Split nights, please help

[snorlax99]

I've posted on here before about split nights and got no response, but I am getting a bit desperate for sleep so I am trying again. In a nutshell, my son is 18 months old, never been the best sleeper and we've had split nights off and on since 4 months old. He started sleeping through occasionally around 16 months, and some nights he still does, but I'd say 5 out of 7 nights a week he's up around 2am for about 2 hours. He's not poorly, calpol doesn't make a difference so I don't think it is due to teething. He has 1 nap a day, if he's at nursery this might only be 45mins, but he naps better at home for anything up to 3hrs, but generally averages 1.5hrs - 2hrs nap at 12:30. He goes to bed at 19:30. Wakes up between 6 and 7. He's in a dark room, in his own cot. We have white noise playing. Heating on low so he isn't cold. We're absolutely exhausted and have actually paused TTC baby number 2 because we don't know how we'll cope with getting up so often with a baby and a toddler. Has anyone managed to find the cause of split nights in their toddler?

For us, regular split nights have usually meant we're trying for too much sleep in a 24 hour period. What you describe is a pretty typical sleep schedule for an 18 month old, but not all of them need that much sleep. It sounds like he's relatively flexible on timings, so you could probably try cutting down whichever way suits you best – shorter nap, later bedtime, even an earlier start to the day if a very early start happens to work for you.

@skkyelark thank you for replying. I don't know how much shorter we can cut his nap, as some days he has as little as 45 mins and will still have a split night. I suppose I could put him to bed a bit later but he generally goes down quickly at half 7. I'm not really willing or able to start my day any earlier than 6am, tbh, so may have to try a later bed time first. Thanks for your advice.

Hiya my little one has had split nights on and off for last few years but as mentioned by previous poster it was often if she’d had too much sleep in 24 hours but we’d find it could have a knock on effect from previous days. So if she’d had an extra long nap at home one day and then 30 mins the next day she’d still have split nights.

To get out of the habit we had to cap the nap to similar each day and after a week or so we’d see a difference.

We had major split nights just before dropping the nap recently too and now it’s been a good few months since our last one so hopefully that’s it now! Xx

Yeah, we're the same – it's not allowed to be morning before 6am here.

Apparently historically split nights used to be a really common sleep pattern, adults, children, everyone, so biologically, it's a really normal pattern – just very inconvenient for modern adults.

How does he do if you keep his at home naps more like 1-1.5 hours and avoid the 2-3 hour ones? That might trim enough sleep off his week to make a difference, if you prefer that to pushing bedtime back.

Maybe drop the nap? Also, is he too hot? Is the room too dark?

Thanks everyone for your advice.

@Emmibea18 I think I might cap the nap at 1.5hrs and see if it makes a difference. I definitely think when he's had a split night he compensates by having a really long nap the next day. But usually I'm so tired myself I can't contemplate waking him up. But I might have to accept it in the short term for the (hopefully) long term gain if it helps him sleep better at night.

@skkyelark yes, I've never got him up before 6am. We went though a hell-ish phase of 5-5:30am wake ups and we never left his room until at least 6am because I just wasn't prepared to entertain it. Thankfully at least that phase has passed. I think I'm going to try keeping his naps to 1.5hrs, then if that doesn't help look at shifting bed time back a bit.

@notknowledgeable he's only 18 months, so I don't really want to drop his nap altogether. I do think he needs a nap as he tends to go down very easily for a nap, but maybe he's napping too long some days which is making things inconsistent. He did drop to 1 nap at 10 months though, so I am prepared for the fact he may drop the nap altogether quite early. I don't think he's too hot as he's dressed appropriately for the temperature of the room according to the room temperature charts. He has a very dim night light so it isn't complete pitch darkness in there so I wouldn't say it was too dark either.

I think 18 months is a common age for sleep needs to reduce. Mine needed his nap capping from this age. I too find that if DS sleeps a lot in one set of 24hrs, the next set of 24hrs he needs less. Thankfully now he doesn't nap any more it just means he wakes earlier in the morning and it's not as complicated to work out.

You have to not give him any chance to catch up on sleep except in the night time. I would trim the nap as others have suggested, I'd also make sure he's always up at roughly the same time whilst doing this so he doesn't just add the sleep he's not getting in the day onto the morning and continue with the split night pattern. You'll have a cranky child for a while but you've got to reset his system. It will be like when you have jet lag as an adult. Keep him busy outside and hopefully he won't be too grumpy.

I didn’t let my DC sleep more than 75-90 minutes at that age and I woke them up before 2pm.

As an alternate strategy, what happens if you don't go in to him? My DC I think has always been a wake at night sometimes, even as an infant, we realized that sometimes she would just lay quietly in her moses basket for 30 minutes and then go back to sleep. As a older child, we would hear her chatting to her stuffed kitty and then she'd go back to sleep. She's 5 now and we think still does the same (we stopped listening a long time ago!). Can you get your DC to just be happy in the cot then at least you can sleep?

I’d go for the later bedtime. Then the wake up is later 4.30-5 am wake up isn’t bad once you get used to it

@LGBirmingham @NewYear24 I have been keeping his naps to 1.5 hrs and up by 2pm and so far we've not had another split night, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that's helping. He's come down with some snotty/chesty viral thing though, so it could all change with illness etc.

@Happyhappyday I only go to him if he cries. Sometimes, he'll wake up for a bit and chat or sing to himself and then take himself back off to sleep. Then other nights he cries and we have a split night.

@Autumn1990 a regular 4:30-5am wake up is not for me.

Thanks for the update, that’s good to hear.

Great news!

@snorlax99 did cutting the nap down each day to 1.5hrs & waking at the same time each day help with this?!

weve been having awful split nights since 11/12m (he’s now over 17m) and it’s awful. Wakes between 12&3am and often awake for 2-3hrs. Doesn’t seem to matter the length of nap but now hopeful that if I’m strict with nap length and wake time regardless of how the night went then he’ll be forced to sleep at night as there won’t be another opportunity to catch up on zzz’s … 🙏🏻

@ecossegirl91 Yes, it has definitely improved the situation and he now mostly sleeps through from 7:30pm - between 6:30/7am. We have the occasional mad night where he gets up still, but it has gone from every night to maybe once or twice a week. And whereas he used to be up for 2-3hrs, it isn't anywhere near as long now. So still far from perfect but definitely progress and I don't feel like the sleep deprivation is killing me anymore.

@snorlax99 thank you for replying - so pleased it better for you, the split nights nearly every night are torture aren’t they! I’m so pleased I found this thread I feel like I’ve been researching this for months (and had my own threads about it!) I’ll try nap capping and same wake ups to see if it helps over here!

@LGBirmingham are you meaning me? I don’t know what you mean sorry?

@ecossegirl91 someone posted about some stupid noise app trying to get business I reported and it's been deleted. Not you don't worry!

How are you getting on?

im currently going through a split nights phase with my 11 month old! Please someone help me. When should she drop to 1 nap? We usually have 20/30 mins in the morning and 2hrs in the afternoon. Always up by 3pm. Bed at 7.30pm. Currently in the midst of said split night hence the message lol!

@99SR dropping the morning sleep, then having one nap after lunch from 12:30 until 2 solved this for us. Some will say it is early to drop the first nap, but all kids are different and it was right for us. Hope you find a solution that works, split nights are hell x

@99SR , both of mine were ready to drop to one nap around 10-11 months. With DD1, we tried to keep two naps going because everything said it was too early – it really, really did not work. She just wasn't tired enough.

We also never had a consistent 2 hours in the afternoon – most days were 1-1.5 hours, 2 maybe once or twice a week. (Mine also never were on board with an exact schedule.)