Parenting Toddlers (1-3) Support Group
This community is focused on the joys, challenges and concerns faced by parents of toddlers (1 to 3 year olds). The major areas of child development include: physical development, perception and sensory development, communication and language development, cognitive development, emotional development and social development. Join to share your stories and get advice.
With in the past few weeks my son (he is 2) has started sleeping really wierd hours, and no matter what I do to try to correct it it doesn't work. He will sleep for an hour and be awake for 8. Then when it is time to go to bed he will sleep for 2 maybe 3 hours, and then he is up again for another 8. I don't know what to do. He is acting like he is fine on 3-5 hours of sleep a day but I know that isn't health for him (or me). Does anyone have any idea what could be causeing this or what I can do to fix it?
I tried waking him up at 6, keeping him awake till 12 or so, forcing him to take a nap (or at least lay down in his crib) for an hour or so, wake him up for a few hours, and try to put him to bed around 10 thinking that would help him get regulated, but that wasn't the case. He ended up waking up at 11:45pm wanting to play till 6. I am just at my whits end and I don't know what to do. Any advice?
I tried waking him up at 6, keeping him awake till 12 or so, forcing him to take a nap (or at least lay down in his crib) for an hour or so, wake him up for a few hours, and try to put him to bed around 10 thinking that would help him get regulated, but that wasn't the case. He ended up waking up at 11:45pm wanting to play till 6. I am just at my whits end and I don't know what to do. Any advice?
In my opinion this is a phase your little one may be experiencing. Perhaps he is a child who would benefit from no naps at all -- my mom works with toddlers, infants and preschoolers and noticed that some kids just don't take naps and are fine.
The main concern is for your son to get enough sleep at night (not going back to confusing night and day and getting the routine mixed up). If he's fine (not irritable) then try and see if he sleeps longer at night without getting naps to give him energy throughout the day.
Also perhaps making sure that he can't jump, skip, shout and play loudly (get's his heart rate going and gets him hyper) at least an hour and a half before bed... I know that helps my daughter. When she was going through that similar phase we would have a 1/2 hr of quiet play time in her room (dim the lights and play on the floor with blocks, read books, putting dollies to sleep, etc. Plus a bath before bed doesn't hurt. Just make sure you're talking very quietly and keeping the energy low.
Even now we still ensure we don't let her run and jump before bed and dim the lights for rocking and story time before bed which seems to set the mood for relaxing her body and mind enough to get sleepy and not hyped up.
Good luck :)