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View Full Version : 2.5yo napping on the couch...sigh (long)



kristenk
10-18-2006, 02:49 PM
We've been having all sorts of sleep problems ever since DD started preschool. I've posted about it before, but the quick rundown is that DH or I will lie down on a mattress on her floor while she goes to sleep at night and naptime. Last week, she was almost asleep at naptime when she suddenly stood up and started crying that she wanted to "go to the other room" (meaning either the TV room or the master bedroom - don't think it mattered to her which one) and really crying about it. After staying in there with her for maybe 20-30 minutes of "I want to go...", I sat with her in the rocker and we both ended up falling asleep. Oops. That nap, she said the same thing, but we stayed in her room and she went to sleep. For the next couple of days, I gave her Hyland's Calms Forte 4 Kids before sleep times and she was fine.

Sooooo, yesterday she was super talkative at nap time and after about 30 minutes stood up and said she wanted to go into the other room. Sigh. I decided that maybe "quiet time" would be better for her. She could either entertain herself with books or (hopefully) fall asleep. Amazingly enough, a 2.5yo doesn't quite get the concept of quiet time on the first try, so our QT consisted of me doing things on the other side of the house and then returning to her room approx. every 4 minutes to deliver more books to her. Not quite what I had in mind. After quite a while (45 minutes or so), I decided QT was over and let DD watch Franklin while lying on the couch. I looked back in the room 10 minutes later and, yes, she was asleep.

Today something similar happened. The only difference was that QT didn't last so long b/c I knew she'd fall asleep on the couch so I brought her out here earlier.

Um...HELP! I don't want her to nap on the couch. It appears that she definitely still NEEDS a nap, so I don't want to just do QT with books and then keep her busy so she stays awake. I really don't know what to do. Do you? :)

Aunt to sweet baby boy
10-19-2006, 08:47 AM
Your dd is a bit older than avi but these are the things that come to mind:

is her room dark, and is everything the same way that it is at nighttime?

have you had a "transition" to naptime, maybe similar to your bedtime routine?

is something else going on that might be making her hesitant to fall asleep knowing that you will be doing other things- meaning she is at school all day and maybe some snuggles before bed will help.

i do not think i would do QT since she seems to still need a nap, have you tried doing an activitiy/activities during her "nap time" and then putting her to bed early? Some kids drop their naps around this age, some still need them until they are 3 1/2.

avi sleeps in a crib and for naptime he just goes and plays with his toys that are in there and talks and sings before he falls asleep so your situation is different then ours.

i just had another thought, did something different happen on the two days that she did not want to sleep? was the routine different, did she eat different foods, etc.

you might have already thought of these things, but they are what came to my mind.

i hope she starts napping again,

Ilana, aka Nana to my sweet nephew Avi

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