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We've all been there: You've finally found a good rhythm, and seem to have settled on a sleep schedule that works for your child (and you!). You're able to plan events, know what times of the day are "off limits", and your child is going down without a fuss for sleep sessions (If this is not you, I can help with that!). Suddenly out of nowhere, your good sleeper is taking forever to settle, or is skipping a nap all together. Your carefully crafted schedule is deviating further and further from the norm, and you're not quite sure what to expect when you lay your child down. Is this nap going to be smooth, or are we going to have a battle? Will you have an hour plus of free time, or will he be up in 35 minutes staring into the baby monitor, ready to roll? Or, if he does sleep well for his nap(s), will he be up at an ungodly hour the next morning, or raring to go an hour after your typical "bedtime"?
Unfortunately, sleep is fluid and ever changing. What works for a time generally speaking won't work for forever (unless your child is older, or you're an adult as sleep needs generally stabilize). In the first 3 years of life, particularly in the first year, sleep needs change drastically. Children go from needing up to 17 hours of sleep a day to as little as 10 hours. It doesn't sound like a big difference but trust me, those 7 hours are a LOT, and they have to come from SOMEWHERE. Generally speaking, they come from dropping naps. In the first 3 years of life, children go from 5+ naps a day to 0, with the biggest changes (going from 5+ to 2 or rarely 1), in the first year alone. So how do you know when your child needs to (purposely) lose some sleep? Here are _ things to think about when considering a nap transition (AKA dropping a nap).
Age
Sleep is NOT one-size-fits-all, so of course there will be some outliers when it comes to how old a child is when they drop a nap. However, the majority of children fit into an age range when these transitions occur.
AGE | NAP TRANSITION |
4 - 5 months | from 4 - 5+ naps to 3 naps |
6 - 9 months | from 3 naps to 2 naps |
14- 18 months | from 2 naps to 1 nap |
3 - 4 years | from nap time to quiet time (1 nap - 0) |
2. Readiness Signs
This is probably your biggest indicator of whether or not a nap transition is on the horizon. When sleep is going well, you won't have any of these signs (aside from the odd "off" day that we all have). As your child approaches a sleep needs shift, their stamina will build which allows them to stay awake for longer periods before needing to release some sleep pressure (AKA take a nap). You want sufficient pressure to build for them to stay asleep for a good nap. Too little sleep pressure (AKA undertired), you might have trouble falling asleep, staying asleep, or sleeping for long. These are also the same signs of too much sleep pressure building (AKA overtired), so you need to look at it in combination with their age and their mood while awake. Typical nap transition readiness signs include:
nap lengths becoming increasingly shorter
an ability to stay asleep longer between naps (seeming very content and alert through their whole awake time even at regular nap time)
protesting naps or skipping/refusing nap all together
Taking a long time to fall asleep (or significantly longer than YOUR child's norm) for naps or bedtime
Early mornings
In general, you don't want to look at any of these readiness signs in isolation. If you are truly approaching a nap transition, you will see multiple of these signs happening throughout the day.
3. Length of Sleep Disruption
The readiness signs above are considered sleep disruptions. They are causing sleep to become more difficult/abnormal. Nap transitions can be seamless, but often it takes children a little bit to adjust. For some children, they are a really difficult transition. As such, you don't want to jump into dropping a nap at the first sign of difficulty, or even a few days of difficulty. Children can hit rough sleep patches for many reasons including sickness, teething, and/or development (AKA sleep regression, or as I like to call it, sleep PROgression since it is related to growth/learning which is a GREAT thing). This means you could have a rough week or two of sleep, and then suddenly your previous schedule starts working perfectly again, without you changing a thing.
For example, a very common time for parents to drop a nap is around 11-13 months (2-1 transition), BUT this is actually on the early side for most kids. This is because a very distinct regression tends to happen around this time (the "12-month regression") which is characterized by sleep disruptions that are very similar to transition readiness signs. Often, their 11, 12, or 13 month old suddenly starts protesting one nap (or both), and parents think it MUST be time to drop it. In reality, if you wait it out a couple weeks, sticking with your schedule and offering both naps and bedtime as usual without changing your approach, often children will suddenly go right back to their schedule from before for at least a couple more months.
When considering a nap transition, you want to be seeing the above readiness signs at least 3 or 4 days a week for at least a week (preferably 2-3+, especially for the 2-1 or 1-0 transitions). Just like adults, children will have "off" days of sleep (hello to all those times you've had a hard time falling asleep or back to sleep in the night and you have no clue why), so you want to be sure that there is a definite pattern happening and not just a one-off.
If you drop a nap too early, you can battle with major overtiredness that can be a challenge to come back from as your child is simply not able to handle those longer periods of awake time. However if you do find yourself in this situation, don't think that all hope is lost. You can always bring back the nap if after a week or two the new schedule just isn't working for your little one.
Lastly, it is easier to know when to drop a nap if your little one is typically a great independent sleeper. This is because they have all the skills to put themselves to sleep and BACK to sleep, so there are many less variables that could be impacting sleep at play. If you're struggling with your child's sleep don't be afraid to reach out! Every healthy child can become a great sleeper, and you don't have to struggle through it alone.
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