Boo hoo! Tell me we're not heading for no nap territory!!!!

[becky1969]

LO is 29 months.  He's been an excellent napper his whole life! We've been on one nap since about 16 months old.  Guess he decided 1 year of the same routine was making mommy's life too easy!

He's been a consistent 2 hour napper this whole time, until about 2 weeks ago when he was ill.  Then we had some touch and go days because he was vomitting right before nap (sorry if TMI!) and having trouble sleeping after that. Once he was done being sick, he seemed to have trouble napping because of being afraid he'd vomit again. I thought i fixed the problem by pushing nap back to 1 pm so he'd have a good 5.5-6 hours of awake time. That worked for about 3 days, but then the last 2 days no nap again!

Do I just need to suck it up and realize that he's just in that transition period before no nap? Or is there still a chance he'll go back to sleeping every day again, consistently? Do I need to do more active stuff in the morning time to make it more likely that he'll nap?

Help!! Guide me thru the toddler phase, please!  I'd love to hear stories of what *your* toddler did at this age. Thanks!

[LeesMom]

Hi Becky,

I think it's very, very possible that your lo will go back to napping regularly again, at least for a while, because he'd been such a consistent napper up until being sick. I'm guessing that being ill kind of threw everything off. That being said, at that age DD was only napping about once a week or so, but she had been skipping naps on and off since right around her 2nd birthday. She started by only napping every other day or so, then after every 2 days, etc. until now, when she naps less than once a week, in general. It was definitely a gradual transition here, and she hadn't been doing consistent 2 hour naps for a LONG time before that anyway  . She has gone through phases where she napped every day during the past 8 mos. too, so it was definitely worth it to make sure to try for a nap every day even if she didn't end up sleeping. I would definitely keep trying for the nap with your lo... it'll at least give him some quiet time to relax and recharge. One piece of great advice (thanks Stacy!) that I got on this board was to try and make sure to have DD in bed 12 hours after waking if no nap. Good luck and HTH. 

[becky1969]

Thanks for the advice!

I'm still putting him in his crib for a nap no matter what, and if he doesn't sleep I leave him in there for at least an hour. Sometimes 2, if he's agreeable!    The nice thing about the no naps is that the nighttime chatting has disappeared. He must go to sleep immediately because I never hear a peep from him once I leave the room.


Anyone else want to give me their experience?