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Friday, September 23, 2011

One Nap a.k.a Please don't do it.

After a comment conversation with Sherry the other day, I realized that I never shared this milestone on the blog (and ya'll know I love to over share/ give my unsolicited opinion on everything).
Jer's quote-"it's like you're talking with a celebrity!" (he knows how much I love me some Sherry and John)

About a month ago, upon our return from Ohio, Isla June, though not politely, informed me that she was done with the whole two nap thing...by refusing to take a second nap in the day.  Excuse me?  I thought I was in charge here.  I put you in the crib, it's nap time.  right?
yeah, not so much.  I was outvoted and decided that unfortunately, we were going to have to work on this new milestone sooner rather than later (a cranky and abhorrent toddler will win every time).
Let me give you some back story- We were following a great little daily routine of 9 am and 2 pm naps with a 7 pm bedtime- love, love, love it.  I knew that if the first nap wasn't a total success, we could always try again in a few hours.  And naps were mostly consisting of 1-2 hour stints. Very reasonable.  Most days, I could get a solid 3 hours total out of her.  A little breathing time for mommy.
But then, everything changed.  Like I said, she stopped taking the second nap.  The first nap stayed pretty consistent as she is a little tired in the mornings anyway.  But because she wouldn't nap in the afternoon she would be up for 5-7 hours straight!  And be a total nightmare. (plus we were teething. ugh, teething.  Some days I wanted to remove all of her baby teeth and just buy her dentures).
So, I figured that we would just stay up later and take a nap at like 11:00 or 12:00.  Cool.  ummm. no.  Isla June slept for an hour and 30 min.  max.  Now we were back to square one (the staying up for 5-6 hours at a time ).  I probably should have done some research into this progression instead of just fumbling around blindly, but I don't have a library membership and I didn't know of a specific book I could buy (and I didn't want to buy a ton), and I guess I could have asked other mommies, but every baby is different.  Hmmm. maybe I'm just stubborn and lazy.
Anywho, we played the "figure it out as you go" game.  I figured out that we need to have a slower progression toward the all-in-one afternoon nap, 10:00, then 10:30, then 11:00, you get the point.  And it took at least 2-3 weeks for the naps to start to get longer (consistent 2 hours and now sometimes 3 or 3.5!!).  It was a struggle of patience and toddlerdom.  ugh.  Glad it's (mostly) over.  Sometimes I feel like, because I'm not following a set of rules about sleep (like babywise or moms on call, etc), that I'm ruining my child and her sleep habits.  We kind of just make it all up as we go along.  The adventurer in me I guess.
Oh, one other thing.  Lunch comes AFTER nap.  Pooping in the middle of sleepy time does NOT work for this momma.

4 comments:

  1. I was so sad when my (now two year old) daughter gave up her "baby naps" she used to be an "every two hours" napper. She'd go down for anywhere from an hour to two and half hours and then be up for to hours and then go back down. Her bed time was 8 pm, and she would get up at midnight, four AM and eight AM to eat and then sleep until ten AM (then be up for the day). For 18 months we did this, some people thought it was crazy (the feedings at night) but I was HAPPY to do quick night feedings in order to have all those day time naps to accomplish things. Then her pediatrician said "no more night feedings" and within a week she was sleeping through the night and only taking one two hour nap a day. I wanted to kick things and yell "oh sugar" (I ALSO read YHL, lol). I feel ya, it's sad when the "baby" naps end and the "toddler" behavior surfaces! Hang in there momma!

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  2. Thanks! It seems that we have to do what's best for "them", but it doesn't always work out for us! The life of a mom!

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  3. Library books and experts behind, we all figure it out as we go along, since every baby - every person - is different! You are doing great!

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  4. I agree with Marilyn... I am a "Babywise" Mom but that doesn't mean it doesn't take a lot of trial and error to figure things out! We have gone back and forth from one nap and two since my daughter was 11 months old (she is 18 months today!)

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