Afternoon nap - is it time to go?

[mummychicken]

DS is 2.6. He has a routine of 7pm bath, teeth, story, bed, for over a year and he aslo has a 1.5 to 2.5 hour nap in the afternoon from about 1.30 pm. Therehas never been an issue with going to sleep at night. Until now......

Last night he was singing, banging, shouting etc until 8.45pm. Tonight he stopped at 8.30pm

I think my options are

a) get rid of the nap and put him to bed earlier

b) keep the nap and put him to bed later

c) reduce nap time (an hour maybe)and try and keep bedtime the same

Anyonehave any experience or other suggestions?

I would cut down the nap time - if its 1.5 to 2.5 hours you've got plenty of scope to cut it down to e.g. 1 hour and see how that goes. If it doesn't work, then at least you're gradually getting him used to even less sleep or no nap.

I would also try to make sure the nap starts no later than 1pm, so he's up and about earlier in the afternoon, and more tired by bedtime.

FWIW my DD1 is 2.9 and needs the most sleep of any child I know. But if I give her more than 1.75 hrs at lunch, she won't go to bed without a huge fuss (well, more than normal...). As she gets older and starts playing up again, I just cut down the nap time by 15 mins, so next time we'll be down to 1.5 hours etc.

Thanks LWCOT - I tried 1.5 hrs today and he went to bed without a fuss (still sang and played for a while but at least no tantrum).

Good idea about getting the nap in earlier as well, may have to work on that by putting him to bed 5 mins earlier each day

Good stuff, every easy bedtime is a bonus at this age!

The tantrums start with DS at tea time as well going into bedtime. As we all eat together we have started ignoring him - If he wants tea he can join us, if not he can play. He gets bored really quickly and has joined us (big praise etc) every time and eaten beautifully. (however, didn't help with bedtime but made tea time alot nicer)

I think they definitely go through stages of pushing boundaries don't they? DD1 is usually (mostly) an angel, but every couple of months we have a horrific few days/week where I think she just grows up a bit and tries to see what else she can get away with (and what she can do to get attention). It always takes me a few days to realise what's going on, and once I become Tough Love Mummy, and reinforce rules and boundaries, she normally calms down again. Ignoring is a really good tip - hard to do, but it really works!

Sigh, only just realised today that we're going through another one of these phases. Just put her down for her nap, from her cot - 'mummy, come here I want to kick you'. Er, no, I don't think so!

'mummy, come here I want to kick you'

PMSL

That is the sort of thing I can imagine my DD saying (2.1)

"yes dear, I'll be right up in a minute. Shall I bring you up some boots so you can do it really hard?"

Toddlers are great.

I know, I had to try really hard to be frowny and not laugh. Its the pure innocence that she really thinks I might be OK with that! We're currently going through a zero tolerance policy on kicking (DD2 having been at the receiving end unfortunately), hence her obsession with it.

I had to tell DH about this - it made him feel a bit better about dd's habit of shouting at 3am

"daddy, daddy, I want a big hug"