Читать книгу The Naptime Book - Cynthia MacGregor - Страница 7

Introduction: Even Without the Closet Monster

Bedtimes and naptimes. They share so much and yet in ways they are dissimilar, too. In both cases, you are trying to get a child to go to sleep—primarily because the child needs to rest and secondarily because (let's be honest), you need a break too! When your child is down for a nap, you can catch a nap yourself—or at least catch your breath, maybe get tonight's dinner started, or “pick up” the living room so it no longer looks like it was visited by a deranged tornado. (See the chapter, “Time Out for Mom, Too!” for a little more on the subject of making good use for yourself of your child's naptime.)

Kids resist going to bed at night for many reasons. Fear of the dark—and of the imagined bugaboos that await in that darkness—is a prime one. On the other hand, very few kids fear naptime because of “the closet monster” or “what's under the bed”; in daylight, these kinds of terrors recede. Another reason that lurks behind resistance to going to bed at night is fear of having a nightmare, but very few kids have nightmares during naps.

Yet, even without being concerned over closet monsters and nightmares, many kids resist going to bed for a nap just the same.

Why is that?

One big reason—and it's an operative in avoiding nighttime bedtime too—is the fear of missing something. What are you going to be doing while your child is asleep? What's going to be happening in the house and in the world out there that he's not going to be aware of while he sleeps? You may say, “I'm just going to be resting, myself,” or “I'll only be in the kitchen, starting dinner,” but that's scant reassurance to an active four-year-old for whom every audible fire siren and every squirrel on the tree branch outside the window is an adventure. Even the prospect that Barney or Blue's Clues might come on the TV while he sleeps—and misses it—is devastating.

You can't in clear conscience promise him unconditionally that nothing exciting will transpire while he's napping. You don't know what neighborhood excitement will erupt, what friend will ring the doorbell, or what else might occur during that time.

The best you can do is make lying down for a nap seem appealing and pave the way for him to relax and rest. And that's basically what this book is about.

Studies state that sleep is important for all of us but especially for kids. The average preschooler needs nine hours of sleep a night, as well as a nap during the day. And I surely don't have to explain that a nap is as important to his disposition as it is to his health! What parent hasn't had to deal with a cranky child who's out of sorts or out of control due to missing a nap or having a nap curtailed?

The aim of this book is to offer you ways to make naptime easier. It's a two-pronged plan: You need to induce your child into getting on her bed in preparation for a nap; and you need to get her to relax once she's there, so she can fall asleep.

In this introduction I'll discuss ways to ease the naptime struggle. Then I'll suggest some activities that you can engage in with your child in or on the bed. These activities have a dual purpose:

1 The prospect of participating in them can help lure your child to his bed.

2 The activities themselves are soothing and/or engaging. They will help relax the child and/or take his attention away from anything that might be troubling him, from a concern about missing something while he sleeps to an even more pressing worry such as an imminent trip to the dentist, or the approach of his first day in kindergarten or pre-school or daycare.

Besides being concerned that they'll miss something, other reasons kids resist naps are because they want to be “a big kid” and because they simply don't realize they're tired. Kids aren't as attuned to their body signals as adults are. If you're at the end of your rope, if simple tasks are defeating you, everyone is annoying you, and you're just about out of patience, chances are it's because you're overtired and chances are you know it. But the three- or four-year-old who's cranky or racing around the house out of control is probably also overtired but almost certainly doesn't recognize it.

Fortunately you do. If your son or daughter is showing every sign of being overtired, you, at least, know what the matter is—and what the solution is. After he has his nap, things will get better.

You can help your cause along by taking the following steps:

1 Try to put him in for his nap at the same time every day. It helps to establish a routine. If your child knows naptime isn't “negotiable,” he'll be less likely to try to fight it. If 1:00 or 2:00 or just after lunch is naptime every day, your child will know that it's naptime and he's expected to go inside and lie down and close his eyes. Making one of the activities in this book part of a pre-nap routine should help. If the child knows the routine involves something enjoyable and is not just a boring, loss-of-playtime nap, he's more likely to be acquiescent.Do not, however, be such a slave to routine that you go to either of the two extremes. If it's fifteen minutes before your child's usual naptime but he's clearly tired, it won't throw his whole routine off if you put him in for his nap fifteen minutes early today. On the other hand, if you have company whom your child is involved with and you know they're going to leave soon, it's better to put your child in for his nap fifteen minutes or half an hour late than to try to break up his visit with his cousin and force him to go lie down. Routine is a good thing; but so is a reasonable amount of flexibility.

2 Limit her intake of sugars and other stimulants in the hour or so before naptime. Though science is still not in complete accord about the role sugar plays in turning kids into whirlwinds, more scientists and doctors seem to believe the theory than not; what's the harm in playing safe? I don't suppose a dish of chocolate pudding is going to totally ruin her chances of falling asleep or even settling down and trying, but does she really need that candy bar or glass of soda before her nap? It can wait until afterward.

3 Speaking of waiting till afterward, in extreme cases you can always try promising him something good—a sweet or a story, a game, or something else he enjoys—if he naps or at least stays in bed for a set amount of time. Okay, this is bribery, but you know what? Bribery's been around for so long because bribery works. And if your child is so nap-resistant that the only way to get him to lie down is to promise him a treat for afterward, you can promise him something minimal—or something you were going to give him anyhow. As long as you don't use bribery to get him to do every single thing you want, from cleaning his room to taking his vitamins to being nice to his siblings, there's no harm in occasional bribes.

4 Right after lunch is often a good time to put a child in for a nap. The body is more sluggish anyhow since it's busy digesting food and she's less likely to be filled with enough energy to run around the block forty times. As a result, she'll probably be more likely to lie down without resisting. Also, if she's just been busy with lunch you're not interrupting her in the middle of a fun game, an interesting TV show, or some other activity she's resistant to being taken away from.

5 Draw the blinds when you put him in. Many kids are perfectly capable of sleeping in broad daylight, but others aren't. Too, if his room is on the first floor or otherwise has a view visible from his bed—even if it's only of a tree full of robins and squirrels—you'll eliminate distractions and give him one less reason to fight to keep his eyes open. Also a darkened room is reminiscent of nighttime and suggests his closing his eyes and drifting off. It's subtle but it's valuable.

6 Make naptime comforting. When she was an infant you probably put her in for naps with a bottle and perhaps a stuffed animal. As she grew a little older, she probably still took a stuffed animal with her, and perhaps a “blankie.” Now that she's three or four, she may no longer have a “blankie” (though if she does, by all means let her take it in for naps) but she can still take a stuffed animal to bed for naps. And it wouldn't hurt to cover her with a blanket for that secure, protected feeling it gives, even if the room temperature doesn't require it. In fact, a special “nap blanket” or “nap quilt” can reinforce the idea that now it's naptime.Some parents go so far as to put the child in her p.j.s and under the covers for a nap. While this does reinforce the idea that sleep is expected, most parents think it's not necessary. Simply lying on the bed—in clothes—is good enough, though lying under a blanket or other covering can be helpful.

Be aware that there will come a time when he outgrows naps. At first he may just fail to fall asleep from time to time when you put him in for his nap. Or he may be more actively resistant: “I'm not tired.” “I don't want to lie down.” If he's four or five, pay attention. This may not be that old-time resistance; this may be a sincere statement that he's outgrowing the need for naps.

But, for a while, you can mandate a “quiet time,” simply a rest period even if he doesn't literally fall asleep. If he lies down, rests, and relaxes, that still accomplishes some good in giving his body a chance to catch up. And it accomplishes some good in giving you a break too.

Tell him you don't necessarily expect him to sleep, but you do want him to rest. The thinking activities described in the chapter “Travels to the Lands of Imagination and Conceptualization,” while offered here as a means to get the child settled into bed and into a relaxed state prior to napping, will also serve well in giving him something pleasant to keep his mind occupied while he rests.

While we're on the subject of napping vs. resting and eventually giving up the practice altogether, let's talk about the child who says she's too old for a nap or who simply can't sleep in the daytime anymore. If she says she's too old to nap, she may be telling the truth—or she may simply be trying to grow up quickly. Despite the sentiments of Peter Pan and his band of lost boys who proclaimed they didn't ever want to grow up, most kids are very eager to be “big kids” and then eventually grownups. And if Kim up the street or friend Michael's older brother Jerry no longer nap because they're “too old for that,” not napping may seem like a delightfully grown-up concept.

But there comes a time when a child truly does outgrow the need to nap. It usually isn't something that happens overnight. The child may start waking up sooner after lying down for a nap or having more trouble falling asleep at naptime, as well as perhaps being more resistant to the idea of going in for a nap at all. But, at least at first, there will still be days when he needs a nap—and gets oh-so-cranky or out of control if he doesn't have one. Try to get him to at least lie down for a simple rest period, at least for a few more months.

Those naptimes of hers—even if they're now just rest times—are helpful to her, and are equally helpful to you. But take heart—when she does give up naps and resting altogether, you'll probably be able to get her in for bed a little earlier at night. You can even use that as an actual bargain: “You're old enough that I'll let you skip your nap. But you're going to have to go to bed half an hour/fifteen minutes earlier.”

But for as long as your child is young enough, he's going to need naps. The purpose of this book is to make naptime easier—a part of the day that the child will at least accept even if not actively look forward to and a part of the day that you won't have to dread. Getting him in for a nap may offer you a break, but it hardly seems worth it if it's preceded by twenty minutes of resistance, of begging and arguing and “I'm not tired!” and “Please let me play for ten minutes more!” and possibly even angry screaming and stamping.

Besides all the suggestions I've already made, what may be the best suggestion of all—and it's the crux of this book—is to tempt her to bed for her nap with an activity that's relaxing and soothing and may help make it easier for her to sleep. And because these activities are fun, they can help persuade her to get onto the bed, where the activity is to take place.

Parents have long been putting kids to bed at night with a story or other bedtime activity. (For more ideas on bedtime activities, see my book Night-Night.) Why should naptime be any different? We sweeten the going-to-bed routine for kids at night by settling them in with a story or other activity, why not at naptime?

What follows are some suggestions for pre-nap activities. They'll tempt your child to go to bed when you tell him what you have planned for the two of you as soon as he's settled onto his bed. They'll relax him, too, and distract him from whatever thoughts might otherwise keep him awake. Obviously some are more suitable for younger nappers, others for kids who have developed certain skills and abilities. But, whatever your child's age is now, you're sure to find poems, games, storytime activities, and fun things to think about and imagine that will capture his interest.

May they be of great help to you.