10 month old napping too long

[Mackjack]

Hi,
My lo (on a good day) will wake at around 6.15am. She'll have a nap around 3 hours later but this nap can last for ages - sometimes 2hrs 45!! If it's only around 2/2.5 hours, she'll have another nap in the afternoon which will last between 30mins-1hr. If it's the full 2hrs 45, she may have a quick nap in the afternoon when we're out in her pram for around 10/20mins.

My question is - sometimes she wakes in the morning at around 5/5.30am (goes to bed between 6pm-7pm). Is this EW because she is having so much sleep in the day? And should I wake her from her am nap after 1.5hrs and then let her have another 1.5hrs in the afternoon rather than these really long am naps?

[~Karen~]

It depends what you're aiming for!  If you want her to sleep later in the morning then yes, you'll need to cap her first nap at about 2 hours as right now it seems like she's tagging the lost night sleep onto that first nap.

[Mackjack]

Yes, sorry, didn't really make that clear did I!! Yes, I'd like her to wake a little later from her night sleep. So if I let her have 2hrs in the morning and 1hr in the afternoon, does that sound about right?

[~Karen~]

That would probably be a good start and see how you get on from there!

[Mackjack]

Oh, dear I'm finding this really hard! I tried limiting her morning nap to 2hours but then she wouldn't take her PM nap. I've tried lots of different things - we're all over the place. One day she woke at 6.30, napped at 9.40 and I woke her after 1hr 45 (11.25). She then crashed at 3.30 and napped in the car for 30mins and went to bed at 7.30.

Next day she woke at 6am, napped at 9 and woke herself after 1hr30. Then she napped again 3.75 hours later (although she fought this nap a little)and I woke her after 1.hr30 (3.45pm) and she went to bed at 7.15.

Today she was with her gran - she woke at 6am, stayed awake until 10am (which is ages for her!) then gran woke her at 11.30 after 1hr 30 (as that's what I'd told her to do - not thinking she'd have an A time of 4 hours!). She started getting sleepy around 3 hours later so gran put her down for her nap but she started playing so she got her up and she eventually went down for her nap at 3.50pm. I was worried this was really late so told gran to wake her after 30mins but she woke up by herself.

The trouble is, I feel like I don't know what I'm aiming for. Most things I read say that I should be aiming to keep the PM nap but this is the one that she resists. She goes down for her morning nap really well - should I instead focus on that one, let her sleep as long as she wants and put her to bed early if she refuses the second one? Then eventually let the morning nap get later and later, thus dropping the PM one??

I just don't know what to do and keep randomly waking her from naps and feeling like I'm messing her up!!!!

[~Karen~]

From experience I've found limiting the morning nap in order to get a good second nap works best.  That's what I did with ds1 and it worked really well.  Just kept cutting the morning nap when needed until he could handle the longer A times and went to one nap.  With ds2 I've done the long am nap and short pm nap but I've found that I got pm nap refusal a long time before he was ready for one nap.  I didn't really have a choice but to do it this way though due to having to do 3 school runs a day!

Is the limiting am nap something you'd be willing to do or would you rather let her sleep longer in the am?

[Mackjack]

Hi Karen,

Thanks for your reply. I'm kind of inclined to let her sleep longer in the morning - only because that's the nap she seems to like taking (and doesn't fight - not yet anyway!). Because it seems that she fights her pm nap however short I cut the am one - (although I've only cut it to 1.5hours so far). So in that situation, I would be cutting her morning nap and then if she does have a pm nap, I'd have to cut that too as she will usually have it quite late in the day - so I'd feel like she's not ever getting the chance to have a 'natural' wake up from a nap, iykwim. And if she's not having a natural wake up, how do I ever gauge when she's ready for one nap? I feel like I'd rather she had one natural nap and then I can gauge what to do about the second one. Does that make sense??

BUT if you think this is going to spell disaster I am willing to do what you recommend!!! What was it like for you? How long did your lo used to nap for in the am?

[~Karen~]

Yes totally makes sense!  I haven't wanted to wake ds2 up from his am nap which is why we've done it that way round.  However, I can put him to bed early and he'll have a goo night sleep.  With ds1 though he was an ew so I had to cut am nap in order to stop him trying to catch up on night sleep and get him sleeping later in the morning.  I did find that way worked best but go with what makes you happy.  See how she get on for a while and if it's not working you can always re evaluate then.

[Mackjack]

Hello again, Karen,

Still experimenting with this - I tried letting her sleep as much as she wanted in the am but, just like you said, this does seem to lead to EW (around 5.30). She's still getting a good stretch of night time sleep (around 11hours).

Today she woke at 5.30am so I put her down for her am nap at 8.30 and woke her 1hr 15 later (this is much shorter than she'd usually do but I think I'm going to have to really cut the am nap a lot if I want to ensure she doesn't fight the pm one). So with the PM nap, assuming she doesn't fight it, how long should I let her sleep - as long as she wants, to see what happens? (assuming she doesn't go past about 4pm - although I'm hoping she'll nap much earlier than that!)

[Mackjack]

...well, I just let her sleep for the pm nap and she slept for 1 hour (woke at 2pm). So now we've got ages til bedtime. I really don't know what to do for the best.....

[~Karen~]

Go for a 6/630pm bedtime to try and stop her getting OT.  I know it's hard to wake them up from morning nap when they've been up so early and you just want them to sleep and catch up!