Why is my 15 mo DD waking after 40ish minutes from every nap? What to do?

[Peek-a-boo]

DD is 15 months.  Forever her routine went something like this:

7:30 ish wake up

3.5 hours A time

45 minute nap (I wake her up)

3.5 hours A time

1.25-2 hour nap (I wake her up by 5:00)

8:30ish bed time

About two weeks ago, she suddenly started taking longer to fall asleep (went from 5 minutes or less to settle to 15-20 minutes) and then waking up from both naps at around the 40 minute mark (hard to note an exact time as she mutters and babbles softly as she's drifting off and I get distracted by other things).  For her afternoon nap, I let her be after she wakes, and she'll lie in there and quietly murmer to herself for 30-60 minutes.  Despite the lack of napping, she acts generally well-rested. 

I thought, hmmm, perhaps she's finally ready for one nap.  So we tried one nap for five days in a row.  We did not have any successful naps.  She still took 15-20 minutes to settle and most days she woke around the 40 minute mark, cried, then resettled for some broken sleep.  The 5th day she slept 40 minutes and never would resettle.  On the one nap days she tended to be very cranky and very clumsy by bed time and we also started to have some odd EW.

So, we've gone back to our old routine and once again she is waking around 40 minutes from both naps.  She's been a little cranky the last couple of days, but not clumsy, so I suspect that her canine teeth are moving.  We're sticking with the two short naps for now as the seems to keep her more well-rested than the one nap situation, but I'm not loving this, to be honest.  I'd much prefer to have her on one long nap and if not that, then I'd at least like one short and one longish nap.   

I've tried the last couple of days to put her down a little earlier for her afternoon nap to accommodate for the added time it's taking her to settle, but that hasn't made a difference in the nap length.

I've tried making the first nap later in hopes that she'd fall asleep more quickly, but that hasn't worked either. 

Any thoughts?  What would you do?  Is it possible that all she needs right now is 2 40 minute naps and an 11ish hour night?  That doesn't seem like enough sleep.  :-/

My next thought is to try shortening her first nap to 20 minutes, but it's so hard to wake her at the 20 minute mark when she's spent 15-20 minutes settling.  

[Mashi]

Can you try cutting her morning nap to 30 minutes and moving her afternoon nap earlier? Will she be more tired by then and able to sleep longer than 40?

[Peek-a-boo]

if she's been doing 3.5 hours on a 45 min nap, what would you guess as A time after a 30 minute nap?

[Mashi]

  <shrug>  3 hours? 

(I feel like that's a trick question somehow..like, "If a little girl can stay awake for 3 hours after sleeping 45 minutes, how long can she stay awake after sleeping 30 minutes?" And the answer is "None!  Little girls don't ever sleep at all, silly! Hahahahah"  You know what I mean. ...

Anyway, I always calculated shaving double the time off the A time as a start, and then adjusted from there.  That and my LO does 3.5 hours after a 45 minute sleep and he can barely do 3 hours after his 30 minute morning nap.  Most days he's closer to 2h50ish minutes, unless we've not been up to much and it's been a boring day around the house, in which case he can go a weeee bit over the 3h mark, but barely.  On days when we go to play group after his 30m nap, he is struggling to make 2.5 hours sometimes!     (Am I the only mother in the world who would smile over that? I love it. It's worth the 30 minute trek up the hill to get to playgroup just because it tires him out so much.....!)

[Peek-a-boo]

Thanks, Mashi   She's been doing the same thing for so long I've lost all my little rules of thumb for making time tweaks to her routine, lol.   

[deckchariot]

welcome to the 2 to 1 switch Bethany!    Most bubs don't do well with going cold turkey to one nap....so.....There are basically 2 approaches to the switch:
1) keep 1st nap at the same A time every day, but gradually shorten the length of it; at the same time, move pm nap earlier (by the same amount you shorten nap 1).  When nap 1 is <30 min, attempt to cut it out and just have 1 nap.
2) push morning A time later, allow your bub to sleep as long as they want in the am, then do a late pm catnap (can be a shorter A time than in the am, as you don't want them to take a full nap); eventually cut out pm catnap.

If he needs a longer A time before bed, then option #1 is generally better.  If he doesn't and HATES being woken from the am nap, option #2 may be better.  In both cases, you can offer an early bedtime if one/both of the naps is bad.

Whichever approach you choose - it's best to go gradually - so either cut 15 min off the am nap every 3-5 days or lengthen the am A time by 15 min every 3-5 days.  It also is helpful to know about how much day sleep is "optimal" for your dd and how much A time she needs (minimum) between her last nap and bedtime - that can help you plan out the day.

hth
michelle

[Peek-a-boo]

Okay, so she didn't take an afternoon nap. 

It went like this:

7:40 wake up
11:10-11:30 chatting in crib
11:30-12:00 nap (I woke her)
3:00 in crib, chatted and played and finally started fussing around 4:20, never having slept. 

Any suggestions for what to try tomorrow?

Sorry to be so needy, but I feel like crap right now (1st trimester nausea and fatigue + a cold) and am totally devoid of decision making skills.

[deckchariot]

{{{{{hugs}}}} Bethany!  Does she need a lot of  A time before bed?  What would happen if you tried the pm nap at 3:30?  That seems so late for a long nap....even if you woke her at 5, then maybe an 8 bedtime?  When you went cold turkey to 1 nap, what time did you offer it?  And she refused it altogether?  I'm wondering if you did a nap at 11:30 and let her sleep, then if her nap wasn't a good 2 hrs, do a late catnap to get her from the nap til bedtime?  That first nap is so close to being at a time you want 1 nap anyway, and it looks like she could go til 11:30.  What do you think?

[Peek-a-boo]

The first few days I offered the one nap at 5.5 hours.  She was a little fussy/tired acting around the 4 hour mark, but by 4.5 hours and brushed it off and was fine.    Didn't see clear sleep signs at 5.5 hours, that just seemed like a good time to try for it.   The first few 1 nap days she woke around the 40 minute mark and cried but then resettled and had some sort of additional sleep (though broken as I'd hear her periodically).   

I posted and folks suggested going earlier, so I drifted it to 5.25 hours (this produced a solid 80 minute nap from which she woke unhappy) and then 5 hours the last day.  The day we tried 5 hours was actually the worst as she woke at the 40 minute mark and never did go back to sleep. 

A little part of me wonders if since I didn't really see sleepy signs once she made it past that 4 hour hump where she's used to napping, if perhaps what I really needed to do was extend her A time to 6 hours rather than pulling it back to 5? 

If I'm going with 2 naps, I think you're on the right track, Michelle--shorten the am nap, but maintain the old A time rather than dialing it back since it had quit working.  She needs at least 3.5 hours A time before bed (although that may have changed too, lol, as everything else seems to have) and I don't mind putting her down at 8:30, so she just has to up by 5:00. 

Okay, so I think my plan for tomorrow will be two naps, wake her after 30 minutes from the first nap, then go for a second nap 3.5 hours later and see what happens. 

Thanks for holding my hand.   

[huntersmummyinoz]

if she is taking ages to fall asleep for that first nap, move it 15mins later and then let her sleep 30 mins. also, most mums find LOs can handle 2 to 3hrs A time after a 30 min nap (of course your LO may be an exception ) but something to think about. we did the long am nap and pm catnap as hunter was horrid if woken from a nap, so cant be more helpful sorry. good luck

[Peek-a-boo]

What I'm noticing is that in the last two weeks regardless of what time I put her down for any nap, she's taking 10-20 minutes to settle.  I've tired moving the 1st nap later lately and it still takes her that long to settle. 

Hmmmm . . . okay will have to think about A time post 30 minute nap . . .

[deckchariot]

I noticed as Abby got older that she went through a phase of taking longer to fall asleep - almost like she was so interested in her world that it took her longer to "wind down", so we just started planning for that in our winddown, and as long as she was happy, I didn't worry about it.....don't know if that helps or not.

we'll hold your hand