My 19 month old son has always been a crappy sleeper. My in-laws were here the week before/after our wedding, which screwed up little man's nap schedule, so I waved my little white flag and said fine, let's cut out the morning nap.... And I thought THAT was bad, HA!! Little did I know, but now his afternoon nap isn't even an hour long. HE NEEDS SLEEP!... because I need the break!
Heck, my almost 6 and 7 year old's still go down for a rest most days; even if they don't sleep, they read or play quietly.
I rely on naptime to catch up on work, housework, and regain a little sanity.
When do kids stop napping altogether? Is he trying to tell me he's done with naps? I mean, some days he's only in there, quiet, for maybe 10 minutes. He wakes up around 7-8am every morning, and goes to bed around 8, 8:30pm at night.
He should still be napping, right? He gets sooo bad when he's over tired. Even if he's not sleeping, should I at least leave him back there for some quiet time (even if he's mad?) At least then, he'd have the option to sleep or rest, right?
I never had this problem with the first two, they loved sleep as much as I do ;)
Every child is different! And, as we all know, you can't "force" someone to sleep if they don't want to! My daughter napped religiously till age 4, but my son gave up his naps completely at 1 1/2! If you think the naps have completely gone out the window, I wouldn't force it, just insist that his former nap time becomes "quiet time" and stick to it. He will eventually get the hint!
It's really hard when they're transitioning out of their daily nap isn't it? I had a napper and a non-napper. My best advice is to implement "quiet time". Mommy has a chance to close her eyes while he watches 30 minutes of video. Is this possible for you??
I've had awful napping problems with my son. He's almost four and he takes a 3 hour nap on weekends, when he's home with us. What's fascinating about this is that he didn't nap at home for a YEAR before this. And before that his naps really fluctuated and it was beyond difficult to get him to go down.
Yes, he should absolutely be sleeping at this age. My little guy was beyond cranky when he didn't sleep at 3 years old; I cannot even imagine your little guy without a nap. My advice, from experience with my son, is to play around with different ways of getting him to go to sleep. Maybe try to read him a book, sing him a lullaby, sit by his bed and hold his hand until he drifts off, give him a massage before hand, etc. Is he too hyper before the nap to actually go down and stay down? Mine would always insist he didn't need a nap but I could practically see his eyes and brain shutting down. Getting him to lie still was HARD! We eventually learned to sit with him for 20-30 minutes and continuosly tell him "Lie down, close your eyes." We tried bribing him with a toy car if he slept, but that didn't work. What worked for us after our one year of being napfree? Something I swore I'd NEVER do - putting him to sleep in our bed. It's a little annoying but I lie down with him, he tosses and turns for a bit and is out in 10 minutes and out for a while! Then I quietly run away and enjoy time to do housework, laundry, cook, watch television, etc.
I'm not sure what will work for your son but try different things out. Something's bound to work because he does need the sleep!
Good luck!
My 3 y/o still naps 1.5 hrs almost daily (if he sleeps in on the wknds I will sometimes let him skip) and my 7 y/o naps usually for 2-3 hours at some point during the weekend. They both get 10 hours of sleep most nights.
I feel you! My two year olds naps are getting shorter and shorter. Sigh - I need a nap too, lol!
I would still give him quiet time, put him in his crib with some books for an hour, maybe some soft music. That's a long stretch for a 19 months old to be up all day. He might fight it for a while but then he might start to learn to enjoy his quiet/alone time.
you are going to get a million responses saying they let the kid give up naps. jsut because he no longer wants to sleep does not mean you have to give up control of the household. put him into his crib and down for nap. and let him scream if he wants but don't give it. he needs some quiet time. i made my kids have quiet time till they were in school full time. and even in the summer still did it till they were in like 5th grade. they can watch a movie, read a book etc but they do need quiet time.
My son dropped nap time altogether when he was 27 months old. When he was 19 months, he always took one 2- 2.5 hr nap a day, usually around 1pm. I would say, put him down for a nap and hope for the best. If he doesnt want to sleep, then take him out of his crib and go about your day. My son goes through these spells where he like doesnt sleep at all. He wont fall asleep unti like 10pm and he'll be up by 4am!! However, after a few days, he'll go back to sleepin 10-11hrs a night. Give it a few days, and ill bet your little one will go back to the naps.
My 22 month old just went through this a few months ago. Turns out he was cutting his two bottom 2 yr molars, and he had a huge vocab break through. Both my boys have a horrible time winding down when a big milestone comes knocking. It's almost like they can't shut down, and then its a vicious cycle of being over tired and not sleeping. I just kept to my normal routine and w/in a week he was back to his 1.5hr nap--and gasp the last 3 days 3.5 hrs (wish my 3 yr old was on board with that one). Its up to you, I would think most at his age still need to nap!!!
both my kids were 2 years old when they stopped napping.
One thing that works for me when my kids have had a hard time settling down for sleep is to put them down much earlier than when I think they need to go down. I try to make my 18 month old wait til 1, since my four year old naps at one.... but sometimes that's too long for him. Until my daughter was two she took her nap at 11 am and usually slept for three hours. If I tried to put her down later than that, she was overtired and wouldn't sleep.
That being said, I believe sometimes they get out of whack and need to be "reset". I have spent 3-4 days skipping naps, letting them sleep in cars, whatever just to get back to our regular routine and it almost always works. My daughter didn't nap for about three months last year, but I'd still put her down every day for one hour quiet time. Eventually she started napping again, every day. Now I know it won't last that much longer since she's 4, but I'm enjoying that hour every day!
i think he's way too young to give up naps completely. Just keep putting him down at the same time every day and leave him in there for the full hour whether he's sleeping or not (I always do 90 minutes of mandatory "nap time" with my kids). My 2.5 year old will wake up and read or play quietly until his *alarm* goes off (a little monkey alarm clock that goes to sleep and wakes up and sings at the set time) and even my 10 month old will just kind of babble to herself until I come get her. it took a long time and a lot of crying for them to be content with just hanging out until mom got them though, so be patient and hang in there! He still desperately needs his sleep--most kids need naps until they're 6 or 7 years old (or even older...)
My oldest never napped after age 1, my youngest stopped at about 1 1/2..................occasionally (like once every three months) she will nap for a bit and i always worry it will be hard to get her asleep that night.
i think its because we get a good 8 to 9 hours every night.
My son DID switch from two naps to one at around that age, though I don't remember exactly how old he was. His single nap was longer, though, around an hour and a half. Gave it up completely btw 2.5 and 3.
Two recommendations for you:
First, if you want to institute a "quiet time" hour, make it fun and productive for your son; don't just stick him in his room if he's mad. My friend's son has a ritual of quiet time with paper and crayons, and it's helped him develop into very artistic little boy with good concentration skills.
And second, don't fall into the trap of thinking you can only get work done when your son's asleep. (I did that to some extent myself; I'm not being holier-than-thou). Instead, recruit him as your "helper." When I finally got my act together on this, I put my son in charge of putting all non-sharp, non-breakable dishes away (okay, so that's like 3 dishes total, but he's he's little & distractable). He now can put his own laundry away too, though not folded. If I'm paying bills, my son "helps" with the calculator. The key is to avoid letting your kids think housework is mom's job and mom's job alone. We all know where that leaves us in the end.....
How well does he understand what you say to him? If he understands you well, then don't say the word "nap" - say that everyone, yourself included, is going to take some time to rest. For some reason that made a difference with my son - when I say nap he starts losing it but if we are just going to rest, that's okay. Also, will he lay in bed with a couple of SAFE toys and/or books? I guess I'm saying, try to take the focus off of "you must sleep" and maybe it will distract him enough that he just might fall asleep!
