The Great Nap Transition

Those of you with children will understand this post. The nap transition. Its tough, unpredictable and a pain the rear end. We are there. We've been there for like 2 months now... and its still a day by day thing.

Bella just turned 16 months a few days ago. She started her babyhood as a terrible sleeper. I hardly slept at all for the first 3 months of her life. I was convinced that I would never sleep again and it really held a toll on me. However, thankfully, Bella became a wonderful sleeper as she grew older. I will never claim any one thing did it because I truely believe that different things work for different families and that really in the end, the kid is the one that decides when he/she will sleep. I was consistent with nap times, wake up times and routine and maybe it helped, but who will really know?

So as we approached the 6 month mark Bella was on a wonderful 2 nap schedule. 2 naps a day, 2 hours each like clockwork plus 12-13 hours of nighttime sleep. Fabulous! She continued to do this every day until about 13 months or so. It has been since then that we have entered this transition time. Most people have told me that she is ready to go down to one nap. Well, I tell those people, yo utry keeping up a cranky 16 month old at 10:30 in the morning and tell me how much you enjoy it, haha! So we definitely play it by ear each day. Some days still she wants one nap. Some days she was two. Somedays the 2 naps are 2 hours. Somedays they are 45 minutes. I wish I knew when it would transition to one solid nap, but I don't. Eh, the life of a mother!

Anyway, just a little post to let all the mommas out there know that whatever they are going through in terms of sleep or routine issues with their little ones, they are normal. They are not bad parents. And somehow, someway we will all make it through and have happy healthy children. And when they are teenagers we will look back and laugh at the fact that they didn't want to nap now!