Split nights - what would you do?

[cocoya]

For the last 4 nights, DS - aged 2.5 - has been waking up just after midnight and staying wide awake for a couple of hours. He asks for the light to be turned on, read books, play with toys, to go into the living room and play, to have something to eat etc

We room share - he has his crib in my bedroom and usually in the night if he wakes I'll bring him into my bed and he will go to sleep there again quite quickly but the last 4 nights have been disastrous.

I have been keeping the light off, offering water, songs, cuddles but he just cries and cries until I put the lamp on and he can see some of his toys or I'll read him some books. Then it's a battle to get the lamp off again....

Should I cave much sooner and read him books in the hope he'll go back to sleep more quickly? Or will that just reinforce the night waking?

He was unwell last week, a cough followed by an ear infection so part of me thinks this could be linked to that?

His current sleep routine is
6am wake
12-2 nap
7.30 bed

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Have you tried dropping the nap?

No, because he has been unwell he has needed the sleep. My husband was also away for work so that was a change in the normal routine too.

I could try shortening the nap now he is on the mend?

Drop the nap. DS did exactly this, or slept through but started the day at 4am. Dropping the nap had him sleeping though again in a couple of days. Sounds like you are quite resistant to dropping the nap so at the bare minimum cut it off at 40 minutes or so and see if that helps.

DS is almost 2 and we've had to curb the nap recently. Can't let him sleep past 2 or for more than an hour. He's had 20 mins today in the car on the way back from the zoo.

He can't manage all the time without a nap yet but doesn't need 12 hours overnight AND 1 hour in the day so we find he wakes earlier (thankfully no overnight parties) when he has a nap or when his nap has been later when at his child minder.

I'd be looking to shorten the nap and see if that helps overnight.

Thanks for your replies.

Yes I suppose I am hesitant to drop the nap. The last time he skipped a nap was about a month ago and he got himself so worked up and overtired by 5.30pm that he made himself sick

Also, I very much thought it would be a gradual transition - maybe he would only take every other nap, then only a couple of times a week rather than drop them altogether all at once.

As he has been unwell I have been letting him nap longer than usual - for example yesterday he had 11.45 - 2.30 which is definitely too long. He is back at nursery today and therefore won't be napping until about 12.45 so I can cap that one at one hour and see if that makes a difference to his sleep tonight.

If you have dropped the nap, what do you do over nap time instead? I have seen suggestions of a 'quiet hour' or spending the time with books or similar?

It’s the nap. One of the most common causes of split nights is from too much day sleep, so not enough sleep pressure to stay asleep overnight. I wouldn’t totally drop the nap yet but definitely make it shorter.

Yesterday I capped the nap to 1hr 1pm-2pm.

He seemed more tired than usual and went down for bed really easily at 7pm. He woke at 1.15am for a drink and I thought "OK here we go!" but he went back to sleep again straight away and stayed down until 5.45am 🥳

Will continue with this routine and see how we go.

Thanks for all the advice on here

That’s great news, OP. Sometimes it can take a few days or even a good week of doing the same thing to see if it makes a proper difference or not but that definitely sounds like a good start.