dropping day nap at 16 months

[jan2013]

is this too early? dd is not going to bed till at least ten no matter what i do, routine, putting her down before etc etc. i need my evenings back finding it hard to cope! should i try keeping her up during the day? shes a live wire.

My 18 m old is doing the same atm. I've got her napping before lunch most days (2 days at nursery where they're after lunch but restricting to half hour), and annoyingly, when my pil's have dc's overnight, she goes down fine. When they bring them back late aft they both sleep (ds is just 3) and it's a fucking nightmare difficult to get them both to bed after.

You're not alone x

its a mixed blessing when they are away for the night isn't it?

well i think my plan backfired. she fell asleep on in the car and i brought her into the house still asleep - i don't have the heart to wake her yet. she usually sleeps for an hour but im going to wake her when she's had half an hour. and its too late for her to be sleeping if i want an earlier bedtime! so she really does still need a nap, so ill try to aim for earlier nap, and shorter, and see if it helps!

Certainly has been the last few times!

There is supposed to be some sleep regression at 18 months so maybe your dd is a bit advanced

It's just thrown me as ds is such a stickler for his routine while dd laughs in the face of it all.

seriously finding this so hard. been limiting her nap to half an hour. ex dh takes her one day at the weekend and a couple of nights during the week - he was bringing her back at 9 as she would sometimes have fallen asleep and be transferred. this does not work anymore... so i told him can he bring her back at 7.30 as i was now aiming for a 7.45 - 8 bedtime.

she was knackered tonight. but put her down, and she goes completely hyper. no chance of sleeping, so i bring her downstairs again. milk, snack, her jumping all over the furniture and being generally whiny probably cos she is over tired and stimulated. so, try again to get her down. hysterics as soon as she hits the cot... i do the pick up and put down method until i physically cannot do it any more and then i hold her down... i hold her and when she stops fighting i let my hand rest on her chest until she falls asleep. if i move my hand, she gets straight up, even if she is half asleep - she is so so stupidly alert.

so this is whats been happening... and its exhausting, and then she wakes loads during the night. i need my evenings back so bad! what can i do? am i a bad mum for holding her down to get her over to sleep? if i didn't i feel it would go on for hours.

With regard to the holding down, I have been wishing that cots have straps in them like pushchairs for the past week! 18 month old DS has been waking for up to 3 hours in the night and keeps getting up. The only way to get him to stay down is to keep my hand on his chest and sort of pin him down, it's the only way he goes back to sleep. My wrists are black and blue from doing it through the cot bars!

so glad im not the only one!!

Op If i'm brutally honest she sounds overtired to me. Typically, kids that age are still having a decent 2hr nap, some still have 2 naps & most kids dont drop the nap completely til nearer 3yrs old. I would stop cutting her nap to just 30mins its not enough

If she was only having an hour anyway it may be the timing of the nap was already off so it may be worth posting what her daytime routine usually looks like (Wakeup time, naptime & bedtime) as it may be possible to tweak it to both improve her nap and bedtime.

While she is napping for just 1hr i would also bring bedtime much earlier & have her down for nearer to 7pm, it may be 7.45-8pm is still too late (unless she is napping ridiculously late in the afternoon). The more wired she is the harder she will fond it to settle, so going earlier to bed can often mean they settle sooner & sleep longer.

Also does she have a regular bedtime routine? Regular sequence of events to prepare her for sleep may help her settle better.

Finally with regard to pick up put down, once they become toddlers thid can be too stimulating & wind them ip more. At the most you want to just do the put down part, so if she stands & cries you lay her back down, the aom being to do most of the soothing in the cot.

Personally i would address routine first & foremost, i think if you can get her a bit better rested the bedtime antics will settle. Post her routine & id be happy to offer some suggestions.

Sorry for all sp mistakes stupid phone!

hi omama

thanks for your reply i appreciate your help. i feel that she IS over tired at night but i still don't know how to get her to go to sleep, it seems impossible. limiting her sleep to half an hour a day has seemed to help so far so im reluctant to give up on this tactic so soon, but im open to suggestions.

the pickup putdown - sorry i was doing it the way you said, as she is constantly getting up so it is just the put down i am doing.

her wake up is usually around 7.30 - 8, her nap time is usually around 12.30, and ive tried to get her down anytime from 7ish, which usually doesn't work. she does have a regular bedtime routine but to be honest on very busy days i skip the bath cos i am just too tired (single parent here). also, twice a week she is with her dad, and her routine gets completely messed up and he brings her home around 7.30.

hope this helps give you an understanding of where things are at

yesterday dd had half hour sleep in day, she fell asleep in car at half seven when dh brought her home. out for the count till 11pm - then she tossed and turned and was up messing about till around 6. what am i doing wrong? i gave nurofen, loosened her nappy etc, i do not know what is keeping her up.

My DDs are 1.9 and 3.9

DD 1.9 recently dropped her second nap - naps anytime between 10.30 - 4pm for about 2-3 hours

DD 3.9 is just stating to drop her nap - she has one for about 2 hours every 2/3 days, 'quiet time' the other days.

IMO dropping it at 16 months is going to cause you bigger sleep problems.

Re the bedtime routing, could you give us some more detail about that?

routine

i didn't want to cut the nap out entirely. she would never sleep more than an hour, but was still a nightmare to get down.

bedtime routine - dinner, she likes watching in the night garden while having a bottle, and reading books, sometimes a bath, then when i take her to her room i have the very low light on, flick through another book and put her down in her cot. everytime she gets up i put her down and sometimes hold her there till she falls asleep. when she is with dh, their routine might be different - it won't be a winding down environment in their house. but she winds down in the car on the way home and sometimes falls asleep, which of course is a problem if she wakes up when she gets home (not sure what to do about this - should i cut out midweek visits now)

when she wakes after i am in bed, she comes into my bed. sometimes she squirms a lot all night. all suggestions are much appreciated! have tried the cot mobiles and they seem to stimulate her.

I've just changed things with out little one recently, to simplify it, and have found she goes down much easier. We have bath, stories in the living room, then her milk on my lap in the dark in her bedroom while I sing. Now she sleeps straight away, was taking a few times of going in when I did stories in her room with low light. Might be worth a try?

its amazing how small changes can make a big difference. thanks i will definately be trying it out

it worked thanks it got her over to sleep, yay, but her in between sleep is still rubbish!

Oh, that's great news!

What do you do when she wakes in between?

the first time she wakes she comes into my bed. when she is messing about i keep trying to lift her back into a sleeping position, sometimes i roll over and ignore her, sometimes i give her calpol if she seems upset. i don't really do anything much. maybe i should get a tv in my room and watch movies!

Have you tried leaving her in her own room? I'd be waking all night too if I could cuddle and play with someone warm and fun!

If it were me, I'd ignore her until she cries, then go in to soothe every few minutes until she sleeps, repeat until she has the message that she's not going into your room.

ive tried many variations of that, to train her back to sleep. but when i became a single mum it just became too difficult - i just don't have the energy to be up beside her cot so many times a night. its just easier to bring her in my bed and i just don't have the will to go back there and try anymore!

Have you tried consistently for 3 nights? I've never found it takes more than 3.

yes i used to do it every night she wouldn't sleep - the first time i let her in my bed was when she got tonsilitis about a month after dh moved out, and i did do it on a consistent basis before this. perhaps i could try it again in the future... i just don't think i could do it now!