Wife exhausted - live wire 1 yr old won't sleep

[Tireddaddy23]

1 year old sleep issues/mum is exhausted

Posting as a worried dad! My wife is at her whits end with our 1 year old (just turned), she is an absolute live wire from the start to the end of the day, she's already walking around almost running! She never...and I mean never stops! Which is great fun admittedly

However the worst part is that she just won't sleep great at night, last night she was up 5 times! Tonight we've only just got her down after two false starts and it's taken an hour and a half to settle her (she woke from her last nap at 4pm!)
Every night she is up at least twice or three times a night and has only ever slept through twice!

Naps are usually ok she still having two of them and are anywhere from 1 hour to 2 hours AVG about 1.5 hours x 2

My wife goes back to work in two weeks (baby starts nursery) and feels almost depressed by the worry, partly because she just isn't getting enough rest, she's absolutely exhausted and when she starts back as a solicitor she has a stressful amount of work to get through!

We've tried everything...
Night feeds, ignoring her, Calpol, gum teething stuff, early bed time, later bed time, more layers, less layers, heating uo a bit more, night light, setting the wind down tone early, read books, bath time and she feeds fine with solids (but has started chucking a lot more food on the floor ATM)! I'm not sure what else we can do but it's so hard for this to keep going!

It doesn't help that we've got a Bengal cat that doesn't shut up either lol

Please help 🥺

Too much day sleep too close to bedtime. Cut the first nap off at 20-30 minutes and the second nap off at 1.5 hours, ending much earlier than 4pm. If no success, drop to 1 nap in the middle of the day.

I had one (still have) one of those.

Waking up at 4pm would have been too late for us, no sleep after 3pm in this house and a 7pm bedtime.

Make sure she's eating lots and lots. More than you might think, their calorie requirements are huge.

I found nursery timings everything was earlier and both DC were knackered after a full day both of which might help you. So nap after lunch was about 12-2. Also both dropped the morning nap at about 13/14 months.

But the truth is when both parents are working you have to share the tiredness. Alternate nights on who deals with DC so the other gets a full nights sleep. In our case it's early waking so we take it in turns to get up.

I had one of these, she didn't sleep through the night until she was 4. Things that helped me a little were having her in bed with me, I found not having to physically get up meant I fell asleep more quickly. My husband and I also slept in separate rooms, he would get up at 5 each morning so I could then get an extra 2 hours unbroken sleep before starting the day. Then good coffee, and too many biscuits I'm afraid. It does pass though! 🥱

Naps are not usually as late as they have been recently it's just panned out that way! She just seems to keep going in between the naps as she has so much energy! Even at night time she just keeps going and going like a energizer bunny 🥴

You need to change up her daytime sleep. I would do a quick morning nap, literally 30mins then up and out for some fresh air/soft play. Home for a longer lunchtime nap and awake by 3pm at the latest, out again for another walk/fresh air and in bed for 7. It might be you could move her onto one lunchtime nap or nursery might even do it for you. Once she's on the one nap play around with the best time for her, DC1 was better 12-2ish but DC2 was better 11-1. Depends if she needs longer before her nap or before her bedtime.

Yes we've tried that too I've been in the spare room with the cat and shes had our little one in with her. She also has tried feeding her when she wakes as atm she flings her head back when she gets up and won't settle otherwise!

Could you ask Nursery what schedule they have for naps and try to follow that?

First guess what that's kids for you. Second why any afternoon naps she ain't tiring herself out. Ours stopped any naps from 10months and we have 3 same age together. The only time they nap is if not well. They have all slept in there own beds since 11-12 months and slept thru from 6:30pm till 7-8am. Snacks wouldn't recommend any especially after tea. Ours don't get any from 2am onwards learnt that from older kids to full of rubbish to settle down. Also worth trying a bedtime story works a treat

That afternoon nap I would recommend to be shorter and awake by 2.30, 3pm at the latest.
it took us far too long figure this out with DD, the broken sleep and up through the night was a killer. With DS, he went down to 1 x 1.5-2 hour nap after lunch at about 12-14 months old and things just clicked into place.

both are now excellent sleepers at 6 & 4 so tell your wife to hang in there, she is doing great and it will get easier.

We nap her both times when she starts yawning and pulling her ears and rubbing her eyes so she still needs naps

Her sleep might improve once she has a nursery routine. I have twins and one was like this - it does get better :)

Thanks for the advice guys maybe capping the early napay be a good idea to try 😀

A good sleep consultant can be helpful too. Not all are about just training etc, ours worked with us with a routine etc too and was a game changer for our twins. It was worth the money for us. Lots of luck!

TBH sounds like DD who has ADHD and didn't sleep consistently until 2. And she was better than some friends. Small improvements with limiting naps, LOTS of outside time, preferably beach or forest or something challenging, every day, but I was a zombie for years.

Partly age, lots of developmental leaps going on so that will pass. And I’d stop the nap earlier so she has a longer wake window.

Im a tax advisor so similar client facing type role and technical finicky detailed knowledge required and I find my days at work are my days off and my days with DD (now 2) are my work days 😂 agree with others that nursery will also tire her out.

You just have to learn to have a schedule as parents where one person takes over early evening to early morning and the other does early morning to late morning and if you get sleep so be it but if you don't each person gets an allocated amount of sleep.

You can't force sleep, you can only work on building a good bedtime routine.

I say this as a SEN mum with a child who doesn't sleep!

If the last nap finished at 4pm you just need to go for a later bedtime. I'd see how much awake time she needs before bed and go from there to figure out how you can tweak the naps.

Are you getting out with her every day? Loads of fresh air without fail? I agree with the naps being too late. Loads of food in the day, milk before bed and then I suggest gentle sleep training. Sounds like she's over tired and so not switching off properly enough to get I to a deep enough sleep.

3hrs is probably too much daytime sleep as well as 4pm being too late. Cut the morning nap back to 30mins and the other to 1.5-2hrs. Definitely wake before 3pm, preferably 2.30 depending on what time you are aiming to get her into bed.
plenty of fresh air in the afternoon.
Consistent winding down routine before bed. This might need to be quite short if she’s prone to getting second wind.

How is she normally at self settling for naps/bedtime? What are her sleep cues?

Whatever you try you’ll need to stick at it for a while.

Cut the naps. Wake her up. Not all toddlers need loads sleep. Mine was like that. In night I'd hand her a bottle and go back to bed & ignore her.
Hopefully nursery will wipe her out.
Mine never stopped and climbed everything. At 12 was diagnosed with adhd

I cut nap times down and no sleep after 2:30.

More outdoor time, running around

Less napping

More solid food

She might be getting ready to drop a nap. When my daughter went from 2 to 1 and then 1 to 0 naps it had an impact on her sleep. Once she full transition it improved again.

I don't like waking sleeping children but we gently tried to wake our daughter if she was asleep at 4. If she had a late nap we pushed bedtime 10-15 minutes later and added an extra story to the bed time routine followed by a little extra settling. She went to bed about 20-30 minutes later. The slightly longer bed time helped to prepare for bed. It's difficult when they still need the sleep but their awake windows a getting ready for less sleep.

Now my daughter is on no naps if she does have a random nap maybe once in 2-3 weeks we do bedtime 20 minutes later and add a jigsaw or story before getting in PJ's. The calming activity before sleep provides that bit of rest when she's not quite tired.

She dropped her morning nap at 13 months and she went to bed at 8.

we had one who didn’t sleep and every so often one of us would grab a night in a travelodge to get a full night of sleep. We took it in turns with night time wakings. And consider rehoming the cat - or could a family member have it for a couple of months?