How long to fall asleep for nap?

HELP! How long does it take your toddler to fall asleep for their nap. We've suddenly gone from taking 5 mins to take 1 to 2 hours! Then she wants to keep sleeping for 2+ hours and it gets too late! It doesn't matter if I put her down at noon or at 1.30...she does the same thing.

She definitely needs the sleep - gets tired, starts getting irritable etc but when she goes down she does what she does in the middle of the night - sings, squeals etc at the top of her lungs.

If we try to skip the sleep she ends up totally crashing at 3pm or getting night terrors and ends being awake half the night so she definitely needs her nap. Sleep breeds sleep for her so the less she gets...the less she sleeps.

So now she parties in bed for 1 to 2 hours before her nap, 1 to 2 hours before she goes to sleep at night and for 2 to 4 hours in the middle of the night! 2 weeks ago she would always go straight to sleep day and night! ARGH!

This is the routine SHE has been trying to have:
9.30am up! She wants to sleep in as she is so tired from being awake in the night!
2.30 nap until 5 or later!
10pm bed then awake from midnight or so for 3 or 4 hours.

I try to keep her to:
7.30 up
12.30 or 1 nap for 2 hours
7.30 bed.

Edited by FionaS

Its so hard. You just cant force them to sleep.

Sounds just like Keira at that age. I would put her to bed just after lunch it would take a few hours to fall asleep and by then shes so tired she'll sleep right through untill dinner time. I felt she was missing out spending so long in her bed, but she really needed the sleep.

We tried so many different things, really tiring her out in the mornings, putting her to sleep later. Eventually the one thing that did work was one afternoon DH had friends around one of them walked passed the bedroom, poked thier head in and said goodnight. I think it scared her a little so she slept. Mummy and Daddy are too easy.

I think we had a few days of other people putting her to bed and then she was so used to sleeping straight away she just did it.

She did eventually start taking longer to sleep again and by this stage she seemed to be able to cope better. It became quiet time for a few hours rather than nap time, just so we both got that break. It also meant once we dropped the day sleep she went to bed earlier so was able to cope without that nap.

 

Sleeping problems are tricky, I hope you get it sorted soon!

Sounds like she's got all her routine all messed, no clue how to fix it. Have you tried staying with her until she falls asleep or gets very sleepy then walk out of the room. My DD is slightly older but she wont nap if I just put her in her room and leave, she wants to play etc. She'll only sleep if she falls asleep in the car, or if I stroke her hair until she's goes to sleep which takes about 5 mintues. It's a pain, but she still needs to sleep otherwise by 430pm she starts to loose the plot.