I think most of motherhood has been driven, for me, by instincts. In large part, I've known what is best for Stella at any given point in her life; I've felt pretty comfortable and confident in motherhood because of this. But when it comes to my daughter not napping, I'm clueless. I find myself going back and forth as to whether or not we are doing the right thing by going with the flow and letting Stella skip her nap at only 22 months old. For the past few weeks we've been experimenting with no naps - for anyone who has been reading my blog lately you've seen the recent photos of her passed out sleeping on our couch at 4:30 in the afternoon and napping in her carseat on the way to walk on the beach (glasses crookedly hanging off her little face...).
I came home tonight from mentoring Nicky, a wonderful girl from the youth group at church, and Tim told me Stella was a hot mess when he got her home from Grammy Susan's house. Stella went over to visit Grammy Suze and stayed with her this afternoon until 6:30pm. Susan is so great and, as usual, Stella was fed and bathed when Tim arrived to pick her up. However, by the time Tim got her home Stella was exhausted from all the activities of the day and no nap - she was hitting Tim when he wouldn't give her juice, sucking in air while simultaneously sobbing and sucking her thumb, and pleading for "bed, bed, bed." It's nights like these that make me feel like we're getting it totally wrong with not having her nap. The alternative, though, when she was napping was weeks of her taking an hour or more at night to fall asleep...clearly not tired; it seemed equally inappropriate and exhausting that her bedtime (at less than two year old) was usually around 9pm.
I know that raising a child is full of transitions and phases, it's just hard when you're not fully able to distinguish what your child needs on a given day - especially when these days seem pretty unpredictable in the sleep department.
No comments:
Post a Comment