Support Thread for 2 to 1 nap transition cont.

[Flightmommy]

Ohhh, wish I could join you all in the "perfect day" group.....this pm catnap thing is getting worst and worst, and as a result, we are doing more and more one nap days, far more than i would want at only 12 months. Today, as I was shshing, rocking and jiggling (yes, all at once..lol!!) to try to get him to sleep, I started thinking about trying the short am/long pm routine...it never worked for us before, but clearly what we're doing now isn't working either..it was sooo beautiful though for awhile there, no nap refusals, looong amnap, easy short pm nap, 11.5h nights..ahhhh, the luxury!!
  Here's our day today:
 6:40am awake (short night though, 10hrs)
 10:45-12:15 nap1
  4:15pm (start trying for catnap..was falling asleep in my arms during windown, so looked favorable...put him down and he just played, and played....and played, with some fussing towards the end....UNTIL 5:30PM!!! Then i tried the APOP...no luck)
7:15pm asleep (tried for earlier bedtime, but it was already 6pm by the time i gave up on his catnap, should have given up earlier!!)
  So, after 4 hours A time, he doesn't seem to want to nap again..i've tried a longer A and same thing. Maybe he's actually overtired and could do with a shorter A??? I'll give it one more day and do the shorter A time, but I really have my doubts.
  For those of you doing the short am/long pm, what A times work for you? I haven't tried it in sooo long and wouldn't know where to start.....just wondering so that i have an idea what to do with him. LOL!! I just know i've got to tweak something, i don't feel like we're going in the right direction at all.
  I'm returning to work next month (yuck!!) and the thought of leaving him with someone during such 2-1 chaos makes me nervous...i mean, if I can't get it right with all the reading and posting i've done here, how can I expect someone else to get it right?

[hjrmom01]

flightmommy (sorry I don't know your name!) when we first started the short am and long pm we did something like this:
up at 7
nap 1 10-10:30
nap 2 1:30-3:30
bedtime 7:30 

I kept pushing out that first nap and over time his A time between the 2 naps lengthened to 3.5 hrs. After that we went to the 20 min am nap
up at 7
nap 1 10:30-10:50
nap 2 1:45/2-up by 3:45/4
bedtime 7:45/8

Again, we kept pushing that first nap out a bit (slowly as needed) and the A between the 2 naps lengthened to 3.5 hrs. We had to start cutting back the pm nap to 1.5 hrs to keep bedtime reasonable! Even though H had a good pm nap he always stuck with 4/4.25 to bed, especially when cutting teeth...he goes way down and like a nice shorter time before bed.

Hope that helps you!!  H has been on the 20-30 min am nap for quite some time now. I think we started the 20 min nap back in November!  We've done a few one nap days since then but we've only had 1 good night resulting from that.  I have a hard time getting that last A time right!!

[Flightmommy]

Thanks, that helps for sure! How is your LO though after being woken from his 20-30 min nap? DS is beyond crabby when woken from his pm catnap, i dread going up to his room to get him lol!! And he's just soo used to having his deliciously long am nap that i'm sure if I wake him from that after 30 minutes, i'm going to be dealing with one cranky toddler.....oh well, the alternative is not any better anyways!! lol!!

[*Jo*]

Jo - we have the same issue and Caleb hates being woken up, i woke him at 30 mins this morning and he was crying and everytime i put him down on the floor or whatever he would cry and come after me, so what ive started doing is i just sit wiht him and cuddle and spend 20mins with him and then he comes right. its like he needs that extra comfort because he doesnt like to be woken early

[Flightmommy]

Thanks Jo, good to know! I think my Caleb would respond well to that too. Are you officially on the short am/long pm now? What are your A times like?

[*Jo*]

Well I thought we were but he's just refused his PM nap!!! After a 30 min AM nap I have just endured 35mins of screaming as I did WI/WO so we are now in the car doing APOP! I've never done so much APOP as I have in the last week with these nap refusals and it's driving me insane!

[*Jo*]

so he fell asleep in teh car, got him home and he only slept a total of 30mins! we tried extending but he screamed to the point of gagging. Im so over this...........I just want to cry

[hjrmom01]

Jo, I'm so sorry that Caleb only slept another 30 min Do you think he was OT or maybe discomfort from teeth?? Or, if he's refusing the PM nap and you think he was initially UT you can try the 20 min?

Jo (other Jo!), H doesn't like to be woken up either...and I hate waking him. But I go in and turn off his white noise and his fan and then step out of the room for a minute. When I come back in he's usually awake and I pick him up and we have a cuddle in the rocker. We read books, talk about what we'll do. After a few he'll push away and want down to play, then I know we're good to go It really helps to get out and about after the short am nap to keep him busy and keep any crankies at bay!!!

So I'm officially fed up with teething and the 2-1. Today H did
up at 7
nap 1 10:40-10:55
nap 2 1:50-3:30
bedtime 7:50ish
NW 1:15  He woke up and cried for a second but then stopped. He was moving around and trying to go back to sleep and would keep crying out. Finally at 2 I went in and gave him some Tylenol and MOtrin (we also medicate before bed). We rocked and he fell back asleep at 2:20 only to shoot up awake 20 mins later. He is SO restless and constantly is kicking and stretching in his sleep. I couldn't get him back to sleep so I put him in his crib at 2:45 where he has been off and on screaming for 10 mins. I better go back in and settle him. This is only the first molar and I'm already to call it quits!  And all I hear it "nothing you can do about it!"

[*Jo*]

oh Alyssa i feel for you, after Caleb got up i saw the tooth had cut through the gums and also he had a massive welt on his leg which looked like an insect bite so im presuming thats what all that was about, but Molars! ugh, no way! I hope it comes through soon for you, im no looking forward to that experience

and just so everyone is confused my name is Jo and DS is Caleb and Flightmommy's name is Jo and her son is named Caleb as well

[hjrmom01]

yeah, talk about confusing!! 

H has been working on this molar since...Christmas I think? At least January. We're definitely at least 4 weeks into it...he is a massively SLOW teether 

[Flightmommy]

I hear ya on the slow teething....Caleb turned 1 last week and still NO TEETH!!! Not even a sign of one....his fingers are constantly in his mouth, but they have been since he's been 3 months old, so who knows!! I just wish he'd get some soon, i'm so tired of having to puree everything!!

[hjrmom01]

Jo, I thought H was a slow teether getting the first at 9.5 months!  My niece didn't get any until she was like 13 or 14 months old...then got a MOUTHFUL! But she never had any problems with them. Maybe that's how Caleb will be!

[Flightmommy]

Alyssa, I really hope you're right....Caleb doesn't take well to anything though, he's very sensitive...very touchy, so if the teething gets really intense and we get a mouthful at once, we may be in for some serious trouble!!
  Well, I may have figured out why we were getting pm nap refusal....that middle A time was too long I think. I shortened it yesterday and he went down no problem and i had to wake him after 45 minutes!! We'll see today if the same thing works...but it makes sense really, i don't know why i couldn't see it before....he does 4 hoursA time after a full night's sleep, so he obviously needs less A time after a 1.5 hour nap...don't know why I thought he could do 4 hours again, so it's 3.5 now. Hope it keeps working!!

[gavinsmum1]

This is the one place I can go when I'm feeling like tearing my hair out over the 2-1. 
We are having just the same kind of issues here, but I think we are not going to kick OT until we're down to one nap steadily!
We were doing the short am/long pm nap for months until Jesse started refusing his afternoon nap, even on an A time that was neither too long or too short (we played around for a long time with that second A time!!!) So, now we're doing the long am/short pm nap scheme, as that's what we did with our first son and it seemed to work the best.  Both my DSs are similar, but #2 is a bit more touchy.  Anyway, it's taking forever for Jesse to settle for that short cat nap, which we've now cut down to around 15-20 minutes to save bedtime, which is also taking ages to arrive when we put him down.  Anyone else's day look like this?  Does this even look right?!?!
wake 6:15 (too early for me, but there's not much I can do about it now)
nap 10:30 or 10:45-11:45 or 12:00 (typically only one hour 15-30 minutes long)
nap 3:50ish-4:10
bedtime 7:30 or 7:40 (once as late as 8pm!!)

I know that catnap is robbing his night sleep, but this is nuts!! How is he supposed to do 7 hours at the end of the day??
Joining the frustration train!!

[JaspersMum]

Gavinsmum1, thought I'd pass on a few suggestions as I've been where you are - in fact, I've been where all of you on here have been!  (been on one nap for two months now).

- Have you tried messing around with that first A time?  Does cutting back to 4 hours produce a longer or shorter nap?  I'm just thinking that 4.5 hours might be a bit much for his age.  But in saying that, if he can successfully do 4.5 hours, I'd consider jumping to one nap and bringing bedtime much earlier.
- My gut is saying the second A time is too long.  However, if he's really ready for one nap, he'd need the same amount of A time as the morning, that's what I found.
- Bedtime is too late.  Have you tried 7.15?  More than three hours A time on a 20 minute nap could be too much.

Good luck