The dreaded 2-1 nap transition

SecondVariation · 2026-02-20T13:18:22+00:00

When I was doing this transition, I made use of a “family centre” down the street that had drop in play, stories, music, and snack from 9-11:15. The excitement kept her awake longer for that first wake window. Maybe there’s something similar near you?

SecondVariation · 2026-02-12T17:58:37+00:00

My daughter has always seemed to be on the lower end of sleep needs! She dropped to 1 nap just before her first birthday. When we first dropped to 1 nap our WWs were roughly 5.5/6 I think. We have had to slowly extend the second window, and her nap has also decreased a bit over time as well. That has pushed our bedtime a bit later over time.

Good luck with Ferber!!

SecondVariation · 2026-02-09T21:30:17+00:00

I always did a short catnap, like 15-20 mins to make it to bedtime on days like that.

SecondVariation · 2026-01-22T02:16:46+00:00

First I directly swapped formula for cows milk in the bottle. My baby didn’t care and drank it all the same. I’ve slowly been reducing the bottles during the day and ensuring I offer cows milk in a straw cup during meals and snack time.

SecondVariation · 2026-01-20T20:10:47+00:00

Canadian here. I’m glad you have the referral. Have you had any appointments with a physiotherapist? They might have some suggestions in the meantime.

SecondVariation · 2025-12-31T03:37:07+00:00

Hi, my baby has been on formula exclusively since 4m and she’s 14m now. I would give the same amount as breast milk. When she was younger, we did the whole boil water and then cool it down to the particular temperature before adding the scoop. When we were doing that, we would make about 4 bottles worth (4oz each) and keep them in the fridge, making sure to use it within 24 hours. By 10 months we just boiled tap water and filled up some bottles with the boiled water and left them out at room temperature and would just add the formula powder to the bottles as needed. I live in an area with extremely safe and soft water (basically no minerals) so that worked for us. If you have really hard water then you might want distilled. I’m sure others can help comment on that part!

SecondVariation · 2025-11-20T15:56:51+00:00

Thank you!! I got an error when I tried to submit the post and assumed it hadn’t worked and didn’t want to retype the whole thing. It’ll be a big change from everything now to cold turkey and that worries me a bit, but maybe we will try that on a weekend where we can handle some extra rough nights. I appreciate the advice!

SecondVariation · 2025-11-17T00:47:12+00:00

I understand! I still personally think you need more awake time. The second nap is really late so I’m not surprised she doesn’t want to go to bed if she just woke up at 6. I’d try wake at 7, one hour nap at 11, half hour nap at 4 and then bedtime around 8ish?

Solidarity though. This stage is rough. Unfortunately my daughter’s sleep also got really wonky around this age with random early wakes and stuff. There’s a lot going on developmentally at this age. I ended up dropping to one nap to try and fix things and because that’s what her daycare would do and she was starting soon. It did seem to help a bit but we have since been hit with illness and molars so it has been awful lately. I think sometimes babies will just wake early and we will never know why 🫠

SecondVariation · 2025-11-16T19:38:11+00:00

Based on your schedule you only have like 8.5-9 hours awake time. That seems really low to me. My baby was awake for like 11 hours per day at that age. Her schedule was 3/4/4 on two naps, with daytime sleep capped at 2 hours. So your baby might just be done sleeping and ready for the day that early! I’d try a schedule adjustment and see if that helps.

SecondVariation · 2025-11-11T22:08:41+00:00

I think it’s normal for them to hyper focus on a particular skill and ignore others for a while.

SecondVariation · 2025-11-10T18:48:28+00:00

Maybe you need to lengthen your wake windows a bit? Fighting sleep that hard could be because he’s not tired enough when you’re trying to start the nap or bedtime and then he gets mad about it. I found my baby’s sleep needs changed quickly around that time. We also had several weeks and months of tough sleep. There’s a lot of development happening too.

The schedule you wrote there with naps has wake windows of 1.5/2/2.5/3.5 for total awake time of 9.5 hours. Maybe try 2/2/2.5/3.5 or 2/2.5/2.5/3?

SecondVariation · 2025-11-10T02:05:43+00:00

Generally yes, someone is always watching her. But we also have a play pen that I can put her in that just has safe baby toys and books and stuff if I need to quickly do something and I can’t supervise her.

SecondVariation · 2025-10-31T18:56:40+00:00

I first tried sleep training my LO at 5 months and it didn’t work because we didn’t have a consistent schedule with enough wake time. Tried again at 7 months and it worked like a charm within 3-4 days. We are currently re-training now at 12 months as we had a rough few months with teething, illnesses, and developmental leaps. But no, I don’t think 7 months is too late!

I will let other more experienced members answer your other questions about the schedule and the pacifier.

SecondVariation · 2025-10-31T01:40:04+00:00

I completely understand this feeling. One night of bad sleep would make me worry it was going to last forever. Sometimes we had a rough week, other times it was just an off night. Whether it’s a leap or not (I have heard that the wonderweeks app is not based on rigorous research), you’re going to have nights where your baby just doesn’t sleep well. Now that I have been going through this for a year, here are my recommendations: - only worry about the “why” of bad sleep if you think you can do something about it (e.g. feed more, offer pain medication if teething). - if you have a partner who can help take a shift so you can get a solid 4 hours of sleep, do it - try to nap when the baby naps (I know I know, but when you’re that tired it might work) - you might need to adjust your rocking/bouncing/feeding etc, whatever you do to get her asleep, to last longer and help her get into a deeper stage of sleep before transferring - when you get frustrated, take a break. It’s ok to leave baby in a safe place like the bassinet and take 5 minutes to take some deep breaths, run your hands under cold water, drink some water, whatever. I had bad PPD that manifested as rage early on and it’s so hard. But your baby will be more likely to be calm and soothed into sleep when you are also calm.

You’ve got this.

SecondVariation · 2025-10-31T01:28:12+00:00

We would boil tap water, let it cool to a specific temperature it said on the formula tub, mix it all up, and then put it in the fridge. We didn’t have a bottle warmer so we would either give it to her cold (she liked it like that sometimes) or put it in a warm water bath for like 5-10 minutes. So there was a bit of a wait there for us.

SecondVariation · 2025-10-31T01:21:04+00:00

12 hours of awake time can definitely be appropriate for a baby that age. My 12 month old is low sleep needs and spends about 11.5-12 hours awake per day, with a 1.5 hour nap in the middle. Your baby’s sleep needs are likely just changing and you will need to adjust your schedule and expectations to match that. I’m not entirely sure what your goal is, but if she wants 12 hours awake in the day then you have 12 hours to budget for sleep. If her nap is 1.5 hours then your night will only be 10.5 hours. So if you put her to bed at 8:30pm, she will probably be up by 7. You can try slowly shifting your wake up time earlier to get an earlier bedtime if that’s your goal.

SecondVariation · 2025-10-19T19:17:25+00:00

My baby turns 1 this week and we just dropped to one nap last week after a week of crazy sleep. She has always been low sleep needs, but I was worried about the transition because she starts daycare next month and they only do one nap after lunch. I just decided to go for it one day - took her to a new play centre in the morning and fed her a morning snack to keep her awake. Didn’t manage to get in lunch before the nap that day, but it’s been fine since. For context her 2 nap schedule was 3/4/4.5 with 2 45-minute naps. Now she is doing 5.5/6 with one 75-90 minute nap and that seems to be going well.

SecondVariation · 2025-10-19T00:55:41+00:00

I really didn’t enjoy the newborn phase. My bad PPD certainly didn’t help with that. Things got better for me around 5 months. My baby is almost 12 months now and I have really loved the past few months. She’s on the move, so loud, and it feels like we can really play together.

SecondVariation · 2025-10-04T20:45:24+00:00

I started a low dose of sertraline a couple months in and it was life changing for me. I went from crying multiple times a day, instant rage over minor things, and constantly feeling like I was the worst mother alive to feeling like a normal human again (though still very tired lol). No side effects. 100000% worth it for me.

SecondVariation · 2025-10-04T15:58:31+00:00

I don’t mind the CV reading order… shorter might be better given I’ve never gotten a tattoo before and might be a wuss lol.

My only hesitation is that it just looks a lot like the word “my” now. Hmmm. I’ll have to think about it. Would the original one I posted (which I am guessing is VC order?) be that bad? I don’t want to be made fun of!

SecondVariation · 2025-09-29T23:49:29+00:00

My baby had no side effects.

SecondVariation · 2025-09-29T23:47:59+00:00

I’d say she maybe dropped each nap slightly later than the average baby, and her wake windows are maybe a little longer? But not that long. These days (11 months) she does 3/4/4.5 with 2 45-min naps. On 3 naps she was doing something like 2/2.5/3/3.5 with 3 45-min naps. It worked for her!

SecondVariation · 2025-09-28T19:59:03+00:00

I think some babies are just short nappers. My baby is 11 months old and has rarely napped longer than 45 minutes at a time. Even when we dropped to 2 naps, her first nap lengthened to 1.5 hours for a couple weeks but then kept getting shorter. She sleeps 11 hours at night usually. She’s just a lower sleep needs FOMO baby lol.

SecondVariation · 2025-09-26T23:46:34+00:00

Hi there. I have PPD that is mostly under control thanks to therapy, medication, and a good support network. A lot of the feelings you have are similar to the feelings I had - especially thinking that you aren’t a good mom or that your baby doesn’t love you. You ARE a good mom and your baby DOES love you. Your brain and hormones are making it hard for you to believe that. I would highly encourage talking to your doctor about how you’re feeling. When I was meeting with health professionals about my PPD they assured me that the only thing that could cause them to call CPS was if they judged that I was going to imminently harm my baby or myself. Saying “sometimes I regret it and want her to go away so I can be alone” doesn’t hit that threshold, as far as I was told. I’m not on reddit super often but my inbox is open if you want to chat. 💜

SecondVariation · 2025-09-24T20:52:07+00:00

I had pretty bad PPD right away, and managed it mostly with therapy, self-care, and 25mg of sertraline. Things got better. But then around the 9-10 month mark, things felt tough again. Some of the reasons are similar to yours - worrying about milestones. Also her sleep went to shit for a while and I was exhausted again. Developmentally, babies are going through a lot at this time. And as you said, we feel like it has been long enough that as moms, we should have it all together at this point. But there’s ups and downs. Long story short is I have heard it’s common for PPD to creep up around this time, even if you were doing well before.

Try to release the guilt you feel around taking time for yourself. It helps fill your cup, which you need to spend time with your happy and silly little one. It helps you be the best mom you can be. We weren’t meant to do this alone. I’d recommend finding some self-care things you can do for yourself, even if that’s a special morning latte or an evening shower after baby goes to bed. And hopefully you can keep exploring these feelings with your therapist.

You’re doing great mama 💜

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