Can I encourage DS (10 months) to drop his am nap, and have a longer pm nap instead?

[AchtungBaby]

I'll go back to work when DS is 11 months, and his childminder has said that she'd like him to have dropped his am nap, and to have a longer pm nap instead.

I'm not very keen to change his sleep habits (possibly because they're okay / good now, having been bad in the past), but I do appreciate why she'd like me to (she usually goes to a toddler group each morning, and wouldn't really get out of the house with the children otherwise).

So, is it possible to do this? DS currently naps for 1hour 15mins in the am and pm, so I planned to wake him up 15mins earlier each week from his am nap, and hope that he might sleep longer for his pm nap.

Ah ten months is young to drop morning nap, both mine dropped it around 18 months. Possible solutions are:

• Have a shorter morning nap and longer afternoon nap e.g. 9-9.30 then 12-2? Think if you shorten the morning nap you have to put him down earlier for the pm nap cos he'll be overtired.
• have nap starting in the late morning? Could she put him down at 11.30 for 2 and a half hours?
• Could he not have his morning nap in the buggy whilst the others are at toddlers?

Think its a bit much to ask a ten month old to go without sleep all morning. What time would she be wanting him to go to sleep?

Thanks for your relpy CombineArvester.

I worry that it's too young too , and in particular that it's too young for him - he doesn't really show any sign of dropping it himself.

Hmm, your possible solutions:

• shorter am nap, longer pm nap - I think there's some pre-school dropping off etc going on in the am, so he could have a short nap in the car, but prob only ~15mins. Then it's straight off to toddler group .
• late am nap - maybe, although I don't suppose that's his natural sleep rhythm . I'm not sure what time they get back from toddler group.
• morning nap in the buggy - I don't think that he would nap unless the buggy was moving .

I'll need to talk to her again about it - we've chatted a few times over the last few months, and I assumed that she'd work around him while he still had his am nap. It was only recently that I realised that this wasn't likely to be the case.

I thought that this was organised, and I really don't want to let her down.

Oops, sorry, I may have overdone the sad faces!

She must be used to taking on babies that usually have morning naps though - I mean, what does she usually do?

Late morning nap may work as he will be really tired by then but hopefully not overtired. Or could she walk to preschool drop off giving him longer to sleep and the other kids some exercise. Or I suppose it's possible that he would sleep at toddler group for her - I have known Mums who go back to work still feeding the babies to sleep for every nap but the nursery / CM manage to get them to settle.

I am a bit concerned that you don't want to 'let her down' - she is not your Mum or your boss, she is providing a service for you and she has to work around the needs of your child as well as the others in her care. Don't start from the position that she is doing you a massive favour looking after your child - you are paying her. So its possible that if she makes some minor adjustments to her current routine and you make some minor adjustments to DS' routine that things would work. Suggest this to her, tell her you don't think he is ready to go without sleep in the morning for X hours yet and how can she accommodate this- he may well drop it himself anyway.

Is he going there full time?

He's meant to go 4 days / week.

I'm already stressed about teaching him to self-settle so that she can put him down for a nap w/o it taking her away from the other children for ages. (I'd like to teach him this anyway, as he's waking up a couple of times in the night.)

Watching with interest as I'm in the same boat. My (future) CM says DD can sleep in her buggy while she goes to playgroup with the older babies.

SkaterGrrrrl, do you think that your DD will sleep in the non-moving buggy?

I really don't think that DS would!