How long do you try to give a nap before giving up?

[MeredithK]

Ok, I'm exhausted from trying to give DS a nap. He is 9 months old. For a few months now, he has been been great about taking 2 naps a day. Always on me...for about an hour. But, now I can't get him to nap. I realize that he is hitting milestones and his 6th tooth is coming through. But, it's taking me upwards of an hour to get him to nap. He's just too interested in the world.

I just tried for over an hour and a half. I finally gave up. It was too tiring. And he only has an hour and a half before bed.

So, what do you guys do? How long do you try? There's no way he could be trying to go down to one nap at this age, right?

I need help...between being up all night long with him and spending hours upon hours trying to get him to nap, all I want to do is sleep!

Thank you for any advice.

[Tway]

My DD is also 9 months, and I'm a little obsessed with her naps (and, well, her sleep in general). These days, I wait until she shows her tired signs--the big one being eye-rubbing. And even then I give it 5 minutes more of fussing to be sure she's really ready. Then I lay down with her, feed her, and she's usually off in a few minutes.

If she gets up and she's obviously awake and not ready, I curse under my breath, sigh, and get up with her until she shows tired signs again. But if she's trying to get up but looking drowsy (the old "I must stay awake to see more!" move), then I tuck her back against my stomach, put my arm around her, give her my thumb to hold, and kind of prevent her from flipping onto her tummy and waking up. She often falls asleep in 5 minutes--she just needs help giving in to sleep, I think. She's very curious, which is wonderful, but it makes sleeping a bit of a chore at times.

Just my two cents' worth. Hope it can be of some help!

[Nicole730]

My son went down to 2 naps a day at 10 months. His first nap was only 30 minutes long and it was a struggle to get it to happen. Now, at 26 months, he naps for 2-3 hours in the afternoons still. I would stay try earlier or later, play around with it for a bit.

Unfortunately, my son naps best if he takes a nap from 2-5, he won't go down easily before that.

[tzs]

if she's tired and showing it....forever.
there's been a couple times i've given in and taken her out of her crib to wait a while but she was happy babbling so it was obvious to me that i'd just gotten the timing wrong.

but if it was so close to bedtime i'd probably give up after about 30 minutes.

[katelove]

I read somewhere just recently that if a baby hasn't gone to sleep after 20 minutes of trying all the things which usually work then it's probably worth doing something else for a while.

As a PP said though, if they were obviously very tired then I would probably keep going and maybe try something which didn''t usually work (if I hadn't already). Last night J was very unsettled for a while and none of the usual things worked. As a last resort I tried swaddling, which she normally won't tolerate, and she was asleep in 5 minutes. I don't know if it was just a coincidence or not but I'd try it again in similar circumstances.

[BeckyBird]

A few weeks ago, I tried to get Aries to sleep for bedtime. Nothing unusual, just like every other night. I laid down with her, nursed her, and waited for her to fall asleep. I ended up spending 2 HOURS in bed trying to get her to sleep! I kept thinking she would fall asleep soon, and I've already been here for X amount of time, so if I get up now, it would all have been a waste of time.

2 hours, an all time record for me. I vote that if 1 hour has passed, then maybe you should give up.

[cristeen]

I'm with Tway. I rarely spend more than maybe 10 minutes on it for nap-time. Longer at night, but rarely more than 30. It really depends.

Why do you think he needs a nap? At almost 10 mos, my guy gets 2 a day, on a good day. He takes one morning nap (usually 2 hours) and one afternoon nap (usually about 45 minutes). He is almost always up between 4 and his bedtime at 8. That close to bedtime, I would not be trying to get him to take a nap - I might put him to bed a bit earlier, but nap - no (I've made that mistake and been up half the night).

If he falls asleep on his own at that time, I let him sleep and just hope that he's down for the night. Sometimes he is, sometimes he's not.

But we're also dealing with the stage where life is more interesting than sleep. Like Tway, I hold him in my arm, press him against my body and don't let him flip over. If he insists on flipping over and standing up, then I have to assume he's not that tired - and we can try again in 20 minutes if need be. But I'm not going to lie there and fight him. If I'm the one "forcing" the nap, then we have to be in the bedroom, where there are the fewest distractions. Sometimes it takes me stroking his forehead to get him to close his eyes. Sometimes it takes me letting him roll over, spoon with me, and draping my arm over his hip so he can't move. Sometimes it takes me falling asleep myself. And some days the only solution is to pop him in the car and go for a drive - he usually passes out within 5 minutes on those days. And if all of that fails, I pop him in the Mai Tei or the stroller and go for a walk. Just to handle my own frustration level and to stop the fussing. Sometimes he'll sleep, sometimes he won't, but at least I got some fresh air and a break from the fussing.

[MeredithK]

Originally Posted by cristeen

Why do you think he needs a nap?

Well, right now, he's super fussy and rubbing his eyes. He's been up for 4 hours. He woke up every two hours all night long. He's tired. BUT HE WON'T GO TO SLEEP!

I am feeling like such a failure right now. I finally got him to close his eyes while bouncing him on the yoga ball. But, since I can't hold him like that all day, I put him in bed and he just started screaming. I tried for an hour. It seems so silly to think I could force someone to go to sleep, but at the same time it seems ridiculous I can't get my tired baby to nap.

Of all the challenges that we've had since he was born, this, for some reason, is the hardest for me.

[Knitting Mama]

Is he comfortable sleeping in a wrap or carrier? I do that with Cecilia a lot when she's in her "I don't want to be put down" mode. I put her in the wrap and then bounce on the ball, rather than trying to load her up when she's already out.

[maptome]

I do 10 minutes more than it normally takes. For us, DD has been taking 15-20 minutes to take a nap, usually. So, I'll try for 30 minutes and then give up and try again 30 min to one hour later.

Sometimes, she doesn't want to sleep because she has a big poop, or some other valid reason. She's a sleep fighter, so I can't stand anymore than that.

[treeoflife3]

my kiddo was down to one nap at 9 months. She slept for 1-2 hours then and 12 at night.

I didn't try very hard to get her down for naps. If nursing her to sleep didn't work then she wasn't going to nap so we'd go play for a bit longer and try again.

I also made sure she was showing tired signs rather than watching the clock. I've never had naptime scheduled... she's always decided... it was too much of a fight otherwise. She had a general time she'd routinely want one but sometimes she'd be off by up to two hours.. still does that sometimes.

ETA: she would sleep for 12 hours, but that included waking up 2-3 times. 4 on bad nights. she was still down from about 7-7.. sometimes I got 730 and rarely 8am.

[Bellabaz]

My dd is 10 months as she is slowly going to one nap a day. She will give me a short under andhour nap inthe am and then a big 3 or 4 hour nap in the pm. I wit for tired signs, nurse her then put her down. Sometimes she cries for a couple minutes, sometimes she is right to sleep. But I can tell by her cry (its different when she is not going ot go down) and if she doesn't stop after say max 10 minutes (yes, a couple of really stressful, burnt out times I let it go almost that long), that she is not going to sleep right now. So I curse, take a deep breathe and go get her. This has actually been happening more at night then at nap but so far this week seems to be better (knock on wood)

[kismetbaby]

Ugh. I feel you! Some days he goes down easy-peasy and some days. . .not. This afternoon I spent and hour and a half trying to get him to nap. Not. happy. about. that. I would have given up sooner, but I KNOW he's exhausted, but he just won't relax. So I kept trying all my tricks. . .nothing worked though. So now he's playing on the carpet with toys and I am trying not to be frustrated. I think he's getting a tooth though. . .I don't know. It seems to happen on and off and I haven't discovered the pattern--something I'm eating/he's eating? teeth? developmental stuff?

I guess the thing that frustrates me is that now he'll be soooo tired at say 5pm. . too early for bed too late for nap. Grrr. So his schedule (such that it is) will get totally screwed.

I wish I had some brilliant advice for you. But just wanted you to know we're there too and I never quite know what to try or when to give up. Sigh

[MeredithK]

Originally Posted by kismetbaby

I guess the thing that frustrates me is that now he'll be soooo tired at say 5pm. . too early for bed too late for nap. Grrr. So his schedule (such that it is) will get totally screwed.

I know...isn't that the worst? Right now, I don't know what we'll do about bed. He's super cranky now, but won't nap, so either he's going to have to go to bed at like 5 or we'll just have to deal. I hate days like this!

Not that I'm glad you guys are having the same problem, but it does help to know I'm not alone.

[cocoanib]

10-15 minutes.
If she's not into it, we move on to something else until she shows tired signs again.

[kismetbaby]

BTW, I do think that developmental achievements have a lot to do with sleep. When he learned to crawl a month or so ago, he went through a terrible sleep phase. . .up a lot at night and not napping. It was ROUGH. But it seemed to go back to normal, which still isn't the world's "best" or most predictable sleep--he's just a sensitive sleeper I believe. "Normal" for us right now is 11-12 hours at night with 3-4 wake-ups, (although usually the wake-ups are just to nurse a little and fall right back to sleep) and two naps a day. The length of the naps is variable, but he usually goes down around 10am and 2pm.

As for today's fiasco, I am thinking either teeth and/or more developmental stuff. . .he's just this week been pulling up to standing everywhere, all the time. Its like when he learns a new skill he gets totally fixated and can't bear to fall asleep and loose precious practice time. Hopefully, tomorrow will be better for us both!

I keep trying to remember that very very soon he will be a teen-ager and I will miss these days.

[Pookietooth]

Yeah, I try not to spend more than 20-30 minutes with dd trying to get her to sleep for naps. I find I get more frustrated and this translates probably to tension, which doesn't help. I used to try other things -- like if I was nursing her in bed, putting her in the Ergo and trying that, but lately I'm just too lazy/busy to bother with that. I usually wait around 45 minutes to an hour and try again. Or we go somewhere in the car where she falls asleep.

[JordanKX]

To answer your question, only a few minutes. And then try something else - the car was my last attempt on the worst of days. I always thought, maybe I was just reading the wrong signs or trying too early. But the car, that'd tell me quickly if he really wanted sleep, or if he was awake. And more often than not, he was awake. He just wasn't having it.

I will say that 9 months was the worst. Something about mobile (my DS was highly, newly mobile), and he just wouldn't sleep. Where he'd been great, almost 'on schedule' for months prior, 9 months he forgot it all. He went Days with only 1/2 hr in the morning and nothing in the afternoon. But now, just 10 months, he's back to sleeping. So I really do think the mobility was part of it, or Something.

hugs.

[Mom2M]

After a half hour, I give up. If it is at night and she is overtired and can't settle down, I discovered something that calms her down and she'll go right to sleep. I went to youtube earlier this week because she hadn't really had a nap that day and was very overtired and hyped up.
I started playing lullabies on it and my computer chair rocks so I can rock her.
Well, got to the Anne Geddes lullaby with all the baby pictures and we watched it over and over. She started out slumping her head forward and then rested back on me and fell asleep. We watched it 8 times the first day