Can you share your experience with dropping the final nap??

[saltyqueen]

My 2 years and 8 month old daughter has been in a nap skipping phase for several months. I am almost tempted to drop the nap once and for all, but when she goes maybe 3 days without napping, her behavior deteriorates AND her night time sleep starts to suffer (earlier waking, night wakings). But for the first couple of days without a nap, she sleeps 12.5 or more hours per night, which is actually way more total sleep in a 24 hour period than she gets when she does nap, and overall things go pretty well. She just gets a super-early bedtime.

I really want to know what would happen if I decided to go cold turkey with dropping the nap. Yes, there would be bad behavior and some rough nights, but would she get used to it, and, if so, how long would that take?

Anyway, I am really interested in hearing the experience of the moms who have dropped the nap once and for all. How old was your child? Was the transition a rough one? Did you finally go cold turkey??

Thanks for reading!

 

[*Becky*]

I am thinking it might be better to go cold turkey too so will follow along.

[sianie]

Anyway, I am really interested in hearing the experience of the moms who have dropped the nap once and for all. How old was your child? Was the transition a rough one? Did you finally go cold turkey??

DD (who was 3 in June) started dropping her nap at the start of the year & we initially went down the nap capping route, then alternating nap/no nap days....these all worked very temporarily & we eventually dropped her nap completely in April.

It has been/is a really tough transition I'm afraid.....DD has always been a good sleeper but this has totally thrown us. We initially started getting long nights (12+ hrs) when she first transitioned but then nights got shorter for a while, then longer again & we still seem to be in this loop. Early BT's seem to be the main thing that has worked for us is really early BT's (6.30pm or earlier), although this is tricky to manage. I really think that it takes LO's a long time to adjust to not napping & it's a case of trying to ride it out the best you can.

[Khalam's Mama]

We are still in the stage of no nap and then nap days which are working better than CN as once this boy is asleep it is so hard to wake him and then he is a bear. We have been doing this for a month now. We have been getting longer nights too as long as we do early BT and avoid OT. If we get OT then we get EW. It is a constant balancing act.