The dreaded 2-1...

[elenaveronica]

Hello, I was hoping to get some advice/ideas about my DD's day.

She will be 11 months old tomorrow (!! -- where does the time go??) and this is what her day looked like today:

7:30/8:00 am -- Wake up (she tosses in her crib but never cries, so I'm usually not sure when she actually wakes up, but I always go into her room at 8am)
11:00am - 12:00 pm -- Nap 1 (I always wake her up from this nap)
4:15 pm - 5:00 pm -- Nap 2 (She fought me like never before on this one today, and it's getting harder for me to get her to take this nap)
8:00 pm -- Bedtime, but she didn't fall asleep until around 8:40 pm.  We always have her in bed by 8pm, and sometimes she falls asleep within 15 min, sometimes it takes 40 min.  However, she never cries -- we can just hear her tossing around in her crib on the monitor.

She has been STTN since she was 9 months old (yay!).  No EW, and if she does wake, she always puts herself back to sleep.  Neither her father nor I go into her room from 8pm until 8am.

So... I would like to keep her on 2 naps as long as possible, but it's getting very difficult to get them in.  And obviously, neither of them are long.  I had thought to myself that once both naps were cut down to 45 minutes (by me), then I would start transitioning her to 1 nap.  After today's horrible lead-up to the afternoon nap, I was going to cut her morning nap to 45 minutes tomorrow and see if the afternoon nap would be a bit easier in terms of putting her down.  However, that leaves her with only two 45-minute naps in the day.  And she really is having essentially 12.5 to 13-hour days.

Does anyone have any thoughts about this?  Or advice?  Is it possible that I might be close to getting her down to 1 nap?

[Tweakster]

Hi there, have you thought about short AM/long PM?  So you might try cutting her AM nap to 45 mins and then she would do a longer PM nap, like 1.5 hrs.  Not every LO can transition with a long AM/short PM.  Also her long AM isn't really long enough.  I am not sure why you wake her in the first nap?  Are you aiming for long AM or short AM?

Have a read here:
http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=163278.0

For those LO fighting the PM nap it's normally short AM/long PM route that suits them best. 

[elenaveronica]

Hi Wendy, thank you so much for the reply.

For the last two days, I have only been letting her sleep for 45 minutes in the morning (from 11:00 am until 11:45) and then she is going down for her afternoon nap at 3:45 until 4:45 pm.  I am aiming somewhat for short AM and long PM; however, if I let her sleep longer for the afternoon nap (and I know she would), then her bedtime would be getting really late -- she falls asleep around 8:30 pm right now, and I don't want it to get too much later than that.

Would it be a better idea to just give her a 30 minute morning nap so that she takes a longer afternoon nap?  She seems happy with the way it is right now (not cranky, playful as usual) with a 45-min AM and 1-hour PM nap.

I guess to further clarify, I don't think I can let her sleep for too long during the day; otherwise I would have to either let her bedtime get really late or I would have to start waking her up earlier in the morning...

[elenaveronica]

Oh, and I didn't quite answer your question -- the reason I had always been waking her up from her first nap (from 11-12) was because if I didn't, then she wouldn't go down for her afternoon nap.  She needs 4-4.5h of A time in the middle of the day.  So I originally figured that it would be better to cut her first nap short so she would take 2 naps instead of letting her sleep longer for the first  nap, and then her skipping the second and becoming ridiculously OT by bedtime.

[Tweakster]

So I originally figured that it would be better to cut her first nap short so she would take 2 naps instead of letting her sleep longer for the first  nap, and then her skipping the second and becoming ridiculously OT by bedtime.

This is exactly why we did what we did with Finn.  I just got confused about your original post because in my mind 1 hr and 45 mins are both short naps :-)  But if it is working for her now and not affecting her nights then I would leave it until she shows you that she needs a change.  And it sounds like she's good about letting you know by fighting her nap.  It may come to a time where you need to cut back that first nap to 30 mins and allow a longer PM nap i.e. 1 hr 30 or more.  1 hr 45 total nap sleep seems low sleep to me at 11 mths but I would never complain if my LO was also doing good nights on that!  Unfortunately with our son he did short naps and short nights for a loooong time lol

I would hold off on one nap as long as possible, especially if she's got more teeth on the horizon.  You still can go as low as 20 mins for a nap and get in a 2 nap day. 

[elenaveronica]

Thank you, Wendy.  That is exactly the kind of advice I was looking for.  I didn't realize that a 20-minute nap could even be restorative enough to get DD through a few more hours, but I guess we'll give that a try.

And as much as I would like for her to take just one nap a day, I know that she still needs two, and I really don't want to do anything to interfere with her nighttime sleep.  It's taken too long for it to become consistent and I'll do whatever I can to protect that!

Thanks again!

[makka]

HI there

i thought i might add that my lo and i have been on the 2-1 road for 3 months, the aim was short Am long PM, so started off on 1 hour AM, then right before the switch to one nap she was only doing an AM nap of 15 min, it was getting ridiculious, so thought id let you know that it can get as short as this. Her day was getting too long and short nights and EW's were appearing, so had to cut as much as this to preserve a decent bedtime. She is now 13 months and we are doing days like this

1 nap day
1 nap day
2 nap day
1 nap day
1 nap day etc etc

but over the past week seen some changes to sticking with 1 nap, and if i see any signs of OT  then ill give her a 2 nap day

But as wendy says hold onto 2 naps as possible, its a long journey but its all about tweaking the routine with nap cuts and increase or decrease in A times. If you are getting good nights then stick with what you have, but if you see EW or NW then its tome to tweak

kirsten

[stevesmum]

Hey ladies - I was just reading your post and was wondering, how restorative is a 20min nap (should you be fortunate enough to get one!)? A full a time, or a shortened one afterwards?
Cheers

[makka]

Hi STeves mum

after a 20 min nap i would shorten the next A time, 20 min is not as restorative as 45 min. After 20 min my lo could do 2 hour 45, then on 10 min she dropped to 2 hour 30. It depends on your lo, but 20 min is still something and your main aim is to get that PM nap.  and is your aim Short AM LONG PM? if so you could try this

3 hour 30
2 hour 45 after 20 min AM nap
4 hours till bed

when my lo was 11 months she was on 45 min AM and 1 hour 30 PM, as soon as i started to cut the AM nap to about 30 min due to EW's my lo slept longer in the PM nap.

kirsten

[malialeanne]

Hello there. 15 months is the typical age for the 2-1 switch but for some babies it creeps up earlier. 11 months is early but not unheard of.

I could have written your post. DD1 SSTN (12+ hrs) at 9 months and shortly after, started to refuse her afternoon nap. We had a hair-raising month or so before I figured out that she needed to switch to one nap.

She did exactly the same thing you describe with DD--take her regular morning nap but stay awake ALL afternoon and become crazy overtired by bedtime.

Here is what we did, at 10 months or so. We moved the am nap later to 11 am or so, and gave a small catnap in the afternoon to help her make it through until bedtime. I kept moving the am nap later and later, but kept giving her a catnap in the afternoon (or trying to anyway) until her one nap was starting around 1pm. She would sleep for 2 hours or so. Things were sooo much better after she made the transition.

Good luck!

[stevesmum]

Yeah thanks guys... sorry to kidnap the post. I tried for an arvo nap yesterday with no luck. But my oh my I had night wakings last night, which i know were from being overtired. The little guy needs at least 2.5-3hrs sleep in the day. We haven't been able to get two sleeps this week at all (due to work which i have officially finished today) but am going to try for ashort one now, and another perhaps this arvo. He's been sleeping from about 11.20-11.30 for mon-thurs this week, 3hr,2h,2h30,1h30(poo to wake up).... and I couldn't get any more naps into him, so that's why I thought i'd give a quickie nap a go. I realise i'll have to play around with timing, but thought i might try 30min
his day today

6.30am awake
bed 11
awake hopefully 11.30
maybe bed again at 2.30 perhaps (a time of 3hr - he normally does 4h30 okay)
so maybe a sleep of 2hr (I wish)
awake 4.30pm
bed 7.30/8/8.30  WHO KNOWS??!!!
I'll try anyway, and see if it works~!!

[elenaveronica]

Just a quick question again -- is it considered to still be an EW/NW if DD puts herself back to sleep within a minute or two?  Or could she just be crying out in her sleep?

Last night she woke up at 2:30 am (I heard her on the monitor) and cried bloody murder for about 15 seconds.  I was sure that I would have to go to her room to calm her down, but as quickly as the crying started, it stopped, and she was asleep again.

She does this occasionally at night, but I haven't had to go into her room during the night at all during the last 2 months.

With regards to her naps... we're flipping around a bit.  Either 1-hour AM and 45-minute PM or vice versa (depending on afternoon plans).  I'm actually a little bit scared to give her a 30-minute AM nap in hopes of pushing a long (i.e. 1.5 hour) PM nap because then I'm afraid her last A-time would have to be ridiculously long for her to be sufficiently tired to go to sleep, creating a too-late bedtime... |

[malialeanne]

Elenaveronica, our first and last a-times are usually pretty short. Your lo's readiness for bedtime will USUALLY be the result of TOTAL hours of A time during the day, not just the last A time (as long as the p.m. nap is within reason/shorter than 2 hours). So if TOTAL daytime sleep hours are under control, then she should be ready for bed at a reasonable time.

But also, generally when you shorten and then eliminate the a.m. nap, you're also moving the p.m. nap earlier. So in that case, you should be able to get a decent A time in before bed, and maintain a reasonable bedtime. When you find that you CAN'T possibly fit two naps in any longer while maintaining an appropriate bedtime, that's the time to go down to one nap.

[Tweakster]

What Malia said :-)  It's total hours you have to think about. 

Also, I would not call that a NW really.  Everyone wakes in the night, kids are just more vocal about it :-)  She could have had a dream, been disoriented when she came out of a sleep cycle, realized she was in a weird position, anything really.