For The Love of Naps
What is the reason for baby naps. Are they there so that the mother can take a nap, or get stuff done, or simply to take a breather? Those are all nice reasons, but we all know that the main reason is so that the baby can be rested and happy. Which of course in turn means that mommy and daddy are happy too. Well, it seems that my son has decided to ignore the memo on why he should take good naps. Let me tell you a story…
Baby Nick was a happy baby. Right from the start he slept fairly well. By five weeks he was sleeping through the night. His mother and father were so proud of him. Then when he was a few months old the evil cat naps set in, and he started to fight some of them as well. His parents sometimes wanted to pull their hair out, but luckily the stage passed and everything was happy again.
Around six months Baby Nick started to have napping problems again. He did not want to take his evening nap. He would scream and cry before his nap and his mother would have to rock him to sleep. Then he’d wake up screaming and his mother would spend a lot of time calming him down. Baby Nick was terribly unhappy and so was his mother because she could not get anything done. After days of Baby Nick crying and crying his mother finally decided to not put him down for his evening naps any more. She found that it was far easier to deal with his slight fussiness than his crying hysterics that went on and on. In no time everyone settled into a new routine. Baby Nick’s remaining naps got longer and his mother was able to get more done. Once again everyone was happy and the household rejoiced.
A few months went by and Baby Nick got very sick. He once again fought his naps and hardly slept. Then he got medicine and he started to feel better and started to sleep again. Eventually his napping routine went back to normal and his mother and father thought everything would once again be the way it was, but Baby Nick had a different idea. He decided that he didn’t want to take two naps anymore. When his parents put him down for his morning nap he wouldn’t sleep at all. Instead he would play and play. His mother complained that he wasn’t even getting a good rest in. Since he didn’t sleep in the morning he took a nice two hour long afternoon nap. His mother decided that wasn’t a bad deal so they decided that he was ready for only one nap. Baby Nick though became unsure of what he wanted. He wouldn’t want to nap during the morning, but he didn’t want to sleep much in the afternoon either. The end result was a very exhausted and fussy baby. His mother thought she was going to lose it. The one thing she clung to was the thought that at least he still slept 12 hours at night. She prayed that he wouldn’t be like his uncle and not want to nap at all by the time he was a year old.
Will our story have a happy ending? We still don’t know…..
Let’s just pray that he wants to sleep 2 hoursmn the afternoon. I can remember your Mother did not want to nap very much either. She just sleep about 1 to 1 /12 hours in the afternoon. And by 2 years she was done. When she was older I made her lay on the couch and was TV, so she got some rest. Love. You.