Nap Time Success Stories

Nap time is frustrating…

Nap time is frequently a source of nail biting, hair pulling anxiety for many of the families that reach out to me for sleep support. I often hear from parents that their baby’s naps rarely exceeds 45 minutes, or that they’re afraid a long nap is making bedtime more difficult. Some parents are under the impression that keeping baby up for long periods during the day will help baby sleep better at night and other parents are struggling to get their 5 month old to take more than one nap a day.

There’s a variety of challenges that can pop up with nap time, so I’d like to share some success stories from families I’ve worked through customized sleep plans with in conquering the battle of daytime sleep.

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Sleep begets sleep

Jennifer and Adam, parents of a 7 month old, reached out to me because their daughter was rarely taking naps longer than 45 minutes, in addition to waking up several times a night. They’d tried all the things that had worked for their older child without success, and they were so exhausted that they felt it had become a safety issue.

Right away, I gave them some small changes to make, while I created a sleep plan for them. Once they had a plan to work with, Jennifer soon saw results. “It is about 3 weeks after we started the plan and I have very positive things to share about our sleep now… My little girl goes to sleep all by herself!” Not only has her daughter’s nap time has gone from 45 minutes to 2-2.5 hours every day, but she’s also sleeping much better at night too.

“It’s incredible- I thought she was just one of those kids that didn’t sleep but I also learned from Brittney that that’s just a myth, all kids need sleep and thrive when they get enough of it. I also learned that none of these poor sleep habits were her fault, we were instilling these habits and by following this plan, we changed all of that for the better!”

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Prop free nap time

When Hope contacted me, her 6 month old daughter hardly ever took a nap. Dad holding baby during nap time

On the days she did nap, it was only because Hope put a lot of work into getting her to sleep with props, like holding her and rocking her. Hope says “There was a point in time when I would put Avri in the infant carrier and just walk around the house so she would stop crying and go to sleep. One day I had her in the carrier for six hours; it was insane.”

Because Hope’s daughter wasn’t getting enough sleep during the day, she was overtired, which was also causing issues at night. Once Hope implemented the customized sleep plan, she reported, “In almost a two week span after Brittney started helping my family, Avri now takes anywhere from 2-3 naps a day; which is a miracle in itself and she will sleep anywhere from 1-2 hours during each nap! Avri has proved that she can sleep up to 12 hours straight at night!”

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Sleep skills make all the difference for nap time

Chantelle’s 7 month old daughter would only nap while being held, and refused to sleep any other way. Because she wasn’t getting much sleep from her nap time, she was overtired, which was impacting nighttime sleep too. Chantelle contacted me and we created a sleep plan that focused on getting her daughter down at nap time on her own using independent sleep skills. “We started on Monday and by Friday our daughter was able to put herself to sleep and was finally napping on her own for longer than 15-20 minutes.” The quality naptime made nighttime sleep much better too, for the whole family!

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No more nap time struggle

Nap time doesn’t have to be a struggle, it really doesn’t! Teaching baby the skills he needs to fall asleep on his own, even during the day, makes all the difference with sleep for the whole family. A baby who takes adequate naps during the day is able to sleep better at night because overtiredness isn’t an issue.

If you are ready to make a change with daytime sleep in your house, feel free to start here by educating yourself about naps with my FREE expert advice and blog posts. You can read more about preventing overtiredness on this blog or check out these sleep tips for turning your little’s “crap naps” into solid chunks of daytime rest! Or, you can always book a free sleep introductory call so we can chat specifics about what’s up with naps in your house.