napping madness

I know this is posted about a lot, but I need some feedback! I've always had great sleepers so this is very new territory for me. They were taking two solid two hour naps a day until about a month and a half ago. Then they started refusing the morning nap or just taking a cat nap AND refusing the afternoon nap! Out of nowhere!! So a friend said maybe they were ready for one nap...not sleepy enough in the morning and then overtired by the afternoon. I started gradually pushing back nap time. Now we're at the point where they are pretty much staying up until 11:30, eating a small lunch/snack, and then going down. Everyone tells me that they'll eventually start sleeping longer stretches, but it's been a few weeks and they are usually only sleeping for an hour or an hour and a half. By 4:30 they seem exhausted so some days they'll actually go back down for half an hour then, but most days they won't even try. Basically, nap time is in shambles! They are still sleeping a good 11-12 hour stretch at night, but they went from getting 4 hours of nap in the day to 1 hour or so. Does it get better?

 

It does get better. Could you try pushing nap time a little later to see if they sleep longer? I know when mine were waking after an hour, I also would put them back to bed (after checking diapers and what not) and re-do our little mini nap time routine.

 

i don't know if it gets better because i'm at the same point - we switched to one nap a day a couple of weeks ago & the girls are still only sleeping about 1.5 hours. they used to sleep around 4 during the day as well before. but like yours they're still sleeping 11 - 12 hours at night, sometimes even 13. anyway, that's all to say that i think we're all normal!!

sometimes when they're just way too fussy in the evenings, i'll put them down for "quiet" time. i'll do the whole nap routine & put them down in their cribs, but if they choose not to sleep that's fine. i just leave them for an hour & then get them back up. even when they don't sleep that seems to recharge them. i mean, if they're really upset & screaming i don't make them stay for the hour but usually they'll just babble to themselves or throw their stuffies into each other's cribs, or otherwise play quietly till it's time to get back up.

 

are your day naps getting any longer? i hope it was just a phase that they cut to 1 hr and hopefully they'll stretch it out longer.

 

So far still about an hour and a half...two on a good day. Maybe it's all they need, but it's so surprising after they were such solid 4 hour a day nappers before the switch. Sometimes I do put them down for quite time like Rachel and DS will occasionally take the second nap, but most of the time it's only the one. I'm putting them down at 12...should I go later??

 

I know for my twins it took a few months for that one nap to really lengthen. Mine have always been short nappers so we went from 2 60-90 minute naps to one 45-60 minute nap once we switched. I kept nudging the nap a little later and later until I realized that I had them going down a little too late.

At that age, our magic time was about 4.5 to 5 hours after they woke for the day. I think they woke around 6:30 back then, so they napped around 11:30. DS usually right at 11:15 and DD at 11:30. They woke around 1:30 and went to bed for the night around 7:00 or 7:30.

Now that they're older, they go down around 1:00 or 1:30 and sleep until 3:00. But that just happened in the last 6 months.

 

I think it just takes a bunch of trial and error... we take it one day at a time, and for now it works. if we have somewhere we need to be, then I work naps around that, otherwise, I just see how they are and do naps when they get cranky...

we have been lucky, usually when its a 1 nap day they will nap 3+ hrs... their normal 2 naps a day are 2 hours each.

last night we kept them up entirely too late... almost 10p... and this morning my dd woke early at 6:30a. we woke ds at 7:30a. by 9:20a my dd was in full meltdown mode... so I figured we were doing a 2 nap day and I put them down.

well, she ended up sleeping through a wake up from my ds and sleeping until 1:30p... 4 hours!!! My ds ended up not really sleeping until closer to 11:30a (after getting out of his sleep sack and climbing out of his crib for the first time... ugh!) anyway, he slept until close to 2:30p... so he got 3 hrs in. since they slept so long, I didn't even attempt an afternoon nap.

I wonder if, in your case you should put them down earlier? when were their wake time and nap times before the change? did you try to move their naps by 30 min? or just try all at once to keep them up longer?

 

It sounds like they're still adjusting since they're tired before bedtime. It does take a while. I posted a similar post about 6 months ago but mine still only sleep 1 1/2 hours plus or minus 15 minutes. But the good news is now they are okay until bedtime which is at 6:30. Most people who replied to me said their naps got longer as they adjusted so it seems like for most people that is the case. I know how you feel wanting longer naps!!!! Naps are so important for babies but also moms!!!

 

I totally agree, it took quite a while for my girls to adjust and eventually their one nap turned into 2 to 3 hours, but it did take a month or more before it happened. We also keep pushing it back until they had a full lunch at about 11:30 and then went down for a nap and then had a snack when they woke up. Boy, I miss those days!!