Time to drop to just one nap? Or too soon?

[designerbaby]

Hi all,

DD is 11 months and has never been a huge daytime napper. However, her current routine isn't really working on a number of levels, so I'm wondering if it's time to drop to just one nap, btu am worried that she seems a little young for this...

She currently wakes at around 7am, naps for 40mins or so at about 10, but then isn't ready for her afternoon nap until abut 2.30 - but if I leave her to sleep for much more than 40 minutes then , she's a nightmare to get down for bed at 7pm. Plus these two timing mean we can't really do any activities much because both morning and afternoon are b*ggered up by naps.

Wondering if I should try for just one longer nap at about 12/12.30 instead? Or whether you think she's too young and I should just cope as it is for now?

Any experiences?

Thanks muchly

db
xx

This could have been me writing this.

My daughter is nearly ten months, she is just like yours wakes around 7.00am then sleeps around ten for about 30-40 mins, and has a nap around 2.30 and bed at 7.00.

She is trying to drop the 2.30 nap herself, she is very obviously tired but she will not sleep. But this has caused problems because when she has her dinner around 4.30-5.00pm she is too tired to eat it and falls asleep in it. I like her to have a bottle just before bed but this can't be done as she's too tired.

So it's either letting her go to bed later and fall asleep around 5.00pm or trying to get her to have her afternoon nap earlier which is what you are saying.

I have no advice to offer unfortuately, just to let you know I symapthise.

If your daughter is prepared to go to sleep around 12.30pm then i'd do that.

Total sleep in 24 hours is more important than how it's distributed. There is no harm in trying it and seeing how you get on. I would also try putting her down earlier in the morning, say 9am, and then again 3 hours after she wakes from that nap. A 2-3-4 pattern suits a lot of babies/toddlers.

my ds went to one nap at 11 months due to this reason. i found he wanted a nap at 11:30am so had to plan lunch early. i did take a couple of weeks of changing between one and two naps a day but we got their soon enough and his miday nap was a nice length of usually 2 hours.

My dd used to do something similar nap wise. once the afternoon nap went pear i started to cut down the morning nap by 5-10 mins at a time whilst moving the afternoon nap gradually forward a bit. Does this make sense. She was 9-10 months when this happened. I wouldn't just stop it altogether as your dd may get overtired.

I cut it down over the course of 2 weeks and it went well.
this is her routine now.
7.30am wakes. milk & breakfast
12.00 lunch
12.30pm sleep
2.30pm wakes

I do have to get her down by 12.30 otherwise sleep is up and down.

Thanks for all your responses ? I feel a bit more confident about giving it a go...

Ches, I've tried putting her down at 9 instead of 9.30/10 ? all that happened was it took 45minutes to get her down!?

I do wonder about just doing it gradually, as you suggest Barnsleybelle... cutting her morning nap down by 5 minutes a day. I am concerned that lunch will be hopeless if she's tired.

I'll give it a whirl tomorrow - it's a quiet day with nothing much planned so if it all goes pear shaped and I end up with a melting-down baby it'll be easier to cope with. If it's a disaster I'll try the more gradual approach...

At least you don't all think I'm mad - it's just that most of my NCT chums (whose babies are mostly a full month older than mine) are still on 2 full naps (a couple are still on 3!?) a day, so I felt like perhaps I was out of my tree to be contemplating just one...

db
xx

I think it's best to be led by your baby, and it sounds to me like perhaps she's ready to drop the nap. DS is 12.5 months, and he dropped his morning nap a few weeks ago. He had been going down at about 9/9.30am, but it started taking him at least 30 minutes to get to sleep, and then he wouldn't go down at lunchtime until really late. For a few weeks I varied his naps, sometimes giving him a morning sleep and sometimes not (depending on when he woke up and how active he'd been in the morning). Now, though, he's given up the morning nap for good - even if he wakes up at 5.30am (which he unfortunately does occasionally!) he still makes it through until 12/12.30 pretty happily.

And it's really freed me up to do more things with him in the mornings. Only problem we have now is that if we go out somewhere in the morning, he sometimes falls asleep in the car on the way home, and then it can be harder to get him to go down for his lunchtime nap.

My ds dropped to one long nap at 10 months, slept better for it and was much happier HTH

my DD is 10 months and heading towards mainly 1 nao now, too. she will sometimes sleep in the car on the way back from somewhere in the afternoon, but if we're at home, she will very rarely sleep in the afternoon

i decided that fighting her to sleep for an hour only for her to nap say 20 or 30 mins wasn't worth it, so she now usually only has a morning nap

i put her down when she starts looking tired - usually around 9.45, after waking at 6.30/7

she does get worn out by the end of the day, and i do still try and put her down at about 4, but no longer force the issue. i thought it was a bit early too, but i guess some babies are happier to nap than others. she hasn't been on 3 naps a day for a loooooong time.

i think you have to do what suits your baby. if night sleep is good, then naps are less of a worry, i would say. DD does 11/12 hours at night without a peep out of her. maybe those who nap better in the day are night wakers?

Hmmm.... Not sure how successful it was today. She made it through lunch and til 12.30pm quite happily (she woke at 6.50 this morning) - I took her out in the buggy this morning to take her mind off the fact that she's usually sleeping - she got a bit cranky occassionally while we were out but was fine when we got back.

Went down fairly easily at 12.30 but then wok 20 minutes later with a yelp... managed to resettle her and she had another 45 minutes and then woke again. I was worried that she hadn't had enough sleep so cuddled her while she dozed for another 20 minutes or so - so she had an hour and a half.

However when she woke properly and I changed her she'd done a huge poo - which was probably what woke her...

So I'm not sure if she was overtired and so woke prematurely, whether it was the poo which woke her, or whether, despite having no sleep for 5 1/2 hours or more she'll still only sleep 45 minutes (because she's gotten into a habit of shorter naps...?).

She was pretty tried by bedtime and acting up a bit, which she doesn't usually. And she's had a few little wakes this evening, which again is unusual. We'll see how tonight goes...

I guess I'll have to try again and see what happens - although we're out over lunchtime tomorrow, so I'm not going to risk it.

Hmmmm... I dunno. Naps have always been tricky with my LO. Was hoping one nap would be the answer... ho hum.

Thanks foall the advice though...

db
xx

Naps were always tricky with mine as well, so I sympathise. Not saying that one nap is definitely the right thing for your LO right now, but I do think any change of routine always unsettles them for a bit, so maybe you need to stick with it for a bit longer (if that's what you decide to do). My DS had some fairly short single naps for a while after we changed, but now I often have to wake him after 2 hours. It's made no difference to his morning waking time, though, which is what I'd been hoping (some people told me that when their LOs dropped their morning naps they started waking much later in the morning - I wish!). Good luck!