
Naps: When do I just give up!
“What do I do if my child just will not fall asleep?”…sound familiar. It should because it is a very common question.
Many families that I work with wonder what they should do if their child is simply refusing to nap. You would think that if your child is tired they would simply go to sleep; however, this is not the case for all babies. When this starts to happen there are a number of things to consider.
1. Are you offering a nap at the right time?
If your little one was sleeping fine and all of a sudden refuses to go for a nap when you offer it then it is time to either increase or decrease the time your child is awake from wake up to nap, I lovingly refer to this as wake time! (you may have heard me say this once or twice 🙂 )
2. Are you in the process of reducing a sleep association?
If you are trying to make changes to your child’s sleep so you are offering sleep in a different manner. For example: reducing the feed to sleep association, rock to sleep association or sleeping on an adult. This takes time, persistence and consistency for improvement to be noticed.
Sleep Learning 101: Sleep Prop
3. Developmental Milestone
If your child is in the midst of a developmental milestone they may struggle with going to sleep. The reason for the struggle going to sleep is that nap time seems to be when our little ones attempt to practice their new skill instead of going to sleep. Once your child has mastered the new sill they typically tend to go back to their regular sleeping skills.
So now you know why your child is refusing a nap but you are probably wondering…
What can I do? When do I give up?
Typically I recommend that you continue to offer the nap. I would give your little one the chance to go to sleep by using the sleep teaching method of your choice for naps.
So you have been trying for over 30 minutes, now what. Depending on your tolerance/frustration level. You can get your little one up and try again in 30 minutes or try for 1 hour and 15 minutes and see if your little one will fall to sleep. If your little one has not fallen asleep at the end of the 1 hour 15 minutes then I would get your child up and try again in 30 minutes or go to an Emergency nap.
Emergency Nap?
You may be wondering what I mean by an emergency nap. An emergency nap is when you take your child for a walk in the stroller or for a drive in the car. Some families will place their child in a swing. I usually do not recommend the swing as this is often a sleep association the family is trying to remove.
The reason for the emergency nap is that “sleep does beget sleep”. If your child is overtired your child’s nighttime sleep will be affected. An emergency nap is better than no nap.
Using an emergency nap once or twice a week is okay. When you are sleep teaching you may find that you are going to emergency nap at least once a day. This will get better with time and consistency.
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