Please tell me this is a phase!

Our dd has been having a hard time with her afternoon nap. She is almost 8 months old and has been doing this for about 3 weeks. She may have one afternoon nap a week where she falls asleep and naps well. After I nurse her I place her in the crib and walk out. She basically rolls around, babbles, and plays and doesn't fall asleep. She will do this for at least an hour and recently went 2 hours plus not sleeping. She doesn't really cry she just babbles and whines sometimes. She's all over her crib, rolling, laughing, etc... you get the picture. How do I get her to take a nap?! She is exhausted. I end up pulling her out and trying again later, but then it gets close to her bedtime. I can tell she is fighting the exhaustion. I have placed her down earlier but to no avail. I'm just hoping this is a phase. Thanks for listening. FYI: She naps at 9am (morning) and wakes around 1030 and naps again at 1pm (afternoon nap).

 

Holy cow..I could have written your post. Aiden is doing that! He keeps rolling onto his belly and then whines..I put him back on his back and he whines..I cannot figure him out. He will not take his binky as he used to...when I go to give it to him he smiles and laughs..it's crazy. I cannot see dropping a nap b/c he seems tired. I'm lokoing forward to what others suggest.

 

Maybe you could try pushing her afternoon nap back to maybe 2 o'clock instead of 1 o'clock. Maybe if she "plays" a little more after lunch she might tire herself out more easily and not have troubles winding down in her crib. My boys would do this too and I found that pushing back the nap 30 mins or an hour and letting them wear themselves out playing, cut the "playing" and talking in the crib.


Carrie

 

QUOTE(JakoBen @ Jun 11 2007, 08:45 PM) [snapback]288167[/snapback]
Maybe you could try pushing her afternoon nap back to maybe 2 o'clock instead of 1 o'clock. Maybe if she "plays" a little more after lunch she might tire herself out more easily and not have troubles winding down in her crib. My boys would do this too and I found that pushing back the nap 30 mins or an hour and letting them wear themselves out playing, cut the "playing" and talking in the crib.
Carrie

I did this today actually. I usually go for our daily walk after their morning nap for about 45 minutes to an hour then head home. By this time it's close to 100pm, so I get them ready for their afternoon nap. Today I shortened the walk to 30 minutes then went home got in the car and went to visit someone for an hour. I put them down for a nap around 130/145pm and it still took a while (i.e. 45min-1hour) for her to fall asleep. The good thing about today is she's still sleeping. Usually she wakes after 30 minutes or so but it has been about 2 hours now. She must have been really tired. Thanks for the advice. I guess I'll need to come up with other ideas to get her to become more sleepy.

 

I was going to suggest the same thing, to try it a little later in the day. I've noticed our "schedule" changes frequently and I have to change naps times every once in awhile.

My dd will do that a little, too, though not quite as long. Usually I'll let her have a little toy or book and she wears herself out & falls asleep eventually. Either way, I figure she's still resting even if she's not asleep. Sometimes, though, if it's just taking forever & she's not doing her little "clues" of sleepiness I'll just get her up & try again in about an hour or so.

 

Glad to hear it kinda worked today ! Sounds like you have an Energizer Bunny who can go, go, go without becoming sleepy B) . Taking my boys out of the house always seemed to kinda help tire them out (and me... :blush: ). For some reason, going to the park and swinging always did and still does do the trick every time (as you can see in my avatar, they're swinging fools, LOL). In this heat though, the thought of loading them up in the car and getting there seems like an a huge obstacle for me right now ! Needless to say, my DH has started putting together their birthday swingset this weekend. Can't wait till he's done!!! Keep at it, it'll get better as she becomes more and more mobile!!!


Carrie

 

I had that same problem with my guys! They did outgrow it, but I used to just let them play until they conked. Another thing that helped was putting toys in their crib that they had to hold still and look at (Snap-Lock Beads do the trick here).

 

My two did that a couple of weeks ago and I just left them in their crib for their whole nap. I didn't go in and try to soothe them. They would eventually fall asleep and sometimes only get a 20 minute nap. I woke them at their regular time and kept them on their schedule. This only lasted for a week or so. I think they figured out that I wasn't rescuing them from naptime. Hope this helps.

 

Your post made me laugh, as that is what my dd is doing right now! I have been doing the same thing as the pp and just leaving her, unless she really gets to crying, or she gets her brother to crying, which sounds like what might be happening as I type this. I try to go in as little as possible. They do each have one toy in the crib with them.