Tuesday Toddler Tales
It seems the afternoon nap is packing up and leaving our house for good... at my doing!
Yes, you read that correct: I am eliminating the afternoon nap myself.
Why, you ask?
Because after letting her nap over the Memorial Day weekend, I've realized that they just aren't working for us anymore and often times, backfire in my face, leaving me more frustrating and exhausted than if I had skipped it.
Emily woke up around 7:30am every day over the weekend and started to get moody, whiny, defiant, limp, and downright obnoxious around 1:30pm so, we put her down for a nap, wanting a little time to ourselves every afternoon, and she instantly fell asleep and stayed asleep until after 4:00pm. Sounds great, huh so, why are we complaining?
When bath time and bed time rolled around each day at 7:30pm, Emily flipped out, screaming; "I'm not sleepy at all" while running from us, and then, spent the next 3-4 hours talking, singing, thrashing, and playing in her crib, not falling asleep until after midnight. So, what, you say... at least she was in her bed!
Well, yes, at least she was in her bed; however, by this time she was then overly tired and her inner clock was all messed up and she would wake up before 6:00am the next morning, needing to use the bathroom and hungry. Ugh!
This incident reminded me of when she was an infant and I thought that if I kept her up all day she would sleep longer at night. Anyone else remember going through this?
To get her back on schedule, I didn't let her nap on Monday and got her into bed at 7:00pm. She slept 12 hours and was her old happy self, excited to go to school this morning at 7:30am.
It is so hard to give up a nap (for our own sanity) but sometimes necessary! I'm going to miss Celia's second nap, but we have to go down to one now. As nice as daytime breaks are, night time sleep is so important.
ReplyDeleteAw man, I remember the "keep a baby up all day to make them sleep at night" mentality! Totally doesn't work. Sounds like this new idea is working for ya!
ReplyDeleteI can sooo relate to this! My son Andrew gave up naps at 2.5yrs and I think my daughter is heading there too :( She was doing the same thing ...sleeping from 1:30 till past 4pm and not going to bed at 7:30. Who can blame them? There is no way they are going to be tired after only 3 hours at this age.
ReplyDeleteFor my own sanity though, I need Abby to still nap. So, now I'm trying to get her up by 3PM and doing bedtime at 8PM.
Good Luck!
I'm glad Emily is back to her happy self! It sounds like y'all had a fabulous Memorial Day weekend! I hope everyone is doing great!
ReplyDeleteI'm glad Emily is back to her happy self again! It sounds like y'all had a wonderful Memorial Day weekend! Y'all are such a cute family--I love reading the blog to see what is happening in your life!
ReplyDeleteMy daughter Zoe started giving up naps at age two... I thought this was going to be a disaster, not to mention not having that nap time for myself to get things done. But we quickly realized that if she DID nap, she wouldn't go to sleep at night. Soon I started telling her daycare teachers to NOT let her nap because otherwise she wouldn't go to bed until ten! Every kid is different, you have to just adjust to their schedules. Sounds like you have figured it out with Emily!
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