Toddler Support Thread for 2-1 Nap Transition Continued

[Tweakster]

Phew busy on here.

Nauvoo - yay!  Glad that things are looking up.  But yes, it could very well be too much for her with those long nights.  I have heard of mums cutting the night sleep (gasp!) in favour of the nap length.  So like wake her at 11 hours and keep her long nap intact.  I personally am hesitant to do anything to muck with night sleep, I would rather battle out short naps I think lol.  But it is an option to try.  If she's going back to sleep at the moment it may just pass.  But I would worry that too many middle of the night parties might start OT creeping in, if they get any longer.

GM1 - hang in there, take your deep breath, you're doing fine :-)

Nell - how old is your LO...your ticker isn't showing.  I think they tend to do fine with long A's for about a day or 2...but then crash hard into OTland.  So you may end up with early bedtime for a while until he gets used to those long A times.

Jo - we do 1 nap on that routine are you sure he can't manage a 5 hr a time?  If he's caught up on sleep and had multiple nap days, maybe he would be ok?  Failing that I suggest a short AM/long PM, can you cut his nap after 15/20 mins and then put him down 3 hrs later?  Otherwise he's doing his long nap too early.

Well Alyssa we had your day, we had our first short nap in yonks, 1 hr 20 mins.  Molars again I think.  These molars are like watching paint dry would they just bl**dy come in already. 

[gavinsmum1]

Wendy, thanks for your vote of confidence.  I, however, am not that confident that I'm doing things right.  Today went like this:
woke 6:30
nap 11:30-12:45
nap** tried to APOP a catnap in the car to pick up my eldest from Nan's house and no game!!!!  Even after 30 min driving.  BUMMER!!!
bedtime 7:10!!!! (OT for sure!! He was put down closer to 6:30, but fussed around and got up 3 X)

Okay, so I'm thinking I need a better game plan than this.  Tomorrow, unless I've got an insanely EW, I'm going to do 4.75 hours A time, nap, then at most 5 hours A time.  I think I'm just getting too far ahead of myself, but this little guy has not had a 12 hour night in forever, naps no more than 1 hour 45 min daytime sleep lately, and has ONLY three teeth.  I CANNOT wait until the molars appear.  Not only will I need to medicate Jesse, but I may need a few headache pills of my own.

Can someone promise me if I do as stated above, that he will:
A) sleep a wonderful 2-3 hours for his nap
B) nod off for a delicious 12 hour night
C) cut all his darn teeth in one night?

*sigh* Okay, Wendy, I'm taking that deep breath now...

[*Jo*]

eeeek its 1.10pm and Caleb has only slept 20mins from 5.45am today!!! he fell asleep in the car at 9.50-10am and then on the way home again at 12.40-12.50, i went to get him out of the car and transfer him into his bed and I fell over backwards on some bits of wood with him in my arms, didnt fall to the floor but took a bit to regain my balance, then the door was locked (DH locked it while he is home!!!!) so had to get the keys out and so by the time i got him to his bed he was wide awake, exhausted but wide awake, screaming his head off, so sent DH to walk him in the pram, its stinking hot today so that just doesnt help anything!

[Tao]

Thanks for letting me jump on the bandwagon. Nice to know that I'm not the only mommy who sometimes has no idea what is going on with my DD.

HRJ mom: thanks for the advice! Today worked like a charm, 30 min. a.m., 1.20 p.m. and BT right away at 7:00 p.m. I think you helped me hit it on the nose and that was I was still trying to go for 6 p.m. BT after a long PM nap. I know I will miss have an extra hour catching up on work at night, but this seems to work better for her.

Calebsmummy: You have helped me SOOO much in the past, I wish I had answers for you. What a tough day!! It's so hard when they fall asleep in the car...I know my Sophie will NOT let me transfer her into bed after she's fallen asleep a bit in the car. I hope tomorrow is a better day for you =).

[Tweakster]

Well W2S was a miserable failure, slight stirring at 4:30 then it seemed like he was going back to sleep...then BAM 10 minutes later awake for the day.  Saved by the bottle trick and now he's still sleeping at 7:30! 

I don't know, we just can't get more than 10 hours no matter how we slice it. 

Ho hum.

GM1 - I wish I could promise you, we normally get the nice long nap but alas we don't get more than 10 hour nights.  And the teeth, well the teeth are ridiculous if you ask me.  It should not take 4 mths to get molars!

[*Jo*]

Wendy - forgive me but have you done PU/PD or W2S for that early morning wake up yet?

well our day went like this
nap1 9.50-10am (10mins in car)
nap 2 12.40-12.50 (10mins in car, fell over transferring him to bed)
nap 3 1.45-2pm (15mins in stroller)
nap 4 4.30-5pm
bedtime 6.45pm

4 freaking naps!!! the third one he fell asleep in the stroller and he doesnt transfer well to the bed in that, so he woke up, the last one it took 30mins of driving to get him to fall asleep and then i transferred him to the cot, then he slep for 30mins, i woke him up (so we could have dinner etc) and he cried the entire time, all the way through dinner, all the way through his shower etc he was miserable. im not sure if i shouldve just left him to sleep at 4.30, DH thinks I should have. well lets see how the night goes....

[Tweakster]

Oh my Jo, what a day.  Wishing you a better night!  C'mon Caleb buck up son and let's get some sleep 

We don't use PD with Finn because it really riles him up - Spirited and all that.  If I touch him it's game over.
WI/WO has not worked for the EW.  It's just me walking around at 4:30 lol and him yelling in his crib.
GW works the best but again, he won't go back to sleep at an EW, if I lie on his floor and shush he just throws toys on me.  It has worked for NW though.

So he has shown that he CAN go back to sleep i.e. after the bottle, clearly still tired enough to finish up his night sleep, and yet he WON'T unless he WANTS to. 

[gavinsmum1]

Oh, Jo! That sounds like a few days we've had around here within the last few weeks!! Thankfully things have gotten better and they will for you.  Just try to keep cool and know that once you're past the molars/2-1 that things will look up.

So we're officially on the 1 nap programme!!  Yippee!  Jesse's well (finally!!!) and A times are loooooong!  We're getting naps that are long enough to get him through to bedtime and we're getting nights that are long enough to refresh him.  It's like it all magically fell into place and really I didn't do much. 

Yesterday went like this:
wake 6:30
nap 11:30-12:45 (ah, well)
bed 7:10!!! (took him 30 min to fall asleep)

woke 6:55 (yeah!)
nap 11:45-1:15 ( a little longer
bedtime planned for about 7 pm

Whew!! After all that uncertainty and disruption at night, we're finally in a good place.  Even if only for a few days~ it's much better than it was.

[nelliestar]

Wendy - thanks for your reply.

He is 15 mths on Monday. Today I chickened out as we had an EW at 5.45 so he napped 45 mins at 9.45am which I woke him from and he went medieval!!! ( our word for crazy) Real tantrum stuff, arching back etc. And 1 hr 15 at 2pm then bed at 7pm. He was soooo happy after his pm nap. If I have to stay on 2 naps while he's teething, do you think it would be better to do long am short pm? He is always so upset when I wake him fron am nap. He seems to be on the low end of A times and doesn't often get past 3 hrs 45. Hes only ever done 4 and over if we've been out or something unexpected has happened to prolong it. He goes down a dream for naps at home but at nursery it takes them a long time to get him down for pm nap. Maybe its the noise? Or he feels he's missing something - he's very nosy.

Reading all the mummy's experiences on here its mind-boggling :0 ! You are all so great and so dedicated. Hope your experiences can help me.

Thank you and hugs to you all,

Nell xxxxxxxxxx

[Tweakster]

Hi there Nell, well the reason we moved to 1 nap is because Finn was a bear to wake after the 20 mins, he did better with a push on through the morning to get him to his nice long nap...and then he rewarded us with 2 hr+ naps most days (in fact most days 2.5 and sometimes 3!).  We were doing a 20 min AM and then he was miserable all day really - even after a good PM nap.  He was still kind of touchy and unsettled.  And then eventually he was fighting going down for even a 20 min nap, it was just not worth it to fight for something like that.  Choose our battles we do.

You could try long AM/short PM and slowly push the AM out to increase his A time until you don't need the CN anymore.  What's happening with his AM nap at nursery as to why he is fighting the PM?  Is it longer or shorter than his nap at home? 

[*Jo*]

well i think we are back on two naps for now, he slept really well last night, only cried out a few times in teh night but put himself back to sleep, then was up at 6.20am.... I tried to keep him up till 4.25hours A time because I figured he was doing 4.5 hours before so surely he can handle it, nope, took him to do wind down and he slammed the book shut and threw the other one out of my hand, so put him into his bed and hes asleep at 10.30am. Im gonna let him do long AM today, hes almost always done better with that one and he can have a short catnap this evening in the stroller

[nelliestar]

Wendy and everyone,

He has 30 - 40 mins am at Nursery but I just think its totally different for him there - it didn't seem to bother him but now does. At home we just put him down with lovie and say see you later and walk out and he goes off on his own but at N there could be other children in the room sleeping and they have to stroke his face for a while - longer for the pm nap.

He is down for his longer am at the mo. Its a great idea to stick to lond am and slowly increase the A. Just worried about days we have to be out early like Sundays for church we leave the house at 10 and he never gets an am nap at all then falls asleep in pushchair when we go for a walk afterwards then because his times are all wrong he will sometimes refuse the pm nap. Sundays are a mess sometimes!

Thanks for the advice!

Hugs to everyone else struggling,

Nell xxx

Nell

[*Jo*]

Nell, our sundays are a mess due to church as well

well after that issue this morning he did only 1 hour nap, then we had to do a nap in teh stroller in teh PM as he just wont take a second nap otherwise, not sure if i should really be pushing this one nap business back to what we were doing abuot a week or so ago, its just that hes waking far too early to get a decent one nap day in, at least before he was waking at 7-7.30 but this 5.45-6.20am business is really getting up my nose

[nelliestar]

Wendy  - thanks again!

Jo - reading your posts with interest and sending hugs!

I think we will carry on with 2 like you for as long as we can but we don't have the EW yet! I will think again when we do!
Our day turned out ok with the long am and short pm but teething is making him so touchy and he bit his stepbrother tonight and pinched his friends face today!! Hope this is normal and we aren't going to have behaviour problems on top of everything else!Or i it the terrible two's early?!

Lotsa love,

N xxxxxxxxx

[Tao]

Hi Ladies,

I have a quick question for you. This is the second day DD has refused pm nap after 30 minute a.m. nap and I kept thinking that maybe I needed more A time before p.m. nap, but now I'm wondering if maybe it's OTness from too MUCH A time before p.m. nap. These are the times I tried:

Yesterday:
600 a.m. Wake
945-10:15 Nap
1:45 (put her down at this time, took 20 minutes to settle, then went to sleep for 5 minutes and then woke up screaming and refused to go back down.)

Today:
6:00 a.m. Wake
9:50-10:20 Nap
2:00 (tried more A time today and again went down and kept waking back up.)

Just wanted to pick your brain on this. Does this sound like she needs even MORE A time?

Thank you so much!