Almost 17 mos, started daycare & OT

[gerkchar]

DS will be 17 mos old in a bit over a week.  He dropped to one nap at around 13 mos, and hasn't needed 2 daily naps since.  We went on a trip to visit family (plane flight) about 3 weeks ago and DS's routine got off track, with more EW's.  Since starting daycare full time last week, things have gotten worse.  Ideally, our daily routine (prior to daycare & trip) was:

7am - wakeup & breakfast
10am - snack
12pm - lunch
12:30pm-2:30pm/2:45pmish - nap
3pm - snack
5pm - supper
7-7:30pm - bedtime

DS is now usually awake between 6-6:30am.  Last week his naps got shorter (lucky if we can get 2 hrs now).  It can take him close to 1 hr to fall asleep at bedtime.  He was so OT on Sunday, he was walking into walls but refusing to go back down for a nap.

I find DS seems to last about 5.5 hrs from waking until he needs a nap.  This morning he was awake before 6:30am, so I suggested our daycare provider try to get him down for a nap by no later than 12pm.  The other kids at daycare have lunch at noon, and DS refused to go down before then (too much excitement, noise, afraid he'll miss something).  Naps at daycare normally happen from 1pm-3pm, but DS can't function with those times given his early waking.  What can I do to try to get him back on track?  Is wake to sleep my only option?  Thanks in advance.

[munzle]

My dd is 18mo and her routine looks similar to yours. How often does he go to daycare? DD only goes 2 days so even though she goes down late for her nap when there (1pm like yours) I have enough time to get her back on track before she's there again. Yesterday she had half an hour's sleep at the childminder's  Just wondered if you could do really early bedtime? I was always scared of doing it, thinking we'd get another EW, but yesterday I had her in bed by 5.50pm and she slept until 6.50am and woke in a lovely mood.

[gerkchar]

Thanks for the reply.  DS goes to daycare weekdays (Monday-Friday), from 8am-3pm.  Unfortunately two days on the weekend don't seem to be enough to "catch up".  We tried a 6pm bedtime late last week, and it took him over 1 hr to fall asleep anyways.  This morning he was up at 5:45am.

[munzle]

I agree - 2 days isn't long when they're really OT. I'm not sure if WTS would work if they're having EWs due to OT. That's really a tough one. It might be worth persevering with the early bedtimes though and go really early if it's taking him a long time to fall asleep. Earlier this week it was taking dd ages to fall asleep at bedtime, but as she's got less OT it's taken her less time to fall asleep.

[gerkchar]

Okay, we've been trying an early bedtime (around 6pm-6:30pm), but we are still having EW's.  This weekend, I tried to put him down for his nap about 5.5-6 hrs. after waking.  Saturday was good, took almost 2.5 hr nap.  Yesterday he only napped for 1 hr and woke up crying.  He just cut his 4th molar, and may be working on eye teeth now?  Last night he was in bed around 6pm, and I think asleep soon after 6:30.  He woke up this morning at 5am.

He will accept an earlier nap at home (11:30am/12 noonish), but not at daycare because of the activity.  He seems to want about 11 hrs sleep at night.  Should I now try to move his bedtime later?  We were previously doing 7:15-7:30pm bedtime, but moved it earlier last week due to OT.  Thanks in advance!

[munzle]

Poor you. In all honesty, I don't think there's that much you can do when they're teething. We got EWs when dd was teething and nothing we did made any difference. Occasionally she would go back to sleep if we have her some calprofen, but more often that not, we just had to get her up. Sometimes we had to resort to two naps, but she was a lot younger then (she got her molars and canines quite early). I hope it gets better soon.

[LucySol]

i dont think you should move bedtime later,perhaps you arnt going early enough! i would try a 5.30 bedtime.i know this sounds crazy but i was doing an earlier bedtime due to jumping to 1 nap and OT but was still getting EW.so we went even earlier and she slept for 13 hrs!!! it might be something you need to do till she can handle the longer A time to her after lunch nap or she wakes up later.
hth xx

[munzle]

yea - we've done 5.45 before and it means that they wake after their 11 or so hours, but it's still clearly the middle of the night, so they just go back to sleep and you get a good 12 or 13 hours - it can really help.