Sometimes you bite the nap, and sometimes the nap bites you

As promised, two jokes from my children:

From the 7-year-old: Q: What did one fart say to the other fart? A: [Fart noise.]

From the 10-year-old: Q: What did one cheesemonger say to the other cheesemonger? A: Who cut the cheese??

(They sleep all the way through the night. There's that.)

Now: Naps, naps, naps. It seems that all the children of the world are freaking out about naps in the last few weeks. Changing their times, condensing from two to one, dropping them entirely, having problems falling asleep for them.

I think it's the change of seasons, mostly.

And I don't have a blanket (ha!) answer.

If you're in a sleep regression time (4 months, 9 months, 13 months, 18 months, 24-27 months), nap issues are likely symptomatic of that sleep regression (especially if your kid's nighttime sleep is relatively unchanged) and if you can hang on you'll probably get a good nap routine back after the regression is over.

If you're not in a sleep regression time, is there anything else going on? Teething? Learning to crawl/sit/stand/walk/run? All these things can seriously affect sleep, including naps.

If it's not any of the above, then your number just may be up, and this is the new normal. I'm sorry.

Say something about naps.

Comments

[Ellie B]

my daughter dropped he naps at 20 months. like, done, finito. my son napped until he was 4 and would still sleep if he was in the car at the right time.

[Bonnie]

The 18-month regression is EATING ME ALIVE!
And the almost-4-year-old is going through an afraid-of-the-dark phase.
And they share a room.
And both have a cold.
The 18-month-old's nap is great. It's the nighttime sleep that is killing us. Slowly.

At least I know we're not alone...

[Cordy]

Our not-quite-3 year old just dropped his nap. For one thing, he started preschool (which, although only partial day, is during the part when he normally naps, and it's just too freaking exiting to think about sleeping, apparently.)

And for another, he still nurses to sleep, and with nap, that was taking an hour or more (uuuughhhh). Now that he's not napping, after the lights go out, it's 10-15 minutes. Which has done wonders for my sanity, so I've been encouraging the no-nap thing.

HOWEVER. Recently, he's been waking at the crack of dawn, which is not just annoying for us, it's not enough sleep for him. I don't know if this is tied to the no-nap thing or is about something else.

Frankly, the early wakeups are filling me with despair. And I think he's unhealthily exhausted by the end of the day. So I don't know what to do. Try an earlier/later bedtime? Go back to naps? Even if they'd have to be really late naps that would mean he didn't wake up until 5:30?

[Cynthia]

I hate naps. Am I the only one? Hate planning my day around the nap, hate the it's-too-early/going-on-for-too-long/whoops-too-late/fell-asleep-wearing-a-winter-hat-and-coat-in-stroller-let-sleep-or-move?

Once in a while, you get that perfect break, but more often than not it's just annoying.

Older quit napping between 2.5 and 3 and I was relieved. Younger (2.3) has been skipping occasionally but still can't quite make it through without. One more year of naps and I'm done forever!

[AEV]

Oh dear, my 22 month old who has always been an amazing napper/night sleeper just stopped napping out of nowhere. She mostly naps the three days she's at daycare, but won't nap while at home. She learned to climb out of her crib a few months ago, so we had to move her to a toddler bed and it was smooth sailing with that transition so I don't think it was to blame. This came out of nowhere and is insane -- particularly since on the two days I am home with her during the week, I use that time to make work calls/do work emails, etc. I've made her stay in her room and if she won't sleep at least she has "quiet time" and I get a few things done, but it's still nuts. The minute we get in the car to go somewhere she instantly falls asleep - so I know she is tired. Please tell me this isn't the new normal!!

[Meggan]

We moved my 2.5-year-old into a toddler bed recently, ever since he figured out how to escape his crib in 0.2 seconds flat. Now, his 9am wakeup time (don't hate me) has shifted to anywhere from 6:15 to 7:45am. He goes to bed around 8:30 or 9pm (usually closer to 9). Naps are okay still and last around 1.5-2hrs.

Sometimes, especially during the 6 o'clock hour, I can put him back in bed saying "It's very early; it's not time to get up yet; please go back to sleep." and it will work for another hour, sometimes two. If it's closer to 8am, I don't generally try to put him back down.

I can't quite figure out why he gets up when he does; he seems like he still needs the missing hours. I think maybe he used to wake up then anyway, but since he was in a crib he'd just roll over and fall asleep again. Now that he's in a bed he can escape from himself, he just... gets up.

What can I do? Should I try putting him to bed at 7pm?

[SarcastiCarrie]

I'm with Cynthia. My next story will illustrate why I don't care for naps and merely tolerate them as a necessary evil.

And @AEV - I put my first son to sleep by taking a 5-minute car ride every day for a year. Then I would transfer him to his crib or bed. Seriously. If the kid was tired, he'd fall asleep in the car but could not keep himself still enough in the crib to fall asleep. Boy need to be restrained (in fact, I did not have to drive the car...merely sit in it in the garage, which is....strange).

[Susan]

Naps can bite my ... ahem. My 3 year old does not nap anymore. If he does, it's like some sort of miracle. We're experimenting with a later bedtime hoping he's just getting too much nighttime sleep. This is my DH's idea, because I don't think that's possible. I just think my kid is of the non-napping variety and we're playing with fire.

I'd give up the effort if he wasn't in a daycare that forces two hour naps. Because on some days, he cannot be quiet for two hours and gets in trouble instead.

The Internet tells me all sorts of things that don't help at all. Like, "just leave your child alone and he'll get bored to sleep." Actually, no. The Internet has not met my child. Nothing makes him sleepy. Nothing.

[Tine]

I see Susan^ and I harbor the same hostility toward naps. I was just about to type "Naps can kiss my...".

We're beyond napping (ages 6 & 9), but man. When my kids were babies and I really NEEDED them to nap, they would. not. nap. EVER! And when they got bigger and I wanted to be less shackled to the house, they (especially the 9yo) stubbornly persisted with the napping.

Sigh.

I just learned to lower my expectations.

[eep]

Life gets easier when naps are no longer a concern. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel with my youngest, at 2.5. We can go for outings and skip naps once a week or so, and that makes it all manageable. I wasted so much of my life agonizing over naps and I a glad it is almost done.

[Blanche]

Thank you, thank you, thank you! My daughter is at almost 27 months and has gone completely off schedule with naps in the past 2 weeks and I had no. idea. why.

It's about driven me off the rails, so any glimmer of hope that she will return to napping (for even a few months longer) is enough to survive and not despair quite so much.

Whether it's the change of seasons or sleep regression or that we've recently moved into a new house (with a longer than anticipated lay-over at the in-laws), this too will pass, yes?

[Joy]

My 28 month old hasn't napped in 7 days. Then, today after finally just figuring we'd accept and move on...he fell asleep in the car for an hour (at 3:20pm) and stayed asleep when I took him out of the car and went grocery shopping (we were an odd sight I'm sure). Nothing like waking up in Trader Joe's cereal aisle...or trying to grocery shop with a 2.5 year old asleep in your arms.

Is there any way to know for sure when naps are just DONE? I keep reading stuff that emphasizes how important naps are for cognitive development, and since we are continuing to worry about DS's lack of speech (his sound effects are a-maz-ing, but someday it would be nice for him to say red rather than make a siren noise) I'm feeling really rather stressed about the whole darn thing!

[angieD]

I have one simple request of my 12 month old when it chines to naps: the length of you're nap must EXCEED the amount of time it takes me to get you to sleep. Nothing makes me lose it more than when I spend 30 minutes rocking my son to sleep and he only naps for twenty minutes. Sigh.

[Schwa de Vivre]

@Meggan, moving bedtime to 7 might help, if your kid is that model. My kid wakes at 6:00-7:00 NO MATTER WHAT, but he sleeps later if he goes to bed earlier. Occasionally he'll fall asleep at 5/6 pm on the way home from daycare and be asleep for the night, though a bit restless. 7/7:30 seems to be the sweet spot. By 8:00 he's becoming a jerk. So it's worth a shot. Weissbluth recommends going earlier in 20 minute increments, for what that's worth, but when we finally figured it out, we didn't prolong the transition.

Another thing that might work is one of those $50 clocks that lights up at whatever time you set as wake-up time; then you train/bribe/somehow get your kid to stay in bed until the light changes. The cheap version is a night light and a lamp timer like you'd use when you're on vacation, though the $50 version has some other bells and whistles too. What's the name of that catalog, the parenting version of SkyMall? It's in that.

[Barb @ getupandplay]

"Say something about naps."

I would like one.

[Susan]

Naps. When my DCP gives my 5 month old DD a 4-5 oz bottle, she takes nice long nap, whereas when I nurse her to sleep, she takes a short crappy nap. So I feel like she's not getting enough milk from me or something. And that SUCKS.

[Karen]

I want back all of the hours I spent fretting over naps! Trying to get my daughter the sleep she needs has been stressing me out for over 2 years (22 months to age 4). It's so discouraging to realize that all of that stress was just hurting me and didn't get her a single minute more rest than she was going to get otherwise. She is just one of those kids who hates to sleep. Ugh.

[Charisse]

I was always with Cynthia, SarcastiCarrie, Susan, and Tine - naps are the work of the devil, and I was thrilled when Mouse stopped taking them at home right at 2. They break up your day and make your kid (ok, MY kid - YMMV) go to bed hours later. There was a horrible period between 3 and 4 where Mouse napped at a school that took naps late in the day, and couldn't sleep until 11:30 or after.

If you're dealing with a kid like mine (Mouse is 8 now and only naps when ill, like the rest of the family), here was my eventual theory on "the deal" with her. She is low sleep need in general, and could only sleep if she had been up for X hours or more, and that X got bigger as she got older. Even 5 minutes of sleep in the car would flip the switch. So at 1 1/2 if she snoozed for 5 mins in the car at 1pm, she wouldn't be able to go back to sleep until 6:30 or after and we'd usually just keep her up till bedtime. I remember at 3 she couldn't sleep unless she'd been up at least 7 hours, so she wouldn't go down for a 1pm nap at daycare, but would go down for a 3:45 nap at preschool; but when she got up at 4:30, she would be physically incapable of sleeping until 11:30. I can't tell you how hard I begged that teacher to keep her from napping (she wasn't/isn't cranky from too little sleep, almost ever, so she could power through until 8:30-9pm just fine as long as she didn't nap).

So, I guess I just leave this here as a beacon to those who have similar kids - it's true that there are kids for whom the "sleep begets sleep" thing is BS, and there is nothing wrong with them. If you have one, embrace the fun of having a kid you can take out all day and stop trying to match the odd creatures in books who must nap until the age of 5 and nap for hours at a time. BTW, this characteristic manifests now as a medium-size kid who beats jetlag quickly and can be taken out late on a school night on occasion with no consequences. It's all good.

[Dr. Confused]

My kid dropped naps at 15 months. Except when we went out of town, and then she started falling asleep when out and about. At 4, she's still a low-sleep-needs kid, so we put her in her room and make her play alone for an hour and a half before she turns off the light so we can get some adult time.

[Liz]

My son is 28 months and his naps have been slowly going to hell. It first started a few weeks ago when we took away the crib because he was climbing out. He shared a room with my 4 yr old daughter until 3 days ago when we put them in their own rooms, hoping each would rest quietly if alone. My girl does fine, just reads or plays quietly but my son acts like a maniac. He obviously needs the rest and is a monster without it. I am about to lose it. I also have a 10 week old baby who needs his sleep but i can't devote enough time to him because my 2 yr old son is screaming and crying and having a total meltdown. Plus I also need the quiet time. Uggggg. If my husband is home from work on his day off, he will sit with my son until he falls asleep. I tried that today and it did not work, plus i don't have the time or desire to do that. I need help.

[x]

whoa.
this timing is amazing!
like AEV, I have a 23 month old that is dropping naps. for us, luckily, she sleeps at home (agreed-those hours=sanity), but is only 50/50 at day care.
i think i'm okay with it. i want her to be healthy, but she is generally okay without, so maybe we get to do all the stuff we've being waiting for sooner than later.
though i will admit a glimmer of glee-filled hope when you mentioned the 24-27 month regression. (fingers crossed)

[beth]

There's a 24mo sleep regression?? So I probably shouldn't have chosen last night to nightwean my 25mo...again...because I was about to lose my mind with fatigue from feeding her six times a night. Damn.

Naps? I'm over them. I'm over splitting up the day around them. I'm over them occurring at arbitary times depending on how exciting the day is for her. I'm dreading how the hell she'll get to sleep other than walking in the pram if my slow-wean is successful...

I'm such a ray of sleep deprived sunshine...

[Claudia]

Exactly as Karen said, I want all those hours (and there were MANY) back that I spent fretting about the napping. Didn't change a freaking thing, but boy, was I stressed!

All I can say is I'm happy to be past it.

Data point: DD6 quit napping altogether right before she turned 3 1/2, after a month-long vacation where naps were difficult to schedule and achieve). She is a bit on the low side of sleep needs, and will never ever ever sleep in if she's kept up late, so her bedtime is still between 7:30 and 8 pm. Up at 6 sharp every day.

I'm also happy I no longer need naps since I found out I can't tolerate egg whites.

[Louise]

Cynthia I feel you.
Charisse - Mouse could be my little one years from now. She is 12months and exactly as you described. I like that she may be able to handle jet lag and hang out with her night owl mother withoutbeing to lethargic afterwards!
Naps are evil, unless my other half has the little one for an hour and it's me napping - in which case naps are awesome! But infant daytime sleep seriously bites big ones.

[Jane]

I'd like to talk about MY naps... Seriously. My son (only child) is 7.5. On the weekends, there is a point sometime between 1 to 3 pm where I am practically non-functional and must nap for between 20-50 minutes. I fall into that deep sleep within a few minutes of laying down.

Some weekends I can combat the must nap thing for me if I have two large caffeinated beverages (which stinks b/c I'd rather be off the stuff) but when I can't nap, OH WOW the cranky comes out! I really try to fight it.

I know there are a bazillion sleep studies that show napping is good for you etc, however, this is beginning to interfere with my willingness to host playdates and scheduling fun activities for my son and me.

My data points: I have a job outside the house that I truly love but it is very time-pressured and requires a lot of hours outside "workday" (hint: starts with a "t" and ends with "eacher") resulting in work squeezed in early mornings and on the weekends. Married but I am generally the weekend person due to work-related travel or other, completely understandable reasons. (Also, spouse is not a napper at all, doesn't get concept.) I am near, but not yet at, menopause and my Dr just told me routine blood test showed vitamin D deficiency.

Anyone else like this?

[Claudia]

Jane, see my comment about egg whites. Not that I think everyone should not eat egg whites, but food intolerances can show a broad range of symptoms.

How to get tested for intolerance can get controversial, since some consider the methods rather 'woo woo.' But it's easy enough to Google and to judge for yourself. It's nothing harmful, for sure.

I would also think that you've got a lot going on, and it's a good way to decompress, and should just be worked into your day when possible on the weekends. I need lots of alone time, and get seriously short-fused if I haven't had it.

[Cat]

Jeesh. My son is in the middle of the 9 month sleep regression right now but thankfully it is only affecting his naps. I mean, it totally sucks because I'm a SAHM and desperate for that elusive time to myself during the day but at least I'm (sort-of) sleeping at night. My condolences to those of you who are not. Don't hate me, my time has come and will surely come again.

@Claudia, you hit the nail on the head right there: ALONE TIME. I'm a ticking time bomb without it. Moxie, let's talk about the importance of that Holy Grail so I can inadvertently leave my laptop open when my husband is nearby and he can see I'm not crazy, always talking about how much I need time to myself. Or at least not alone in my insanity. Sisters, can I get a what!what!

[Erin]

My 4 y.o. just dropped his naps - he started full day at preschool and is loving it. He's definitely more tired at home, but I bumped up his bedtime by a half an hour and now he and his little brother go to bed at the same time (7). He'd been dropping naps occasionally on the weekend, but he has forced "quiet time" in which he has to lie in bed for an hour and a half, whether or not he sleeps. I need alone time/downtime myself! Plus sometimes he does fall asleep. Our naps were awful year 1 and then, especially once we transitioned to one nap, they've been great. LO seems to love to sleep. (Though they are both early risers, and neither has ever gotten more than 10.5 hrs of sleep per night.)

@Jane - You might talk to your doctor about getting your thyroid checked, if you haven't. That's often a culprit with extreme sleepiness. (underactive thyroid)

[Erin]

Oh, and someone upthread had a 2.5 y.o. getting out of bed. 2.5 is old enough to understand some things - you could get a special device that's set to light up at a certain time, or just use an old fashioned alarm clock. Say, You may not get up until the music comes on. She should get the hang of it in a couple of nights.

(My 4 y.o. can read numbers, so he's not allowed to get up before 6:00, but we did the music trick with the 2.5 y.o when he was under 2 and it worked.)

[Wilhelmina]

My daughter was a late walker. She really didn't walk until 18.5 months.

She walked. Hurrah!

Didn't nap again. GAH!!

Thing is she is a high energy, sturdily built little person with endurance. I stayed home with her. It was the nap that helped me cope. Nights were broken. I have Ehlers-Danlos hypermobility and am fine but not high energy and not very good at endurance. Somnolence comes with that.

Until night sleep improved at 4 to one waking a night I was just tired and could have napped standing up. Really. Naps are the devil's work.

Sleep begets no sleep indeed!

[Vacationland Mom]

I'm mixed about naps. My son will be 2 in a couple of weeks and has been at 1 nap per day for awhile now. On the weekends I RELISH napping with him, ahh it's so refreshing. But when he won't nap or as OP's said, takes *forever* to go to sleep then wakes up shortly thereafter, ugh, those are not such great days. It's also a struggle when you have to plan everything around the nap. Make sure he gets a nap! Oh god that's right in the middle of his nap! As he's gotten older I feel less stressed about it though.

And hold on just one cotton pickin minute. There's another sleep regression at 24-27 months??? OHGODNO. I feel like we have never recovered from the 9mo one.

[Lisa]

Jane, definitely check your Vitamin D and B levels. And take Omega 3s. Also, do check dietary intolerances - one benefit of cutting out gluten for my husband was far fewer midday/post-meal crashes.

[Sarah]

Like many other commenters, I found it a relief when my daughter stopped napping. Sure, that meant I couldn't nap with her (and I would have loved to--I was pregnant at the time) and that I didn't get the break that naps offered. But when naps ended, I was freed of the expectation that she would nap, and along with that the frustration when things didn't go as I hoped. Bedtime also became a zillion times easier after the naps stopped.

My second kid has been even more inconsistent with napping than the first, and I have gone through cycles of not caring and feeling desperate for her to take a real nap every day. But she doesn't, and I'm not going to knock myself out trying to change things. She is 20 months now, and I will be pleased as punch when she drops her nap.

I have been able to curb that desperate feeling of needing a break in other ways. If naptime doesn't work out, I turn on a movie for the girls. I do prefer to limit screen time, but this offers us all a bit of down time. I also do yoga two evenings a week and go for a walk after dinner on the other days. Having a bit of breathing space built into my day has helped tremendously when it comes to my attitude about naps.

[Cassie Pearse]

My son is 16 weeks and has been off his sleeping game for about three weeks. last night I think we hit rock bottom. He was previously a brilliant sleeper and we have had a routine in place since week 5. He would have a bath at 6.30, feed and be in bed by 7.30. He'd wake at 2 and 5 to feed. I was lucky and now I've been bitten in the ass!

Same routine but last night he woke at 9.30, 12.30, 1.30, 2.30, 3.30. Then my husband somehow got him to sleep until 6.30.

I understand why this is happening (and my son is so frustrated because he wants to crawl more than anything) but I don't know what I can do to help him, and us. Do I just have to wait this out or is there anything I can do? Any hints gratefully accepted, I want my perfect sleeper back!

[Wilhelmina]

@VacationlandMom, just my experience with the one child so counts for little but the 8-11 month, lowest point 9 month sleep regression was the worst experience of parenthood in nearly five years.

No other regression was ever near as bad as that one.

[Suchanamateur]

I'm with all the posters above who say naps are the devils work. And I'm obsessed with them (currently posting in a darkened room ready to pat my youngest back to sleep...).

I hate the dreadful irony that I'm having to limit my olders DS' nap to preserve bedtime (and for so long he was a hideous catnapper) and I'm doing everything humanely possible to lengthen DDs (7 mo) naps. Where is the happy medium?!

I also hate everything I ever read about baby naps-especially those who wrote that you can't count 30 minutes as a nap and if you don't get your baby x amount of day sleep, with y waketimes, you will break her and you will Never Sleep Again. I wish I could unread it all. It has definitely contributed to my PPD.

[Vacationland Mom]

@Wilhelmina, thank you :) That definitely helps. That whole time period is a complete blur. I know things are better now, but the memory of that trauma is always lurking in the back of my subconscious. I know that sounds wicked dramatic, I shouldn't frame it that way because it's not my son's fault or anything. It was just a really rough time with the REM sleep deprivation, the separation anxiety, and the constant change. As we approach his second birthday (on the 19th) I feel like we've reached some kind of equilibrium. That's why I'm freaking out a bit that there's a sleep regression right around the corner. Will have to look in the Moxie archives to see what to expect.

[Rbelle]

@Charisse, I have a daughter like that, so thanks for the beacon of hope :)

Here are some of the many issues we have with naps:

-Still having to put her to sleep with nursing or riding in the car
-Not napping early enough to avoid being up super late
-Not napping long enough to let Mama get some paid work done
-Not wanting to WAKE UP from the nap, and being cranky and fussy until
(a) I nurse her, which will almost inevitably put her back to sleep, but not so thoroughly that I can put her down
(b) I turn on a TV show for her
(c) I give her a treat (I've only done this a few times, when I really needed her to wake up, but yes, "bad mother." Fortunately, it's starting to work with any foods now that she's a somewhat better eater)

Most of the time, we go with option (a), with two or three days a week of (b), and I spend half an hour tickling her and poking her and prodding her (and reading to myself, because why not multitask?) while she grumps and gnaws at my boob until I practically force her into a sitting position. And then all of a sudden it's like "ding!" I'm awake and I love life! Ugh. She has always been this way, whether it was naps or waking in the morning - kid takes forever to get to sleep AND forever to wake up.

But the worst part is for all the hassle, I really do NEED her to nap - not just for my paying work, but for my sanity. I have a pretty high-needs kid (all our separation anxiety stage regressions were the. worst) , and while it's getting better now that she's 2, I realized when she woke up after only 20 minutes the other day that if I don't get a break from her of at least 45 minutes, it makes me very stabby.

On the plus side, I guess, I never feel particularly tied to the house for naps - she'll sleep if and when she sleeps, and always has - and only if she's tired AND overstimulated (like after her birthday party, oy) will she be particularly fussy. And if and when she does drop her nap (so far, she doesn't nap about two days out of every month), I can dream that bedtime will become magically easier, hahahahahahaSOB.

[sac louis vuitton]

Shae! Love this place, lets go back for that breakfast menu