10 month old suddenly waking sobbing from afternoon nap after only 30 mins

[Bella23]

My 10 month old DD has always been a very good sleeper and never says a peep when put down for her naps etc.
She happily goes down for a morning nap and I have to wake her from this one - usually after an hour.

For some bizarre reason for her lunchtime one she goes down happily and then bang on 30 mins wakes sobbing instantly. She's still really tired but seems very upset! this has been going on for a week now.

Can't think what's causing it as she never wakes from other sleeps like this. also she is ratty in the afternoon now as she's not had a long enough nap.

Any ideas?

This has happened with my dd ocasionally - she's 2 now. I always put it down to bad dreams. It's really upsetting to see but she does usually calm down.

I'm not sure why it's happening so frequently with your dd though - maybe someone else will have some advice soon...

Ds used to wake like this from afternoon naps. And after trying all sorts of things, someone on here suggested low blood sugar level.

So what we used to do was make sure he had a good snack before going to sleep (banana, cereal bar etc - not biscuits) And actually it did really seem to work.

Hope this helps.

don't know if its related but my ds went to one nap around this age and it could be that she just wants one long nap rather than two shorter ones and at this stage is not tired enough for a longer nap.

Guess if she wants to sleep more in the first nap it will be the second one you need to drop. Just let her sleep longer at this nap. If she has a good 2 hours at this nap then this will see her through to the evening. Try and put her down slightly later as well.

Agree with witch&chips, I gradually shortened ds's morning nap by 10 or 15 mins each day and then he started having a proper nap after lunch. he's 18 months now and sleeping at least 2.5hrs and much better for it!

hth

DD (14 months) normally has a good two hour nap in the morning and another hour in the afternoon, but on Tuesday we were out all day and she only managed 30 minutes - and this is what happened...

We put her to bed at 7pm (normally, we put her down at 7pm and don't hear out of her until 7am).

• At 7.30pm she woke sobbing and pretty much hysterical. We calmed her and put her back to bed.

• At 8.30pm she woke sobbing and pretty much hysterical. We calmed her and put her back to bed.

• At 9.30pm she woke sobbing and pretty much hysterical. We calmed her and put her back to bed.

• At 10.30pm she woke sobbing and pretty much hysterical. She calmed down as soon as DH walked in the room.

• At 11.30pm she woke crying but calmed down before we could get to her.

Our theory is that she was either having reoccurring nightmares, or - and this is more likely - she was stirring in her sleep and because she was so overtired, rather than turning over and settling back to sleep, she was getting upset that she'd woken.

Maybe your little one does need a longer sleep in the morning and then maybe just a catnap in the afternoon.

mmmmm.....I tried shortening her morning nap to see if she would then want more at lunch.

And the point about lengthening the morning nap is that my second DD is due in october and i would realy like them both to sleep over lunchtime.

Its weird though that this has only just started this week!

You may just have to go with what your DD wants/needs at the moment and let her sleep when she needs to.

Good luck.

my ds morning nap got longer and later over a period of a few months and eventually became a lunch time one. so guess this could happen to you as well.

my 8 wk old the same (only sleeps for up to 30 mins during the day and cries when she wakes) and now i'm wondering if i've helped establish bad daytime sleep habits by not encouraging a better ones from earlier on. any advice on how to start this routine late?

tbh at 8 weeks i wouldn't even spend a nanosecond worrying about routines/naps etc. enjoy your tiny one

My ds went through something similar when he was 10months old - he would shout like he was being torn limb from limb 1/2hr into his afternoon nap. Previously he had always done 1hr in the morning and 1.5 hrs in the afternoon. However at the time I was pg and in the really tired phase of the 1st trimester so when I put him down for a nap I would also go for a nap. One day I was really struggling to rouse myself to go and see to him when suddenly it went all quiet - he had gone back to sleep! So when he started shouting the next day I left him for a minute and again he went back to sleep. After about a week he stopped doing it. He continued to have his 2 naps until he was 16months (coincidentally dropped to 1 nap the week after dd was born).

Muddlingthru - I hacve tried to leave her to see if she will go back to sleep but she is sobbing and getting herself into a real state so doesn't go back to sleep as she is just working herselfinto a state !