Daytime nap hell - come talk to me please

[sunshine75]

Aaaaargh Dd is refusing to sleep during the day. We get 15-20 mins in the morning and 25-40 mins in the afternoon. It doesn't happen naturally and she has to be encouraged to do this (stroking, pram, lying beside me on the bed)I know I shouldn't complain 'cos she sleeps ok at night (7-6.30ish with a few wakes/resettles) but i'm shattered. All day she just crawls, clambers and climbs and I don't get a rest at all.

She's 9 months by the way. Every book I've read says they should sleep for 2 hours in the afternoon!!! Has anyone else had a baby like this?

My son never slept for longer than 30 mins at this age....

He started sleeping longer once he reached one, he now does 1.5 hours at once!!!

Not got any advice, just to say I understand where you are coming from with the no rest!!

Bugger, I'll be back to work by then ans someone else will be reeping the benefits of a long sleep

Yep same happened here, but think of the nice weekend sleeps you get!!!

what time is the morning nap?

drop the morning nap, but her to bed around 1pm you'll probably get an hour out of it.

do you think the babies read the books?

its just par for the course....

sorry not to be more helpful xx

Hi there. I have one tip that I read in a book that actually worked for my dd (amazing!). It said to sit just outside their room or by the cot in the time leading up to when they are likely to wake from a nap so that you are there as soon as they start to stir (take a book to read if that helps pass the time!). As soon as they start to stir do whatever you usually do to soothe them to sleep (stroke back, hair etc) and try and get them back to sleep. So hopefully you get another sleep cycle out of them. You might need to do this for a few days in a row and then hopefully they start to sleep that bit longer without you helping them.

I think I only did it once with my dd and from then on she had longer naps! I remember being so amazed. But she did obviously need a longer sleep, she would wake up tired and crying. Perhaps try it for your dd's afternoon nap. It's my one sleep tip and I try and share it with everyone that might benefit!

Oodles of sympathy. We just had all this with DS - but we seem to now be coming out the other side so there is hope (DS is 11.5mo)!

Second what Zulu said (did you read it in CSS E Pantley Zulu?) - we did it and found DS did go back to sleep as long as we got in their quick enough - but even after a month it never seemed to stick with our DS.

Not sure of your routine - how late do you put DD down for her lunch-nap? This ended up being the key for us.

What we found was that DS was basically dropping his first nap but still needed about 10/15m to get him through to the lunch-nap. I started limiting him to max 15m morning nap, but if he does not go down within 25/30m I give up trying (usually do this in the pram walking to be honest as much less stressfull). Then, I make sure he is down for his lunch nap by, say, 12noon if he had no morning nap, or 12.30 at the latest if he grabbed 10/15m. (P.S: DS wakes about 6.15/6.30 usually)

With us, waking after 30/45m was a result of over-tired - he could not make it through to the next cycle. So it was just a case of putting him down a bit earlier.

We now get 1hr20/30m most days (once in a blue moon he throws in a 2hr one for me as a treat)!

Hope this helps. Good luck.