Anyone else’s 8-9m olds only sleep a total of 1hr naps?

[Hannah2025]

We went on holiday on 19th. Prior to going away my son’s sleep was horrendous for around 2 weeks straight, he was waking every hour crying even when co sleeping with me. Prior to this he slept pretty well. I put it down to the 8-9m regression and we were in the absolute pits. I also thought he might be teething but nothing came through.

On holiday, we decided to let him go on his own schedule. I’ve always been really strict with naps etc, but he didn’t seem interested in napping at all. He was only napping 2x 30 min naps a day, then falling asleep after his bottle around 18:15/18:30. He’d often wake again for around an hour at 20:00 too. When he’s awake he’s always happy, babbling, playing and curious showing absolutely no signs of being tired. Whilst doing this, his night sleep drastically improved and he started doing longer stretches, still occasionally stirring/crying for 15 mins or so in the night but so much better than before.

Anyway, everything I see online says 1 hour of nap is absolutely NOT enough for a baby his age.

I’m really confused as to what to do now. Does anyone else let their baby run off their own schedule even if it means a really small amount of nap time? Or should I try and encourage better nap times?

My first used to have 20 minute naps, and his night sleep was mostly fine. He started napping for longer when he was a bit older and went down to one nap a day at nursery.

Your baby (and you) seem much happier with this schedule. Just go with it. It'll change again soon enough. If you hadn't read that online would you be worried? Probably not.

How's his night time sleep generally. my oldest barely even napped even as a newborn - I'd be lucky to get 20 minutes at a time out of her and even that was after 45 minutes of me trying to comfort her as she cried in her cot or in the buggy/car. she never went to sleep on her own accord during the day. but she was always a beautiful night time sleeper and slept through the night 9 hours straight i think from about 10 weeks old and 12 hours from 6 months. But the ONLY time she got grotty was when you tried to make her nap.

My second was the opposite and always needed her naps

Babies are not robots, they all need diffeerent things

Mine, she just doesn't nap long. Ignore what it says online, the sleep industry is full of dubious proclamations. If it's working, great!

My eldest hardly ever napped after about 8 months. He didn't sleep much at night either.

I would say if he is waking up at 8pm for another hour or so, he is having three naps before his night sleep.

I never had routine naps for any of my 4 they would nap whenever.

DS never napped for more than 30mins, and only on the move, but he slept well at night so I didn’t worry at all. DD was a shock with her 2.5 hour naps. She still needs far more sleep than him (early 20s)!