2-1 transition worries (and we haven't even really started yet!)

[ecwinters]

Thanks. He did an OK night - woke at 5:30am (which is normal!) and was up at 6am.

Tried 10am for nap 1 but he only slept until 11:05 - woke quite miserable and has been really hyper since then.  I think he's OT.  I have put him down for a 2nd nap, hoping for an hour, but he's just shrieking away and playing around and I can't see him sleeping at all to be honest.  He's not really a car or buggy sleeper so I can't even use that as a back up method - although if this carries on I may have to try! 

What do you do if they only do 1 nap for about an hour!?  I can try EBT again but at some point he's going to need to catch up.  I'm worried about carrying on pushing out the nap if he's already OT.  Sorry - I'm panicking a bit here now as refusing a nap is SO unlike him.

Thanks for all your help.

[jessmum46]

Hugs, and deep breaths - it will come right in the end   Nap transitions are always tough and some OT is inevitable.  Often whatever you do at these times will be 'wrong' and you will end up with some messy days.  All you can really do is EBT as much as possible (if LO is good at making up sleep that way), and push on forwards to the other side.  Refusing a nap when you've always had a good napper is very unnerving, I totally agree - but if it makes you feel better it is very normal and common in transition.  The logic behind pushing forwards even if he is OT is that if he's going to refuse the afternoon nap anyway, you're better getting the one nap closer to the middle of the day so that's it's not so long a stretch to bedtime.  You also have better chance of resettling a short nap if the first A time is longer.  The alternative I guess is that you keep your 10am nap but wake him after 45/30/20 mins, and hope that means he doesn't refuse a second one.  Ideally you have a pretty short second A time after the first nap to prevent OT.....could be a bit tricky and also quite miserable given how early he is waking though   I think at some point in the past I did see someone here doing something like:

WU 5.30
Nap 10-10.30
Distraction and food galore!
Nap 12.30-2/2.30
BT 6.30/7ish

But I suspect that middle bit of the day would be really rough   We did something a bit similar with the 2-1 when DS was early waking but basically just went for an 11.30/45am set nap, with a quick 15-20 min catnap around 9/9.30 if he needed (basically just made sure were were out and about in car/pushchair at that time so he could doze if he wanted to).  That worked ok, maybe you could try it?

I guess just from the outside I'm thinking it's not like he's a 12 month old (or earlier!) and likely to really struggle with just going for it.  My feeling would be get that nap to 11/11.30 within the next 2-3 weeks and go for early bedtime, and you may well be all done and dusted sooner rather than later x

[ecwinters]

Thanks so much!  He did in the end go down after 4h10m A time for a 2nd nap - but was definitely OT as he squeaked at 30 minutes and then woke up after 40/45mins.  So yesterday looked like:

WU: 5:30 (in cot until 6)
Nap 1: 10-11:05
Nap 2: 3:15-4:00
In bed at 6:10 and asleep by 6:40pm. 
He woke at 5:20 this morning which isn't TOO bad, given he had a relatively early night.  Was very quiet though until about ten to 6 so he could have been dozing - I try and not look too much at the monitor that early in the morning!

He seems less OT today.  There's so much going on for him - he's got a week to go of this last wonder week, he's growing 2 teeth and now this sleep transition.  Teeth have never really disrupted his sleep before though, so I think most of it must be down to this transition. And, getting to be a toddler!  He's 17 months today.

Originally (about a month ago) I tried a short 1st nap, but what happened was he didn't extend his afternoon nap like I'd hoped (just did about an hour) - so I ended up with 2 short naps and a very early bedtime - I did try it for about a week!  He hated being woken up after his morning nap as well.  So I think what we're doing now is the way to go.

I chickened out of a 10am nap today (!) and did 9:45 - but he only did an hour which is what he usually did when he used to go down at 9:30am (when we were properly on 2 naps).  He woke happy and I think wasn't tired enough to do longer.  DH is home for a week and is much braver than I am with the sleep thing so we will try 10am tomorrow.  He went down for his 2nd nap easily today - but that's because nap 1 was shorter.  Anything over an hour seems to make him far less happy to take a 2nd nap!  Is it OK to keep pushing out the nap but do the odd 2 nap day to catch up if he's getting OT?

I can envisage getting to 11am in a couple of weeks - would this look like:

WU: 5:30-6:00
Nap: 11:00 - 1???  I can hope for 2 hours!
Bed time: 6:00?  Or 5:45?  I suppose I could start with a really EBT and then as he gets used to it he could do slightly later maybe?  I can't really expect him to regularly do more than an 11.5 hour night with a 2 hour nap as he averages 13 hours in every 24 usually. 

I think ideally he'd be better on 11:30 for his nap so he'd have the shorter A to bed time as he likes that.  So I will have to keep pushing it out. 

Thanks so much again!

[ecwinters]

Didn't make it anywhere near 10 am this morning - he did a horrible short night (7pm-5:15am) and was clearly exhausted by 9 am.  So, I put him down about 9:25 and he went to sleep really quickly.   Nights shorter than 10.5 hours are normally OT for DS.  Hopefully he'll catch up a bit today and then we can try 10am tomorrow. 

He does really well with set nap times so I hope I'm not confusing him with moving the times of his 1st nap back and forward.  Ideally I'd like to get to 10am and stay on it for a few days to see how he adjusts.

I've got no way of resettling him when he wakes early as he's a totally independent sleeper and if I go in, it signals up time!  The only thing I can do is tell him it's still sleepy time (over the monitor) when he wakes.  He usually lies back down again but he rarely goes back to sleep - just lies and sucks his thumb and chats a bit!

[jessmum46]

I do think you might just need to grit your teeth and get on with it  He is having a really early first nap now and that may well be prolonging the early starts.  I hope he does a good day for you today and you can start pushing forwards tomorrow x

[ecwinters]

Thanks - yes that day he slept for 2 hours and 45 minutes (1 hour 45 in the morning and an hour in the afternoon).  I think something was wrong other than OT as he was just plain miserable and had a bit of a temperature. 

Back to normal yesterday - he woke at 5am but despite this we pushed to 10am for nap 1.  It was fine!  He was tired, but not too much.  So we had
WU: 5:05 am
Get up: 6am
Nap 1: 10:00-11:20
Then he refused nap 2 on a 4 hour A time. 
Bedtime: 5:30pm and asleep at 5:45pm.
Woke at 5:15 am this morning.
So over the 24 hours it was nearly 13 hours, which is his normal amount of sleep.

Today was
WU-5:15am
Get up-6am
Nap 1: 10:00-11:30
Nap 2: we tried 4 hours 15 A time and he went down at 4 pm (so, 4 hours 30 A time).  But there's not really time to even let him have a 30 minute nap as I don't like his day getting longer than 13 hours - he never likes it much. I'm going to try a 20 minute nap and then try bedtime at around 6pm.  Not sure what will happen!  20 minute naps worked for us when we were doing the 3-2 so I'm hoping they still will!

Having survived two 1 nap days - I think I should just push on to getting his nap at 11am.  Then we'd not have a catnap at all by then I think. 

Ideally I'd like him to wake up at 6am again (it's been creeping earlier and earlier)
Nap 1 at 11-1 or even 11:30-1:30
Then bedtime about 6 or 6:30

How quickly could we push to 10:15am?  Do people usually do about 3 or 4 days on each time, before pushing on?

Thanks for all your encouragement!

[jessmum46]

Yes I'd say 3-4 days then add 15 mins x

[ecwinters]

Thanks.
The catnap didn't really work well unfortunately, as we did this:

WU: 5:15 (get up 6:00)
Nap 1: 10-11:30
Nap 2: 4:00-4:20/25 (was really hard to wake him up!)
Bed time: 6:15 and asleep by 6:45
Then he woke at 5am this morning!  So a really short night and not enough sleep overall.

DH has just told me (he did bedtime the day before, when he refused the 2nd nap) that DS did an OT wake up 30 minutes after going down at night that evening.  So, I wouldn't want to do too many of those sorts of days either as the OT might build up?  There doesn't seem to be a good solution!

Today has gone horribly wrong so far as he's just woken 50 minutes into nap 1.  So we're looking at a 2 nap day, but realistically nap 2 is going to be fairly rubbish. 

He's waking SO EARLY!  I can cope with 5:30am but 5am is really starting to be tiring - he hasn't woken later than 6am for months but this 5am thing is fairly recent.  Do you think his body clock is just set like it?  Whatever time I put him to bed he seems to wake between 5-5:30am.  His day is so long as well, I'm not sure that's great either. 

I guess there's nothing we can do though except to push out the nap still!?

Thanks.

[ecwinters]

Just a quick thought...

If I think about it logically, then he's actually doing nearly a 5 hour A time to his first nap.  I know he's in his cot for a bit before I get him up at 6am, but he's definitely awake.  If his 5am wake up was translated to 7am, then things would start to look normal:

7am-wake up
12-1:30-nap (hopefully extending to 2 hours)
7pm-bedtime and hopefully asleep by 7:30pm

Is it asking for trouble doing something like this if he does a decent 1st nap?

5am-wake up
10-11:30-nap (hopefully extending to 2 hours)
5pm-bedtime and hopefully asleep by 5:30pm

So at least he's on a more normal length day and we get some consistency?  And then try pushing out the nap bit by bit to hopefully move his schedule forwards to a more acceptable time?  Or would this MASSIVELY backfire!?

Thanks so much and sorry for another post.

[jessmum46]

No that could definitely work (though if you get an EW on that routine it will be VERY early!)  You could basically approach it like daylight savings   I guess my way of moving that nap out 15 mins every few days is not totally dissimilar, though avoid the super-early bedtime.  Really with this transition it is a case of try it and see.  My only note of caution would be if you go for the 5-5 routine don't get stuck there for long.  Early starts can be tough to change x

[ecwinters]

Thanks!  I'd really only want to stick with it for a week or so.  But yes - 4:30am wake ups would be awful!  When I did the 20 minute catnap yesterday it didn't really work and I think if he does a 1 hour 30 minute (or more) nap I may just try for a 1 sleep day and an EBT. 

What does a 'normal' 1 nap day look like when they are just starting out and haven't got the hang of sleeping for 2 hours flat out yet? Do you try a longer A time in the morning than the afternoon?  And keep the day 12 hours or less?

Thanks again!

[ecwinters]

Apologies for adding another post - today was a bit weird as it was the first day I felt that there wasn't time for a 2nd nap without pushing the day out too far.  The last two days have gone:

WU-5:40
Get up-6:00
Nap: 10:15-11:35/40
Tried for a 2nd nap and he dozed off for 5 minutes from 4:10-4:15pm then sat up and was perfectly happy! 
Bed time - 5:30 and asleep at 5:45

WU: 5:15 (yuck!  But had done 11.5 hours at night)
Get up-6:00
Nap: 10:10-11:50 (longest so far!)
DH then decided that DS didn't need a 2nd nap at all.  I wanted to try in the hope it would give him some quiet time at least, but he won.  We did in fact do a quiet half hour reading before tea.  Not sure whether not giving him the opportunity for a nap was the right decision but DH felt it would have made the day too long, given the EWU time.
Bed time: 5:30 and asleep at 5:55.  I felt he was a bit too tired, so we'll see how he is in the morning. We may have to do a 2 sleep day to catch up.

What does this look like to you please?  Our plan is to push the nap to 10:30 in 2 more days time.  But we'll see how he goes.  Does pushing the nap out later really make him wake up later?  We need to really get him onto a 6am WU routine eventually - that would suit us fine (and was what we used to have). 

Thanks so much.   

[ecwinters]

Hi
Just wondering if someone could please give me an 'ideal' schedule for 1 nap?  With a wake up of 6am ideally.  DS likes 13 hours sleep over the course of 24 hours - very rarely does more so it's no good hoping for a 12 hour night!  He's also unlikely to nap longer than 1.5 hours, at least at the moment. Is it even possible to get him on a 1 nap routine? 

I'm actually in despair as today he's only slept for 1 hour in the morning (10:15-11:15) and refused any further naps!  He's massively overtired but just can't go to sleep

Thanks so so much!

[jessmum46]

'Ideal' is a tough word to be honest as it will be different for every LO. But I'd probably shoot for

WU 6
Nap 11.30/12 as long as he will do
BT 6.30/7

I know we've covered this a lot but why not just skip this gently pushing phase, go straight to 11.30 nap and try the brief (15 mins) in the car catnap around 9/9.30am to get you there until you can push through?

[Scottishmummy]

It's tricky to say "ideal" as different kids do so many different things..check this thread out for all the variations! What does your toddlers day look like?

I think such an early morning nap might make it tricky to do a 1 nap day just yet though...although I have heard of some LOs who like a long morning nap and long afternoon to bedtime..but it sounds like your DS got OT with that.

I saw your post about micro naps...I posted on that but, if your DS can't last until lunchtime yet for his nap, the micro nap might work for you..
At 15-16 mo my DS was doing this set nap pattern:

Wu:6-6.30
Nap 1-  9.35-9.50 (in cot at 9.30)
Nap 2- 1-3
BT: 7pm

He kept doing that until 18mo when he just stopped falling asleep in the morning and went straight to just taking his nap 1-3pm.