Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Nap Boycotter
Help! My two year old is boycotting her naps. I am not ready to give up naptime, and I feel like she is young enough that she still needs them. I have tried putting her to bed earlier, so that she'll wake up earlier, and be more tired at naptime, but she still sleeps in until her normal awake time. I've still been putting her in her crib, but she just plays and talks in there and won't go to sleep. I guess you could say she's at least getting quiet time, and maybe she'll start falling asleep again. But I've been avoiding switching her to a toddler bed, in fear that she'll just play at naptime, and now my fears are confirmed. If I put her in a bed, I think we'll have to kiss naptime officially good-bye because she'll just get up and play! What do you think? Is this just a phase, or are my days of getting things done in the afternoon over?
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6 comments:
My daughter continued taking naps well into her third year, but my son stopped when he was two. I enforced "quiet time," for at least an hour every day. Sometimes he would sleep and sometimes he wouldn't, but he knew he had to stay in his room.
Unfortunately, it got to a point that he was clearly not sleeping ever and quiet time ended much sooner with him than it did with my daughter. I have friends though who are sticklers about quiet time and still make their four year olds do it even though they aren't sleeping. You just have to figure out what will work for your family.
i think all kids nap until different ages. my brother stopped at 18 months! my little girl goes through phases where she will ask to take naps and where she will just play in her room. if she really really needs it and i need to make sure she sleeps, i take her dress up and toys out of her room! :)
when we moved to a bed where she can move freely, it got harder and i have to give her a lecture before every nap :) but it works for us. good luck!!
Bauer goes through phases where he won't nap, but then he's really cranky for the rest of the day so I know his little body still needs one! It could just be a phase so don't give up, and I think keeping a quiet time going at the same time of day will help and then if she does go back to napping it will be easier for her to jump right back into it!
Again, don't give up!
Wow are girls are so similar. I stopped giving my 2 year old naps two months ago because when she did, she wouldn't fall asleep at night until like midnight. Not cool. So we skip nap but every afternoon I have to keep her busy so that she doesn't crash and fall asleep otherwise I'll be up all night. People think it's crazy that she's only two and has no nap, but I've accepted and I've moved on from it and just can't be with her that late at night!
If this happens to you, I try to get things done in the morning when she is alert and wants to watch some PBS shows. Then I do more active things with her during the time she'd be tempted to fall asleep.
So far all my kids stopped taking naps by 2 1/2. With one of my boys it was just like with Linz. If he did take a nap then he was up so late and so I gladly got rid of the nap for the normal bedtime.
Reagan went through that phase a few months ago, but I just made her stay in her crib for an hour so she knew that staying awake didn't benefit her. She sleeps in her bed at night and her crib at nap time. Some days she still doesn't nap, but the majority of the time she still sleeps. She needs it though, because she doesn't sleep the normal 12 hour night. She sleeps about 10 hours at night, whether she has a nap or not. You know her best, you'll figure out what she needs!
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