It's hard to believe, but Simon took his last regularly scheduled afternoon nap last week. He was starting to resist even lying down, and nap time was becoming dramatic. In the event that he would actually sleep, he would be too wired to go to bed in the evening, causing more drama. We were resistant to skipping naps entirely because a tired Simon in the evening was a bad scene.
To my surprise, things are actually going better than expected. He's fairly used to staying up all day, and when evening comes along, he's really ready to turn in. Before he was calling out at regular intervals between 8:30 and 10. Now, we get him to bed often before 8, and we don't hear a peep.
There are pros and cons for us as parents, of course. We don't get a short break in the afternoon, but we do get a longer evening, and it's a lot easier to go out and do stuff with him. That's a net win, I think.
Rolling with this is part of a bigger pattern of constantly trying to balance giving in to what he wants to do, because it's easier, and telling him what to do for a longer-term win. For example, he's terrible about staying on task for anything, whether it's brushing teeth, putting on shoes or eating. As is the case with many different behaviors, we never know how much of it is him being 4, having ASD or SPD. Tonight he wanted to open the garage door for Diana (coincidentally going to a seminar on behavior issues) while eating, and we told him no. It's slightly heartbreaking to see him react, because the optimist in me sees that he really just wants to help, but at some point we have to break the pattern of letting him get his way.
No telling yet on what happens when Daddy wants to take a nap on the weekend.
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