So, you’ve made it to about twice the time on the outside that your little nugget was on the inside. Way to go, you are hitting your stride! As you look back at pictures from their first birthday, you are shocked and amazed at how much they have grown and what little personalities they are getting. Buckle up, it stays crazy.
At this point, your little guy should be taking advantage of one strong nap a day. If you’re lucky, it will last around 3 hours. Make sure the timing of that nap stays consistent. That can get tricky as his increased mobility and need for fun may make it hard to get home in time to settle in for naptime. But, if you’re moving naptime too late or trying to move it around too often, you’re probably paying for it at night. With sleep, consistency is always key. Yes, you can be flexible for sure. Just don’t substitute inconsistent for flexible. Flexible implies there is a standard holding you in place. You should see wake times of 5-7 hours, so a 7 am waking means a post nap lunch is still in order, especially if you want to see a 7:30 ish bedtime. However, I know some bunnies may be waking earlier than 7. If you’re kiddo is waking before 6 am regularly, you don’t have to give into that. There are ways to work on that. If you’re looking to get rid of napping all together, you’ve got at least another six months to go. Some kiddos may be able to drop their nap as early as 22 months. However, you’re usually looking at closer to 3 years old. My kids have been across the board, so know that there will be a lot of variability and try not to force it, or again, you may buy yourself more trouble. If you get into a sticky spot, or if your kiddo has never had a nap schedule, I'm here to help! Get in touch and we can make the magic happen for you too.
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The Magical Mystical Nap: 12-18 months
Happy birthday! You’ve made it to one year of life with this bundle! They may be walking at this point, or getting ready to walk. They are learning all sorts of new things, stacking blocks, “reading” books, “coloring,” using utensils, and working on language a ton. This is a very fun phase of watching your baby turn into a toddler, and it comes with some potential for more freedom from nap prison. Your nugget is probably taking 2 naps per day, morning and afternoon, at the beginning of this window. At some point, you will transition to 1 nap, typically midday. It can be stressful thinking about transitioning. You may worry that your babe won’t be able to last all afternoon or that you will get less sleep at night because he may be overtired. Or, you may be ready to throw a party to have mornings open up wide. Whatever side you are on, there are some easy ways you can make this transition work for all parties involved. Getting rid of an unneeded nap can actually improve your kiddos overnight sleep. As with all nap transitions, you will need to move bedtime a bit earlier initially to help her move to just one nap per day. At this age, your expected wake window is 4-5 hours with two naps and 4.5-6 hours with one nap. You can use that as a guide to time your daily nap based on morning wake up, and to time bedtime as she adjusts to your new routine. We always made naptime right after lunch, so it wasn’t always based exactly on the clock. If we had a super early lunch, we would wait a bit. But basing it around this regularly scheduled activity may give you some more freedom if your kiddo is in any sort of half day school type program or daycare during the week and home on the weekends. The start of parents morning out for my kids was the impetus to move to one nap for both of my girls. When your kiddo is taking 2 naps per day, you would expect each nap to be about 2 hours. Once you move to one nap, you may get to embrace one glorious three hour nap. The heavens have opened wide people. (The total 24 hour sleep goal is 11-14 hours for both nap schedules) The signs to make the move to this new schedule are the same as other transitions: fighting nap time, steadily decreasing nap durations, trouble falling asleep at night, trouble falling asleep at nap time, and the worst one (in my opinion) early morning wakings. If you’re seeing any of these consistently, make a plan to make the move. Welcome to toddler-hood people! Guys, it’s been a real roller coaster of a day. We all woke up without a lot of grace for each other. I won’t lie, I was 80% of the problem.
The day definitely did not improve with the news of school being done for the year and the other new steps put in place to try decrease the flood of patients to hospitals. Let me be clear, I am in favor of all restrictions to stem this tide. But, being in favor of it does not mean that it’s not hard. This season of waiting and isolation feels so very reminiscent of my first postpartum experience. When you weren’t sure if life would ever go on as it did before. And, then you realized it wouldn’t. It would always be different. You would find yourself again, but you too would be different. I feel like that will be true of this as well. I am hopeful that we will all grow in healthy ways through this, but I also know we will lose some people we love. I think about how much this is impacting this generation we are raising and what kind of scars they will carry forward. My girls are taking this all very hard. Their emotions are up and down. And it doesn’t help that mine are as well. I just can’t always be patient and gracious with their behavior. Sometimes I’m unkind in my need to not have to deal with them. But, you know what? We’re all just figuring this crazy mess out. I'm so very grateful that this is how they ended the day, together, reading (not fighting...and no, my 4 year old doesn't know how to read). It feels like a little redemption in the midst of all this loss. I have a deep and abiding hope in something that is bigger than our confusion, our pain, our sickness and morality. But, that doesn’t mean that I don’t feel the hurt of all these things. Being aware, informed and feeling the tension of this time does not mean that you have abandoned your beliefs. It does not mean your faith is weak. My faith is in a God who can hold all of this. My faith is not that I will survive unharmed or live a comfortable life. Of course, I'm human and I hope for and ask for that. But, I know that is not what the Lord promises. He promises himself and himself alone. I have concern for the constant rhetoric of people telling us not to fear. It’s true, we should not have fear. I think it’s important to note that, yes, the Bible tells us not to fear or worry more than any other exhortation. But, I think something we miss in that is that Good knows us so much better than we know ourselves. Maybe he tells us that over and over because he knows we live in a broken world and he knows things will make us fearful and anxious. He knows we need to hear it from him hundreds of times in multiple ways. It’s a reminder that he knows us and loves us and does not desire these things for us. It is not a condemnation on us if we have worries; it’s a reminder to bring those to him and enter into the causes of our worry WITH him. I worry (yes, I said it) that this emphasis on "not worrying" will make those who already struggle with anxiety on a regular basis feel that they are not valid. That their concerns make them weaker or not faithful enough or that it's just another mental health issue they (we) have to solve. So, maybe instead of saying "I'm not worried" or "We should not worry because we have the Lord." We should say, "I know that you are worried, that makes sense. Let's turn to the Lord together in this and seek Him to help give us peace." Not an answer, not an invalidation of people's legitimate concerns as we all approach this very new reality. I am also hopeful that this period of time we are in could bring a lot of us to a place where we do learn what it means to truly not fear. So, let's do this thing together. We are for sure not alone, even when we're apart. ReplyForward Babies, man. AMIRIGHT? I am finding it amusing that to talk about naps for the 2 and under set, I have written 3 blog posts so far and have at least 2 more ahead. I mean, if someone dedicated time to 5 blog posts about naps for 24 months of my life that would be AMAZING! This window of 9-12 months also starts at the beginning of 9 months and ends at the beginning of 12 months. The next post will address the world of the 12-18 monther. But, 9 months is where I found myself feeling more in a groove and beginning to see what all the fuss about procreation was. Your little nugget may be working on crawling, and while moving has its own challenges, I always felt like my kiddos were happier and more engaged as they started making these strides. Now, my kids all started crawling after 9 months, but another topic for another day. As you head into 9 months, your baby’s wake window is about 3-3.5 hours. This is the first time we see variation in the wake window and that reflects that they are not automatons any longer. This is where you may start to see your baby differ more and more from other babies her age. As long as you are hitting milestones and working with your pediatrician, this is all very, very normal. To me, it feels they are becoming their own baby person. Maybe they’re baby tweens. They are certainly in between being a baby and being a toddler. So, let’s call this very tiny time period bweens. So, your bween may increase his wake window to 4-5 hours by 11 months! That’s like half a work day. Go ahead and get his work permit. JK. Don’t do that, it’s a bad idea. But, around this same time of 11 months, you can consider moving from 2 naps to 1 depending on how your bween is handling life. Their daytime sleep goes from 3 hours at 9 months to 2.5-3 hours at 11 months (yeah, not a big change), to 2 hours at 12-18 months (there’s your preview to the next post). During this window, their total 24 hours sleep remains at 12-15 hours. That will drop to 11-14 hours at 12-18 months (I know, your head is spinning with the dramatic drop-off). If you cut back from 2 to 1 nap during this time frame, please do not forget to MOVE BEDTIME EARLIER. Otherwise, you will have a cranky bween in the evening and early morning bean the next day. So, this is not going to address the 4 month sleep “regression”/adjustment/transition, whatever people are calling it. I have deep feelings about this age and this “regression” (you can see where my loyalties lie). It’s another whole blog post. But, for right now, I will say, four months is a great time to get rid of all the things you don’t love about sleep. You’re already going to be dealing with some things, you may as well get something out of it! Four months is typically the recommended starting age for sleep training (I say “typically” because some sweet nuggets can start as early as 3 months, but that is up to the pediatrician and the parent). If you are working on night sleep, you can postpone working on nap sleep until that is under control. But, I don’t mean postpone for months, I mean for a couple of weeks while you work on night sleep. The main thing you need to remember is have a plan and STICK TO THE PLAN. That’s pretty much it. You’re welcome, goodnight. Oh, what is the plan? Oh, right….um, depends. And this, by the way, is the crux of why I do what I am now doing. Because a lot of the time, IT DEPENDS. So, some babies are doing 3 naps a day during this window. And, some need/are transitioning to 2. It depends on your needs. Who is caring for your kiddo during the daytime hours is a huge component to what your baby needs for their schedule. If you are home and have the time/flexibility, then keeping three naps until 9 months is great. But, if you need to move your little nugget forward, then how do you do that? This will not give you all the answers, because that would be a VERY long blog post and I am against that. So, this will be the guidelines and some tips and if this is unsatisfying or you need a different plan, let’s chat because this is not meant to be a fit in or fall down situation. This is parenting, and it is wide open. At 4 months, your baby’s wake window (about how long your baby can tolerate being awake at one time) is 2 hours, it increases by 15 minutes every month until 9 months when it is between 3 & 3.5 hours. Using these wake windows as a guide can be instrumental to getting your baby on a good sleep schedule. It should help you prevent the sweet nugget from being so tired when you’re trying to put him down that he can’t get himself to sleep. And remember, sometimes they start out tolerating the full wake time in the morning, but by evening they have trouble hitting that mark. Maximum daytime sleep during this window starts at 4 hours at 4 months and decreases to 3 hours at 8 and 9 months. The total 24 hour sleep stays constant at 12-15 hours, so seeing a decrease in daytime sleep should mean an increase in nighttime sleep. The REALLY BIG thing to remember as you adjust your baby’s nap schedule is that as you cut down on number of naps and amount of sleep during the day, you NEED TO MOVE BEDTIME EARLIER. This may be just for the transition, a few weeks, but your baby may love this earlier bedtime and you may start seeing later mornings as well. And who doesn’t love more time to drink your coffee (or sleep)? Let’s be honest, this will not answer all your questions. But, these are my general guidelines for what you can expect for napping during the first 3-4 months of your baby’s life. The first guideline is don’t stress out, they will grow out of it. You can practice helpful sleep strategies during this stage, but this is not a time when you can do any actual sleep training. So use wake times as a guideline for when you can try to put your baby down for a nap, and give yourself freedom to make like Elsa and "let it go."
In the first 3 months of life (the 4th trimester), babies will typically take about 4-5 naps per day. The expectation is for average daily day sleep of 4-6 hours ; starting out closer to 6 hours and moving to 4 hours as they get older. The awake period (length of time you expect your baby awake between sleeps) you can expect your baby to tolerate starts around 1 hour at 1 month and increases by about 15 minutes each month and then to 2 hours around 4 months. Wake periods are a helpful tool to use in this time frame to make sure you’re avoiding an overtired baby, but you have the flexibility to adjust to different wake times each day and various nap lengths. Around 4 months, you may see a window open to move your baby to 3 naps a day. A “typical” three nap/day schedule based on wake windows is something like: a morning nap, an afternoon nap and then a shorter evening nap (often timed around 4-5 pm), followed about 1-2 hours after waking, with bedtime. As your baby gets older, you may see that they tolerate a longer wake window in the morning and that this shortens as the day progresses. Eventually you will see that the timing of the naps tends to fall around the same times each day and you can start putting your baby down at specific times. Enter the nap prison portion of your parenting... A note about the infamous "Cat" nap…. In this early stage, babies may also take very lovely (sarcasm implied) “cat naps” where they sleep for 15-30 minutes at a time, as often as every hour. As a parent adjusting to life with a newborn, these can be very frustrating and make you feel like you aren’t going to ever have control over your life again. And, while you won’t ever have control over your life again, you will be able to gain some control over your schedule once your baby is a little older. I remember being told how normal these cat naps were, and wanting to cause harm to the person who told me that, as she laughed it off as just another thing a new mom had to get used to. Now, while it is annoying, you don’t have to get used to it because it will go away. Use this window in your baby’s early life to get out and celebrate not being tied down by naptime. That will come soon enough. If you have a cat napper, I am sorry, but do what I did not do and avoid spending endless hours trying to change that. It will change, but not because of anything you really do in those first couple of months. If you have questions about things you can be trying to “practice” during this time to get you on track to sleep training once they are old enough, or just any questions about what all of this means, please don’t hesitate to reach out! You do not have to sort through all of the information out there alone. I already did that for you! This is the face of a mom who remembered Target's drive-up pick-up service this morning. She needed to work AND run errands during her 2 hr 45 minute "free block" and could not figure out how to get a hand soap refill and cotton balls (both Target specific) without getting sucked into a Target warp. She *may* have gotten on the app to have them delivered and then saw the drive-up option. In less time than it would have taken for her to walk into and out of the store, she had her items and was driving away. Having saved her family about 700% of the purchase price of the two items by avoiding entering the store...
This has me thinking about something I've been pondering a lot lately. Why is it that we have such a hard time asking for help as parents? There are 100,000+ resources out there, and they are often conflicting, but we still feel like we should find the one right answer for us in all that noise. The more parents I talk to, the more I see this theme. Wishing they had asked for help sooner, but feeling like they should have known what to do. They spend so much time going down the rabbit hole of googling and information, only to come out more confused and frazzled. And, now, I think our expectation that we can figure it all out has something to do with amazing things like drive-up pick-up at Target. Our lives have become so busy, that we can't even find time to go get hand soap (and during cold and flu season no less)! We expect to find immediate answers and that we will be able to manifest a solution. We're so used to finding an app or an article (or a blog post...) to solve our problem that we forget sometimes we actually need another person to help us. We forget that it's OKAY to need people, not just answers. And we have transferred this to parenting. Raising children is meant to be done in community. And not just with play dates and preschool outings, but with the hard parts. The (lack of) sleeping, feeding challenges and postpartum issues. It's ok to feel like you don't know what you're doing, you've never had this baby before! So, take a deep breath, give yourself a break and call a friend or acquaintance to come clean your kitchen and hold your baby while you take a nap. Then, have them run thru the Target drive-up for you. Winning. |
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June 2020
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