Napping at Daycare

mrstommyp

My LO has been going to daycare for 3 weeks now and is still only taking 30 minute naps while she's there.  When she is at home she wll sometimes sleep for up to 3  hours during a nap.  Everyone told me that this would be harder on me than it would be on her, but I am wondering when she will get used to being there.  Right now she comes home tired and crabby every night.  I basically feed her, bathe her, and put her to sleep.  I'd like to play with her too!  Sorry for the vent, but I could use some support right now.  Someone please tell me this gets better soon!

sara1104

for us, it never got better until she went to one nap a day and even then, she will nap 1 - 1 1/2 hours at daycare and 2-3 at home.  I use to feel SO GUILTY because i thought if I stayed at home, she would be a better sleeper.  So, while ours didn't get much better, I sure hope it does for you!!!

kickenb

Sam still doesn't nap very well at daycare.  He will take only one nap there for maybe 1-2 hours.  He too is cranky and tired when he gets home. 

When he is at home, he will take 2 naps.  His morning one last about 2-3 hours and his afternoon one will last 1-2 hours.

Sorry to be discouraging.

Valerie120408

DS's naps got better over time (after a month or so he started sleeping about 1.5h in the am and sometimes has a third nap too) although he still has days where he takes only short naps and is exhausted by the time we get home. I think that all the noise, kids, excitement makes it hard to nap at DC. But it may get better. GL

katy75

DD did this too.  When we would get home and she needed sleep, I'd put her down for 30 - 45 minutes so I could cook dinner and DH and I ate.  Then I got her up and fed her, bath and we played A LITTLE sometimes.  It helped, but it does suck.  You want to play with them, but they are so tired. 

DD has gotten better as she has gotten older!  She still naps for about 2 hours at daycare and at home she naps for 3ish hours.  We do get to play in the evenings now.  Hang in there, there is a lot going on at daycare and they don't want to miss anything!  It will get better.

massdreams

DS varies so much in the naps he'll take at daycare. He went a stretch when he was napping for 2 hours there, which he never does at home. The past few days have been rough though. He hasn't been napping well there and he's been so sleepy when he gets home, so he has ended up napping most of the time I'm home and waking up just to eat, get a bath, get changed, and go back to bed. I'm sad about it because I'm losing out on time with him, but he needs his sleep. The nap setup at daycare hasn't changed at all, so we're not sure what the issue is. Could just be a growth spurt. That always seems to be a good thing to blame issues on.

azuremama

For us it got better as he got older.  He didn't always sleep very well at daycare (actually, that got worse as he got older until he moved to the toddler room), but he got more used to it and wasn't as crabby and tired when he got home.  When he was younger, he'd sometimes fall asleep in the car and I'd leave him in the carseat and read the paper or something in the garage to let him nap.  Or sometimes I'd even try to lay him down for 20-30 minutes when we got home.  It sucks when they're grumpy during the time you get together, but hopefully it's just a phase.

BriAndSean

We've had a similar experience to that of most of the PP's. She never naps at DC for more than 45 minutes unless she has a fever. At home she naps for about 2 hours. We are in the process of moving her to one nap a day in preparation for the next room. I am hoping that we will have better luck with her napping in the toddler room since all the kids nap at the same time and they turn out the lights.

I hope it gets better for you! What helped us was to move her bedtime earlier. She goes down around 6:30 now and it helps her get enough rest to not be super crabby at DC.