Talking through entire nap time - how to manage OT? (22mo)

[carla_s]

Hello all,

A few months ago, I posted here when DD was taking 1.5+ hours to fall asleep for her naps (no crying or anything; she would just talk and sing quietly until she fell asleep on her own). She would then sleep for 2 hours, and slept 10 hours straight at night (no problems going to sleep at night). The suggestions I had received at that time helped -- trying to tire her out by playing outside each morning, moving her nap to later, etc. Because she was taking so long to fall asleep, I had gradually moved back her nap time to 1:15 or 1:30pm, and for the most part these last couple months she would sleep from about 2:00pm until 4:00 (and in bed for the night by 7:30pm, asleep by .

However, now at 22 months, I am finding that more and more often (every couple days), she will talk through her entire nap time and not fall asleep at all! By about 3:30pm, I tend to get her up because if she does fall asleep at that time, she is super cranky afterwards and it really interfers with her bedtime.

Today, she was showing signs of being tired early (she had talked through her nap yesterday) so I put her in bed between 12:30pm and 1:00, and she talked until I got her up at 3:20!! (2.5 hours)

She never fusses in her bed, and at about the 1.5 hour mark, I start thinking that I should get her up since she hasn't fallen asleep, but she is usually so content in there that it makes me think that she will fall asleep "any minute now", and I leave her until it gets to our 3:30pm cut off. Should I be getting her up earlier than that?

I don't really know if there is something else going on -- no teeth that I can see, and no general fussiness. When she misses her nap, she tends to be just a little fussier than usual that evening, but never goes into meltdown mode (she's always been a Textbook/Angel mix). We put her to bed earlier on days she misses her nap, but I am concerned with this new trend of missing naps entirely -- is there something I'm doing wrong? From all I've heard, she's too young to drop her last nap.

I'm pretty sure that since she has always done 10 or 11 hours at night (never any more even when she was very well rested), that the missed naps will definately start to translate into OT. She doesn't seem to make up the sleep during the night, even with an earlier bed time.

Any thoughts on what I'm doing wrong or how I can help her? I don't mind her spending the time in her crib, since maybe that's all she needs to rejuvinate, but it just seems like she's way too young for her to drop her nap.

Thanks so much in advance!
Carla

[skatty]

Hi Carla my DD is the same age and just over a month ago I was having the same problems and from reading past posts it seems very common at this age. However we have not had a missed nap in ages now because I tweaked her routine, I now wake her every morning at 7am as she could sleep until after 8 if I let her and then she goes down for her nap at 12.30 (an increase of 45 mins A time!) and then bed between 6.30 and 7pm, she is finally napping more than 1˝hrs a day consistantly and I can't believe I was ready to think she was giving her nap up! Do you have a consistant wake up time? Some people say you can only offer the nap and if they don't take it there is nothing you can do but maybe put her to bed early? When my DD skipped her naps she had awful long NWs and EWs but if your DD is coping perhaps you should just be consistant and hope she goes back to napping. As you put her down early and she still didn't nap then it obviously isn't because she is OT by nap time so maybe you should increase her A time a bit and wake her from the nap if it gets too late? 10 or 11 hours sleep in 24 a day seems too little to me but I have a DD who has always needed more than average. i do think nap skipping at this age is common though but most go back to them so I hope that helps