No Nap at 15 Months

[Pestle]

I have a kid who has been with me for a month and just recently transitioned from three days a week to full-time. Apparently, they have been very bad at napping basically since birth. When here, they they pass out for 5 to 25 minutes and then wake up screaming bloody murder and will not settle down again. It doesn't really matter what time I put them down; sometimes they do it before lunch, sometimes after, and sometimes in the late afternoon, but they will never do two naps in one day. I have them in a room away from the other kids but they still scream and roar so loudly that it wakes the other kids up.

I just can't believe that a 15 month old doesn't need a nap. They refuse a bottle and cuddles and all that stuff when I'm trying to get them to nap or settle down after napping. If it were only happening here, I would chalk it up to separation anxiety and a new environment, but apparently this is how they are with their mother as well.

They don't seem inordinately groggy or cranky, either. But maybe this is just what they are always like and their baseline should be peppier than this.

[Cat Herder]

My 1-year-olds only take one nap per day, 1-3, with the rest of the group. I have not had a two nap per day schedule in many years.

The infants just randomly nap at will whenever they want.

Maybe they would do better skipping am nap?

[Pestle]

I'm only putting them down once a day. Some days they won't sleep at all and others they sleep for between five and 25 minutes. Once, they slept for 45 minutes. But as soon as they wake up from their nap and they start screaming hysterically and wake all the other kids up, even from another room, and it gets a lot worse if I interact with them. The mother says they've been like this basically since birth and have never napped much.

[Pestle]

I should also say: the mom often texts me to say they are having a difficult morning and running behind. And if I do an afternoon walk in the stroller, this child passes right out. So the signs point to habits at home that make it impossible for the child to sleep as they need to, right? It just doesn't seem developmentally likely for a 15 month old to not nap at all, as well as being sluggish in the morning and falling asleep as soon as they are in motion. This sounds like sleep deprivation.

I don't know how that relates to the complete inconsolable meltdown on waking, unless it's just that child isn't sleeping nearly long enough and that's why it's always an unstoppable tantrum afterward. Could also be that they are at the end of their peak separation anxiety phase and daycare is new, but apparently they have always done this at home, too.

[Pestle]

Yes; it's 8:35 AM and I just now got a text from the mom saying that they are running late.

[Cat Herder]

Sounds like the issue is parenting, not the child.

Maybe ask her about her bedtime routine and schedule at home. If she looks like a deer in headlights, you will know.

[Valerie928]

Sounds like the issue is parenting, not the child.

Maybe ask her about her bedtime routine and schedule at home. If she looks like a deer in headlights, you will know.

Lol!! The deer in headlights look. If I had a dime for every time I saw that look