Has anyone reintroduced a daytime sleep for a 2+ year o ld?

[santander]

Ds needs one badly sometimes, but we have got into the AWFUL practice of 'going for a drive' to put him to sleep when he needs an afternoon nap. This is proving expensive and inconvienient!

Last night my overtired youngster was awake from 1am til 5 for some reason this is unusual so I'm prepared to assume it's back molars coming through or something but this morning he's been hellish.

I have made the executive decision to PUT HIM BACK TO BED (11am) He is now crying and wailing upstairs.

Surely this is the right thing to do???

Support and advice please xx

My 2 yr old also has got in the inconvenient habit of only napping in car/buggy. So I feel your pain :(. However personally I think the napping issue has nothing to do with the waking in the night: your son is obviously overtired from lack of sleep at night, perhaps in pain (give him calpol for a few nights to rule that out) & on top of that you're putting him in his cot at 11 am, when a) it's too early for a nap for a toddler that age and b) he's unused to cot these days. I wouldn't do any sleep training of that kind on an overtired toddler.

Well it worked and he went to sleep and slept for 3 hours. Far longer than he would've ever done in the car.

surely the time of the nap is irrelevant if he's been up half the night!

Santander, glad to hear it worked! Clearly he was overtired so I'm glad he managed to nap; I was judging by my own DS who can't get to sleep & cries & cries when overtired so I try to avoid him getting in that state as much as possible. I agree that they sleep much better in cot...

My DS1 napped till about 3 (in his cot) and see it as essential. Sometimes I laid on the bed with him until is fell asleep.

I found life a lot easier to deal with a child who sleeps loads. He still went to bed at 7pm and slept right through.

I loved this time too, as I could do lots of chores, and catch up.

I'd still stick to a strict routine with night time bed I'm sure he'll soon slip into it.

Hiya. DD1 is nearly 3 and she has always been a very good sleeper, and needs lots of it!! We made the decision to stop her mid-day nap a few months ago just so we could get out and about for a whole day instead of having to come home so she could kip. She did fine for a few weeks, but in the end I was sick of the over-tired temper tantrums so decided to re-introduce it. She sleeps 2 hours over lunch, and it doesn;t seem to affect night time sleep so I'm just gonna let her get on with it!

Yes I must say that ds2 (2.9) sleeps MUCH better at night if he's had a nap during the day.

He still naps for around 2-3 hours and has maybe 11 hours at night. If he doesn't nap (like last week when we were on holiday) we ALL suffer for it.