10 month old refusing to nap!

[GlummyMummy]

Having a terrible time just now with our 10 month old. She is cutting her top teeth and has a cold so there is a lot going on just now! The major issue is that she has suddenly started refusing to nap in her cot during the day. Prior to this she had two good naps at the same times every day. She is a very active alert baby who is never still, but despite this, she went to sleep as soon as I put her down in her cot. She has never really been much of a pram napper and certainly not now she is bigger as she likes to sleep on her tummy or side which her pram doesn't really allow.

In the last couple of weeks she started by dropping her afternoon nap some days, but her morning nap was still a good nap of up to one hour 30, usually about 2 hours after her morning getting up time. Now she has started to drop the morning nap too, sometimes having the afternoon nap and sometimes no nap at all!! I wouldn't really mind if she was sleeping through the night but she is up at least once every night.

Yesterday and today, she is flatly refusing to nap in her cot at all! As soon as I put her in her cot, she pulls up to standing and throws her dummy away, I go in and replace the dummy and lie her back down and this routine goes on and on and on until I give in and get her up! I've tried lullaby music, giving her milk before the nap, reading quietly to her beforehand but as soon as she goes in the cot it's like she becomes mega hyper for a while, blowing raspberries and lumping up and down in her cot, before it turns into full blown tears, sobbing and howling! And that's just me!! ;-) haha. My poor neighbours!

The only way I have got her to nap in the last couple of days is to finally relent and take her out in the car, driving aimlessly around, at which point she falls asleep. I can't do that twice a day every day though, I couldn't afford the petrol for one thing! Then as she's taken all afternoon to go to sleep, I end up having to wake her for her tea at 5pm!

I'm at my wits end. The worst thing is that with all this hassle with the naps, it is preventing us from going out and doing things, plus I feel her actual play time is being reduced as it's taking me sometimes 2 hours to get her to go to sleep!

I am hoping this is just a phase and not going to be a permanent thing, but hopefully someone can offer some advice/tips.

Possibly developmental leap (have you checked wonder weeks?) plus teething/cold plus sounds like she might be getting ready to drop a nap too.

Usually when babies go from 2-1 naps the afternoon nap stays & the morning nap goes. However there is a transition period where they may do exactly what your daughter is doing. If she takes a long morning nap then she has a very long afternoon to get through & so can end uo overtired at bedtime, leading to night wakings & early waking. You could try for a late afternoon catnap on those days or failing that an early bedtime. If she screams & refuses her morning nap & you wait til usual afternoon naptime she will be overtired leading to screaming.

What you ultimately need to aim for is a single nap starting after lunch but this could be a way off yet (several months). In the mean time I would slowly shift her morning nap later by 10-15mins every 3-5 days, until she readily takes it. This might be at say 11am for a while & she may sleep for 2-3 hours & then follow it with an early bedtime. If her nap is shorter try & get her to catnap at around 3/4pm to get her through to bedtime. Its unfortunately a messy sleep phase & she may have 2 naps some days & 1 nap on others until she is ready for 1 nap every day. But she will get there. Good luck!

What time is she napping in the morning? Dd went from 9/9:30 ish to nearer 10 at this age. If I tried to put her down earlier she would kick off, but a bit later and she would be more willing.

Hi Littlef00t, thanks for your post. She usually naps about 2 and a half hours from when she gets up, so roughly about 9.30 usually. She usually goes straight over to sleep but for the past week she has been fussing about for about 15 minutes in her cot before going over to sleep. Today, it got to an hour after putting her in the cot and I had to go out so just got her up.

omama - thanks for your useful info. I thought she was too early to be dropping a nap, especially when she isn't sleeping through the night. The morning nap is the one she tends to favour, whereas I get more protest in the afternoon. It's odd because she is still rubbing her eyes so I am assuming that's her ready to nap rather than not being tired yet.

What used to work for dd at this age at nap time was to be in a dark room, white noise machine on and her in her sleeping bag, then I'd hug her standing up and walk around rhythmically humming a tune.

googietheegg - that's interesting as white noise used to work for her, but then she went through a stage of not liking that, maybe it would be worth a try again, thanks for the suggestion.

She's having her morning nap at the moment, pushed it back to 3 hours after she got up (she was awake early this morning) and she's had 1 hour 20 minutes nap so far. Don't know whether to waken her as that seems too long for a morning nap, or just to let her sleep. We aren't going out so think I will just let her sleep but I am guessing she might not want to nap later which means it will be long time till bedtime!

How long did she have altogether? Too late now but I would have done the same & left her. The risk in letting her having a long & early nap on a regular basis though is that she will start waking early on a regular basis too. Then the temptation is to let her nap earlier because she is tired from the early start, but this rarely helps & usually perpetuates the cycle.

I really would try shifting the morning nap a bit later & nip it in the bud before it becomes a problem. If she usually settles after 15mins try 9.45am initially, or push it to 10am if needed. Expect the afternoon nap & possibly bedtime to shift slightly later too. Its just a case of figuring out her new sleep needs. And once she starts resisting/early waking again, move the morning nap 15mins later again. Hth

Thanks for this omama. She has only had one nap per day since then, usually the morning one and not the afternoon one, but today she had the afternoon one and not the morning as she didn't get up till 8.30am ( was up twice overnight though!) My partner has been doing the put downs as I've not been feeling well and frustratingly, she has been settling easily for him! Typical!