5 month old refusing to cat nap

[Jolamo]

Despite my best eforts I cannot get my Lo to catnap.  This has been for the last couple of weeks (and particularly since the transition to 3.5/4 hour easy).  He fights the sleep and sometimes only has 10 minutes at most.  I have tried taking him for a walk but this doesnt work. I have taken him out in the car - which does work - although I am loathed to take him out in the car everyday especially as it takes him 20 mins to go to sleep - this means I have to go out for an hours drive everyday.

Does anyone have any ideas please?

[Spectra]

My son, who is now almost 11 months dropped his catnap around that time.  It was hard because he would end up being real tired an hour or so before bedtime because he wasn't use to being awake from 4pm to 8pm, 4 hour stretch.  Even now he still gets cranky sometimes and I just end up putting him to bed 30 min earlier.

Is your little one really cranky around this time?  It might be he just is getting older and will not take the nap anymore.  He may take about a month to get over that crankiness.  What I did was move his first nap later by 30min and then his second nap to a bit later in the day as well so he wouldn't be such a monster come evening.  Here is my schedule:

8am wake eat
10:30am  nap until about 12:30pm
3pm nap until about 4:30-5pm.
7:30pm bedtime

It evens the awake and sleep time out more so he isn't awake for 4 hours, instead it is just 2.5 or 3 hours.

Here read this link, it may be helpful::
https://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=64837.0

[marensmama]

5 months is a bit young to drop the catnap, but not unheard of.  Usually the catnap is necessary until they can do 3 hours A time throughout the day.  Can you post his routine and we'll see if maybe a tweak is in order?

[Jolamo]

Thanks - I am not sure he is ready to drop the catnap since it took him a while to get to two hours activity time and even now he cannot always make that as he does tend to have 45 minute naps (normally first nap of the day is about 1.30 mins and then the rest is 45 minutes - this was the routine yesterday

2am Eat
6am wake (normally wakes at 7am ish) - talked to himself in cot
6.50 Eat
7 am to 8 pm Activity time
8am Sleep
10.30 am Awake
10.40 Eat
10.50 - 12.20 Activity
12.20 to 1pm sleep
1pm - 2.15 Activity
2.15pm Eat
2.30 - 4pm sleep
5pm Eat
5.30 pm - went out in pushchair however didnt sleep
6pm -bath
6.15 eat - top uo
6.30 bed

Normally he goes to bed at 7 pm however this turned into a long day for him as he was up at 6 am and didnt have a cat nap - perhaps he is overtired since the change to 4 hour easy???  I have tried putting him to bed early to compensate however it just means he wakes up early the next day!!!

Not sure what to do???