - woke 7am, napped at nursery 10:30am-11:30am, refused another nap later on, just put him to bed and asleep by 6:30pm

What am I missing?! There doing seem to be any pattern to it or regularity, making the day quite difficult to plan considering my other son too.

Does he need a short nap? Longer nap? No nap? Also when I say he slept at night, it’s not continuously, he wakes about 4-5 times through the night but not for long.

thank you for any wisdom and advice you might have!

Is he at Nursery every day or just on the days you said he napped at Nursery?

I'm thinking it looks to me that he sleeps better when he's had an early nap and a busy day at Nursery.

Hiya,

He goes three mornings a week, Monday, Tuesday and Friday, 9am-1pm.

I see what you mean, bedtime is a lot easier when he’s had either no nap or a morning one!

It just doesn’t seem to fit into the pattern for toddlers? Especially since he wasn’t doing this before a couple of weeks ago

Maybe he only needs an hour? Looks like when he sleeps longer than that his bedtime is affected

Tbh my DC2's naps have always looked like that (15m). I've never really bothered to analyse it, sometimes she'll need to sleep more because she's teething or had a jab, sometimes she's been more stimulated or learning new skills, sometimes life outside is too exciting to nap. If she goes to bed later then it just means me or DH is up with her later It doesn't affect planning my day as we're out of the house whatever happens, she naps in her buggy. She does tend to wake every day at the same time though (but she's in our room and we have an alarm, so that would wake her if she wasn't waking naturally).

Agree with others. He seems ok with an hour or less but problems if he sleeps longer.

Thanks everyone! I’ll try this week just letting him have an hour and see how that goes for bedtime. I know all kids are different it’s just hard not to compare to my eldest who has always needed more sleep than that.

@faw that would be fine if I didn’t have my eldest to consider too. Neither of them have ever slept in a pram (the world is too exciting for that 🤣) so I’d have to be at home all day if I didn’t plan naps in unfortunately. Great that it works for you though.