The No-Cry Nap Solution

Before DS2 was born, the Family Review Network presented an opportunity to review The No-Cry Nap Solution: Guaranteed Gentle Ways to Solve All Your Naptime Problems by Elizabeth Pantley, and there was no hesitation on my part to sign up for this opportunity. I knew once DS2 was born, all those naptime struggles I’ve been having with DS1 and I was anticipating with DS2 would take its toll, and I would need all the help I could get.

The No-Cry Nap Solution (ARV $15.95) “offers you a proven formula to allow your baby, toddler, or preschooler to get daily restorative rest. You'll learn gentle, loving, tear-free techniques, developed by world-renowned parenting expert Elizabeth Pantley and tested by hundreds of families around the world, guaranteed to help you:

• Convince any child to nap every day
• Effortlessly settle your child for naptime in his or her own bed
• Turn short, fitful naps into long, peaceful ones
• Establish a nap schedule that works for you and your child
• Easily adapt nap routines to your child's developing needs
• Confidently deal with sudden changes, nap strikes, and travel”
  

The book begins by explaining the importance of sleep, and also offers sleep logs and plans to aide you in getting your little one to nap. Pantley offers various suggestions for many types of napping problems, but what I appreciate most is how she acknowledges that each child, each parent, and each situation is different, and how it’s important to do what’s best for your own child based on your needs, beliefs, and situation.

With that in mind, I couldn’t wait to try out the various solutions for DS1, my “Nap Resister.”

Normally, we’d make DS1 take a nap about an hour or so after lunch. Sometimes he’d nap on his own, other times we’d have to lie down with him, and there were days he didn’t take a nap at all. We knew this inconsistency wasn’t good for any of us.

On a day he didn’t want to take a nap, we tried to do a mini-version of our bedtime routine, which entailed reading and singing to him.

It didn’t work.

Then I realized we were trying to get him to take a nap when he wasn’t tired. I was so focused on getting him on a set napping schedule, that I didn’t think about whether or not he was really tired. Once I started recognizing the sleepy signs (less activity, unfocused attention, etc.) I followed some of Pantley’s suggestions—I’d darken his room by closing the shutters and I’d remove his favorite toys so he wasn’t tempted to play. I’d tell him it was naptime, and leave the room. Sometimes I’d have to go back a few times and tell him to “nap-nap,” but once we implemented this routine, he napped on his own for SIX days in a row! Success!

As for DS2, my “Naptime Nursling,” he constantly naps in my arms after nursing, and other times I’ll put him in a swing to nap. It was comforting reading in Pantley’s book how nothing is wrong with this, as long as we don’t feel it’s wrong and it works for us.

Quite frankly, since DS2 is still in the “newborn” stage, I’m enjoying the in-arms naps (they grow too quickly!). And I don’t know what I would do without the swing because right now he hates napping in his crib—if he falls asleep in my arms and I move him to the crib, he’ll start screaming! However, I have slowly begun to implement some of Pantley’s suggestions so when the time is right and both DS2 and I are ready to stop the in-arms naps and swing naps from being a frequent occurrence, the transition will be smooth.

One thing I’ve been trying to do consistently is to stop his non-nutritive sucking when he’s done eating, and it’s been working rather well. As for the transitioning of DS2 from a swing nap to stationary sleep, I’ve moved his swing from the living room to his bedroom, near his crib, and I’ve begun to start turning off the motion while he sleeps. So far he has slept in a stationary swing just once. I’ll be looking for a white noise CD or device to help him nap, and I know this step, along with the others Pantley suggested, will help DS2 get used to a stationary nap and I’ll be able to move him to his crib.

Naptime struggles still happen on occasion with DS1, but it’s nothing like what it was before. And DS2’s transition from in-arms or swing naps to stationary/crib naps is happening slowly, but surely.

Shop: You can purchase The No-Cry Nap Solution anywhere books are sold, including on Amazon.com.

Elizabeth Pantley provides helpful, practical, realistic solutions to tackle napping problems that you can adapt to your own needs, and The No-Cry Nap Solution has been a handy reference that I don’t know what I’d do without.

Thank you to McGraw-Hill for providing the product(s) for review and/or giveaway.

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