What's you nap time policy?

[jammiesandtea]

When parents can't get small children to go to sleep at night, it's not about the nap they had in the afternoon, it's about the parent needing to implement and consistently enforce a proper bedtime routine. Most children will resist sleep and not want to miss out on what everyone else is doing if they are indulged and allowed to get their way when they fuss about it. What's needed is a strict bedtime and a routine of bath, reading a story, or whatever, then lights out and no waffling or negotiating with them. Take control and that is it.

Parents who have bedtime troubles with their kids are not willing or able to take control. That's what it boils down to.

And it shouldn't have to affect YOU negatively by making you work long hours with no break... and it shouldn't affect the child negatively, by making them miss out on sleep that they need, only because their parents aren't willing to step it up and get it done at bedtime.

I'd either put it back on them by explaining exactly that... maybe sugar-coated a little bit, if I cared about keeping them... or I'd fib and let them think the kid didn't nap or only napped what they wanted. It's all in their head and it miraculously improves for them when they think they got their way.