right now it is 1030pm and my 2 y/o is still wide awake laying in his bed. His older brother and sister are asleep and have been for about 2 hours now. This is normal every night for him. he takes a 2-3 hour nap during the day also. If he takes any less than a 2 hour nap he is over tired and MISERABLE in the evening. He ts not even 11 hours of sleep!gets up at 7 in the morning. Thats not even 11 hours of sleep. Recomended sleep for his age is 11.5 to 15.5. Anyone else have this problem and how do I fix it? And yes we do have a bedtime routine. Naptime he goes down at noon and is up by 2 or 3.
Keep in mind that the 11-15 hrs of recommended sleep are total, including the nap.
My son will be 3 in May and most nights he's in bed 9/9:30, but there are the occasional nights that its a bit later. He's up btwn 7 and 8 in the morning. We have found that we need to limit his naps to 90 mins and if he hasn't gone down for a nap by 1:30, we're skipping it.
Sounds like my son at that age. He's four now and is consistently up til 11, even past midnight a lot of nights. He gets up around 7:30 every morning and will sometimes take an hour or two nap. The sleep numbers are guidelines. There will be those children who don't need that much sleep. My son is one of those kids. Even on the weekends when we don't have to go anywhere, he is up by 8, regardless of when he goes to bed. He isn't cranky or overtired. He truly just doesn't need much sleep. I can relate because I am the same way, so the schedule works for us. Once my son starts school, I'll revisit our routine and make some changes at that point. If your son doesn't seem to be having any problems and isn't bothering your other children, I wouldn't make such a big deal about it.
2 hour nap. At the 2 hour mark, you may have to wake him.
Yes, he's grouchy, but I think after a couple days, his "clock" will adjust & it won't be so bad. I encourage you to try it for 3 days, and see what happens by day 4.
What time does his nap end? I used to find bedtime impossible if mine slept past 4 p.m. Could that be it?
Could he be overtired? There's that "window" when you KNOW they're tired, but they're not yawning yet or stumbling around, that's the right time for bed. Past that--bad news!
I would think a 2 year old should be going to bed by 7:30ish?
Good luck.
I would cut out a couple hours of his nap or die trying-just for a couple of days-until the bed time approaches 8pm-or something traditionally thought to be normal.
Have you tried moving his bedtime UP some? Some kids get over tired and just get more and more wound up the later they are awake. You didn't say what time you put him to bed (only that he is still awake).
My daughter always went to bed around 7:30 pm until she was about 4 years old. Then we pushed it back to 8:00pm.
My son is this exact way! It's frustrating and I don't know the solution, yet. Hopefully there is a solution. Just wanted to let you know you are not alone!!
My first son was a night owl due to dad's work schedule and me being a night owl in general. Once he started school that changed of course his dad's work schedule also changed. Funny my oldest son and husband are very similar in their need for sleep. So 9:30 rolls around and both are more than ready for bed. My oldest is almost 15. As a toddler he took his daily naps with no issues and kept taking them til he was about 4.
With my second son he follows me in my night owl ways. Now he does go to bed at 9 each night but many times as I'm going to bed around 11 or 12 he is still trying to go to sleep. He has to be up a 6 every morning. But when I go to wake him up at that time he springs out of bed ready to go. He is only 10 but seems to do just fine on little sleep. When he was younger he gave up on naps when he was 2. No matter what I did to try to get him to nap during the day never worked. Though I have to say it was kind of a good thing cause even now if he starts saying he wants to nap or starts sleeping more than usual for him I know he is getting sick and I need to either get him in to his dr or keep a closer eye on him.
What I'm taking my time to get to is you could just have one of those kids who doesn't need to hours of sleep that is recommended. Also like others have pointed out he could just need to have a busier day to get him into the sleep pattern you would like him to have.
Thats exactly how my 2 year old daughter is.
Mine stays up late, gets up early, has a *max* time of 2 hours to nap in the afternoon. It's just how she is, she doesn't need a lot of sleep. Of course she's in a house with parents who are the same way. For a few days I exhausted her and got her in bed by 8....but I wasn't for waking up at 4am every morning, and playing, and trust me there was NO putting her back to sleep...she was up for the day (thank goodness for coffee!!!!!).
I just hope I find something that works when she starts school, because everything so far just hasn't worked. I did have better results when I cut her 3-4 hour nap down to 1-2 hours. So instead of going to bed at 12:30am she's in bed by 11:30pm (at the latest). I talked to her Dr about it, he said she's just like her parents, and as long as she isn't cranky or over tired then go with it.
I know this probably isn't that helpful but at least you're not alone!
Yep! That's why I'm sitting on the computer. I'm kind of waiting for him to play a bit more, because I know trying to put him to bed right now would just be an exercise in futility.
His schedule sounds basically the same as your sons. My 4 1/2 year old had the same schedule at that age. He now takes no nap and sleeps 11-12 hours a night. It kind of stinks because they both sleep about the same number of hours, but too many of them are not at the same time. It limits what we can do, when we can leave the house and the amount of me time and couple time I get.
But it is a phase, and I know it won't be long before both boys are going to bed at 8:00 pm. Hang in there. I'm right there with ya!
First of all, while you want him to go to bed earlier, don't feel bad because some of us have had the same issue. Our son who is now in kindergarten was the same way until he went to kindergarten last fall and HAD to be up by 7AM and had a full day. Before that I tried everything to get him to bed earlier, but nothing worked. He stopped napping by the time he was 2 1/2, but still no luck. It wasn't until he was consistently up earlier and had a busy day that his internal sleep clock shifted. Our daughter is now 2 and she's adapted to his schedule. Up by 7AM, sometimes no nap. If she gets a nap it can't be more than 60-90 minutes or she does NOT go to bed at night. Our bedtime for both is 7:30PM, and I can tell you I'm a much happier camper!
Hubby and I are both night owls and I was convinced both our kids would be, but thankfully they have adapted. DD is not happy when she does go down for a nap and I wake her up, and we deal with the crankiness for a bit, but then she's fine. But every kid is different, so what works for mine may not work for yours. It sounds like you might not have a choice except to deal with him being overtired and miserable for a while and go ahead and shorten his nap by 15 minutes at a time each week until you find a good fit for him. I wish you much luck in finding what is right for him!
