Baby starting nursery - 1 nap a day

[Busybee1991]

Hi all new mum here!

my baby will be starting nursery soon, he will have just turned one. I was asking them about their routines etc and explained he is on 2 naps a day at the moment (around 9/9:30 and 2/2:30, bedtime about 7:30) for 1-1.5 hours each. They explained that they usually run off a one nap day routine around 12pm after lunch and that they can try and put him down for 2 naps but because it’s so busy it’s unlikely he will sleep until the 12pm nap. That is fine, I know my son well enough to know he will stay away when there’s chaos around him and there’s not much that can be done about that.

I’m concerned as he often wakes up before 6am most days no matter what I do. So he would be awake for 6+ hours before his first nap. I’m anticipating a super overtired baby when I pick him up.

how did others find this transition? Did babies cope okay? The nursery said if I can push his first nap closer to 11am he will manage better but even now I don’t see me pushing him another 2 hours before his first nap before nursery starts.

any reassurance would be great, thanks

When i went to settle mine in she was on two naps a day. they said they will keep them in two naps if we want but generally they drop to one as everything is so exciting and they just fit in with what the others are doing so not to miss out.

Both my friends and i have found our kids have totally different schedules on home days than nursery days. One of them has two naps at home but one longer one at nursery. My daughter does her nap at 11 at home and will literally fall asleep on you if you dont put her down by 1130 but at nursery she naps at 12:30 with the other kids. they do put her down if she's tired before then (she's very clear with what she wants) but it happens rarely.

So please don't stress. They all figure themselves out and adapt and change as time goes on

When my daughter started at 10m old she had such a long morning nap she would go to sleep at 9/9:30 and wake for lunch, missing the whole morning. She was pretty much the only one awake after lunch, gradually her nap moved later and she ended up on their sleep pattern in her own time.
She was totally fine with the change as it was gradual. Hopefully your son will just adapt and go with what's going on around him. I was happy with the change as it meant we could go to playgroup etc on her days at home!

Ahhhgggghh I feel your pain. This was what happened at the first nursery I sent my DD to at 12mo. He really needed 2 naps and they ran off a 1 nap routine. Ridiculous when the room was for babies ages 8mo - 2yrs.

They would try put hum down at 9/9.30am for a quick nap but most of the time he wouldn't sleep amongst other kids playing 🙄
Sometimes if he did go to sleep they'd let him sleep for an hr then he wouldn't have a lunch nap because he wasn't tired by 12 🤨
What I ended up doing was giving him a quick nap at home at 9am for 15mins then dropping him in. Obviously this was ridiculous and ate into my work day but he could not cope 3 days in a row on one nap. I did this till he was about 16mo.

I can't understand why nurseries have children that age but can't offer 2 naps which is what most need. The carers would say to me that the children all slept well, some of them even fell asleep at the table during their lunch ... sounds like they could have done with a morning nap to me!

We've now moved house and I've got DD starting nursery when she's 1 later this year. I've made sure they can accommodate 2 naps otherwise I would have looked for childminder or nanny to get us to 18 months.

My DS was on a long lunch nap and a 10 min morning power nap when he started at nursery at 11 months.
The nursery did try to put him down for his morning nap but he was always too interested in what was going on to fall asleep - also doesn't sleep in his buggy.
Now at 16 months he's just dropped his morning nap completely both at home and at nursery.
He only goes to nursery 3 days a week so he was able to catch up on sleep at the weekend and the 2 days I don't work so we got through the last 5 months ok. If your baby's going to be in nursery for 5 days a week that might become a bigger issue.

Ah yeah we are on 3 days a week so this is reassuring! He may be napping differently by the time it comes around but as long as he can catch up on his days off that’s really good!