Nap confusion!

mrsmctaggart6

ive been doing the 234 method all along but all of a sudden she is staying up later and then taking a monster nap in the middle of the afternoon and a cat nap right when I want to feed her dinner... What is going on with my suddenly unpredictable child!? Is anyone else dealing with this out of the blue?

kmcshane0211

Yep. Just ride it out, I think it should pass. 

Its possible *possible* but not likely she/he is ready to drop that first nap. Although, everything I read indicates the earliest that happens is 12ish months (I guess you're close to that) and still only a very small percentage of babies do it that early.

My daughter fought her first nap and/or started taking a crap nap for that first one for a couple weeks. The second nap was super long on those days. I just kept encouraging that first nap and after a week or so she was back at it. 

Ride it out!

ElleMF728

The best thing I've found to deal with this type of thing is capping naps.  The rule in my house is up by noon and up by 4 pm in order to preserve bedtime. Bedtime is between 8 and 8:30 pm every night and in order to make that happen we have to wake LO up from his naps occasionally.  

There are a lot of days that DS2 would nap from 10:30-12:30 or 3-5 pm if I let him but I don't because I personally believe that a consistent bedtime is the key to my sanity. I also don't let him sleep in mornings past 7:45 am. 

ElleMF728

To add: DS2 is almost a year old.  At this point he is more capable of dealing with an extended wake time if necessary so we are moving to more of a "by the clock" schedule.  Our 2,3,4 is turning into more of a nap at 10, 2:30 and bed at 8 pm schedule.  Obviously we are flexible when he needs us to be though. 

mrsmctaggart6

Thanks, that sounds like a good plan, I've been going with the flow because I'm a sahm but she was on a pretty regular routine and this big shift out of nowhere is really throwing me off, I'll probably give her the week to normalize and if she doesn't I'll have to start trying to control it for my sanity, I thought maybe she was trying to go to one nap, but then she's super grumpy in the afternoon so I have to let her cat nap.