Sharon, mum of 2 year old Alex and newborn Elise, has some questions about her toddler’s daytime sleeping habits.
“Alex has always been a great sleeper, he goes to bed at 7 and usually goes right through till about 6.30 in the morning, with a two hour afternoon nap. I know I’m lucky, most of my friends toddlers sleeping patterns are still all over the place, and having Alex sleep so well is a godsend when I’m up all night with his sister.
In the last couple of weeks he’s started fussing at night time and not wanting to go to sleep until 8 or 9 o’clock. This means he’s exhausted and cranky the next day and I miss out on my evenings. I don’t know what to do about it. Someone suggested that we cut back on his afternoon nap but I’m not sure if I can bear to give that up yet as it’s the only break I get during the day. I thought toddlers didn’t give up their daytime sleep until they were around 3 and was really hoping to get another 9 months of peace and quiet during the day!
What should I do? Do I cut back on his daytime sleep (and my sanity time!) in the hope that he will go to bed earlier, or do I keep up the nap and give him a later bedtime? I would love to hear what other parents have done in this situation, and how old their toddlers were when they gave up their daytime nap.”
The results of our mums’ survey are in and it would appear that our toddlers are nothing if not varied in their sleeping habits! Our results showed that 85% of your children had dropped their day sleep by age 3 with roughly 1/3 stopping before age 2 and the rest fizzling out between 2 and 3 years of age. Of those under 3 year olds still napping, 45% were napping for 1-1 ½ hours – good news for anyone who, like Sharon, enjoys a bit of sanity time during the day!
The most common reasons for stopping the daytime nap included going to bed later at night (29%), not settling during the day (19%) and your child deciding they no longer wanted to sleep (34%). Other reasons included childcare issues and the day sleep being pushed so late in the day it made more sense to drop it and introduce an earlier bedtime.
For parents like Sharon who are wondering what they should do, here is some advice from our mums:
“When my daughter started showing signs of not being tired at bedtime I cut her nap back by 30mins until she settled better at night. She used to nap for up to 3 hrs and over the course of 6months has now cut back to 1.5hrs (I just wake her gently). This way you still get a break during the day and the wee one's not cranky in the afternoon but still ready for bed at 7,” Sally, Brighton
“I would look at how easy they were to settle at night and how long after they were in bed they actually slept along with how easily they settled during the day. If both showed a change in pattern I would look to either reducing nap first then dropping it. When we dropped it, we bought bedtime forward up to a couple of hours on the first day slowly returning it to normal over 2 week period,” Debbie, Swansea
“It really depends what you value more - your time in the afternoon or your time in the evening? Ideally, you want your child to be down at a reasonable hour, and all toddlers drop their afternoon nap eventually. Have you tried taking him out for walks and trying to tire him out in the afternoon? Also, maybe try giving him a nap just after lunch rather than mid afternoon so that he has more time to tire before bedtime,” Bec, Liverpool
Hi have you tried putting him down earlier for his daytime sleep so it’s further away from bedtime? Perhaps moving it forward 10 minutes a day? If he slept straight after lunch it should give home enough time to be tired by bedtime. Plenty of fresh air will help at night too as well as routine,” Laura, Bath