Many parents worry that a child at 2 years old does not sleep during the day. Some people think that it’s absolutely not necessary - it doesn’t want, well, it’s not necessary, it will fall early in the evening! And this approach is completely wrong, preschool children must have a rest during the day, and sleep is an obligatory stage of the regimen. During sleep, children not only relax, but also grow, the nervous system normalizes, the immune system rises, and without sleep, all this will fail, as it is with nature! In the article we will find out the reasons why a child at 2 years old does not sleep during the day, and learn how to deal with them. From the publication you will understand why in general the child needs to sleep during the day and how long it takes in time according to the standards.
How much does a child sleep at 2 years in the afternoon?
Let's start with physiological norms, and it is worth noting here that modern children from infancy have far gone from the usual norms - they sleep less! For today's two-year-old children, it has become the norm to go to bed only once a day if 10 years ago a sleep was required every 6 hours of wakefulness!
Today, a modern two-year-old child sleeps 2 hours a day - this is the norm in medicine, but in practice all children are individual. One can sleep one and a half hours, the other 30 minutes, and the third is ready for 3 hours to break away from daytime activities.
Is it worth it to worry about the lack of daytime sleep?
Some parents are very concerned about the question of why the child does not sleep during the day at 2 years. But is it dangerous to health?
If the baby sleeps at night, which is not appropriate for his age, 10-11 hours, but all 12-13, and feels great during the day, nothing worries him, he does not act up, then you should not worry at all. This is mainly due to genetics, and many parents of such children recall that they themselves at an early age began to abandon daytime rest in favor of games, but at night it took longer to sleep.
If a child at 2 years old does not sleep during the day, a night's sleep is 10-11 hours or less, and during the day it becomes lethargic, capricious, but still refuses to sleep (or simply cannot fall asleep), then you should consider visiting a neurologist , psychotherapist and psychologist.
The value of daytime sleep for children
Even without consulting a specialist, everyone knows that a sleepy child is active, cheerful, he has plenty of energy, he is attracted to learning new things, memory and reflexes work much better. The baby who has not slept is sluggish, cannot occupy himself, is constantly whimpering, apathetic. That is, sleep affects the psychological state of the child.
Daytime sleep is a simple and necessary prevention of nervous system overexcitation. By about two years of life, mental and nervous processes in the brain begin to become more complicated, and all this leads to overwork, overexcitation. And if the baby does not sleep during the day, then due to nervous overexcitation, he will not be able to sleep normally, and in the morning he will get up badly, not having enough sleep, without mood. Permanent lack of sleep is a decrease in immunity, attention, and mental abilities of the child.
During sleep, the brain and nervous system do not rest, but cease to receive all the new information, and can calmly "put on shelves" already received. Daytime sleep for a child is a kind of reboot, and without it, the baby will begin to “hang”.
Next, we propose going to an overview of the possible reasons why a child at 2 years of age does not go to bed in the afternoon.
Lack of mode
This is the main reason for today, and mainly applies to children who do not attend kindergarten. According to Dr. Komarovsky, a child at 2 years old does not sleep during the day due to the fact that this is simply not in the regime, the parents did not accustom. Indeed, many people think that “training” in the form of a regimen is useless for a child, it’s cruel to demand that the baby perform the required actions.
Experts are in a hurry to assure that there is nothing cruel in the regime, and this is a simple set of obligatory tasks that need to be completed in a day, and preferably at the same time - this gives a feeling of comfort and stability, a child from an early age learns to allocate his time, which useful to him in later life.
We will talk about how to make the daily regimen at the end of the article, but for now we will move on to other reasons why a child at 2 years old refuses to sleep during the day.
Late rise
This, again, is due to the lack of a regime. If the child wakes up late, sleeps for more than 12 hours, and feels great during the day, then you should not worry, but still you need to think about the regimen.
If the baby sleeps the norm, but wakes up by noon, it means that he is late in bed, which is also bad. Begin to put the child to sleep at night earlier, wake up no later than 9 in the morning, and thus by three in the afternoon he will tire, will agree to lie down to rest.
Unspent energy
Do you observe the regimen, but still a child at 2 years old does not sleep during the day? And look what he does. If a child in the morning sits with a gadget in his hands, draws, watches TV, flips through a book, then he just does not have time to get tired, wasting energy. Of course, by five o’clock in the evening he will want to sleep, but this will not be possible, since late daytime sleep pushes the night, and this knocks down the regime. What to do?
Transfer all your household chores in the morning to the afternoon. Take your child for a walk before lunch: to the playground, to the park, to the zoo, just to the shops, to the pool, but at least not to sit at home! The child will have time to spend all his energy before dinner, get tired of the order, and then eat, and go to bed. Here you can relax, or take care of the affairs that remained in the morning.
Emotional overstimulation
If a child at 2 years old does not sleep during the day due to any events (guests arrived, took the animal home, moved, and so on), then this is an emotional outburst that simply does not allow fatigue to be perceived. What to do in this case?
Whenever possible, avoid emotional outbursts at this age. But if this happened, then you have to wait, it lasts no more than two days, and then everything will work out. If in this case it is not possible to lay the baby on a day's rest, then do not force him, he will only begin to act up. In the evening, try to put him early so that the child overslept the time prescribed per day.
External irritants
If the child does not sleep during the day at 2.5 years and at an earlier age, then pay attention to what may interfere with this:
- Is the room too stuffy? If so, then slightly open the window, or put the fan.
- Maybe cool? Turn on the heater, but away from the bed so that the baby does not accidentally burn about it when waking up.
- Is it too light in the room? Close the curtains, hang additional curtains made of dense fabric.
- If extraneous sounds interfere (neighbors make repairs, children run around in the yard, and so on), then softly playing, calm music, or the TV on (only not on the cartoon channel) will help. Quiet sounds in the room will be in the foreground, and the child will cease to perceive loud sounds from the outside.
- Perhaps the baby stopped sleeping in the daytime after the situation was changed in his room? For example, rearranged or replaced furniture, painted walls or re-glued wallpapers? Then he just adapts, he is unusual in his room, and he feels like a guest here. In this case, too, have to wait.
- Inconvenient pajamas, not good quality pajamas or bedding. All this creates discomfort. The child is uncomfortable, uncomfortable, hot, maybe something is pricking, somewhere he is pressing a seam. Examine the bedding and sleepwear well, replace if necessary.
Fright
If a child at 2 years old stopped sleeping during the day, and even rises and tantrums happen at night, then most likely he has a fright. What could be the reason?
- Parental quarrels, fights that stably occur with a child. Perhaps the baby heard swearing at night, and from this he woke up, scared.
- At night in a dream the child could hear sounds coming from the TV, or catch a glimpse of a fragment of a horror movie, an action movie. All this greatly affects the psyche, and the child is simply frightened, refuses to sleep during the day, and at night simply “cuts him out” of fatigue.
- Pets or animals outdoors. For example, a dog began to bark sharply.
- Sharp noise, thunderstorm.
What to do? Eliminate everything that can frighten the child, do not swear when the baby is at home, watch TV quietly when he is sleeping, and do not watch horrors / action movies during the wake of the child.
The main mistake of parents
Many parents are sure that the regimen is not needed, and the child will go to bed during the day if he gets tired. This is all wrong! From a very young age, a child is interested in everything, and it would be better to stay awake, communicate with his mother, but not sleep, and if you do not take measures so that the child falls asleep, he will simply overwork. Until two years, and even later, from overwork, many people really fall asleep right in toys, but this is no longer a healthy dream. Firstly, the baby fell asleep later than necessary, which means that in the evening it will be more difficult to lay him. Secondly, the child really just "knocked out", and he fell asleep not in the most comfortable environment.
In this case, the regime will help, which will have to gradually accustom the baby. This is simply necessary if you want the child to grow up healthy.
How to build a daily routine and make the baby sleep?
We suggest that you familiarize yourself with the approximate daily routine that any child and his parents must observe. If the baby does not go to the garden, where there is this same mode, then create all the conditions at home:
- From 7 to 7.30 you need to wake up. Then half an hour to wash, sip, change clothes from pajamas to home clothes.
- From 8 to 8.30 you need to have breakfast. Next, we go together to make the bed, tidy up the toys, water the flowers. Anything but the TV!
- From 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. there is an entertainment program. These are walks in the park, on the playground for children, shopping, to the zoo and so on.
- Then you can have a bite to eat: fruit, tea with cookies. Until one in the afternoon you can read, watch TV, play calm games.
- From one o'clock in the afternoon to half past one - lunch, then we digest food for half an hour and go get laid for a day's rest.
- From 14.00 to 15.30 or 16.00 you need to sleep. If the child does not want to, then close the curtains, ask him to simply lie down with his eyes closed while you read him a fairy tale. The voice should be calm, monotonous. In extreme cases, lie down next to yourself, the child will fall asleep so quickly.
- At 16.00 or at 16.30 - afternoon tea.
- From 17.00 you can walk an hour and a half.
- At seven in the evening, dinner.
- Up to 8 you can play, read. Next swimming.
- At 21.00 hang up.
This routine will help you accustom your baby to daytime sleep!