You’ve all heard parents talk about that magical time during their day where they get a ton of stuff done, right? You know, they answer emails and cook meals. They do laundry and call friends. Doze by the television…

That magical hour (or two or three! if you’re lucky) is called the daily (or twice/thrice daily) nap.

I have never experienced this nap.

Maybe once or twice. But fewer times than I can count on one hand.

My baby has always napped on me. Only napped on me. On the boob, in my arms, in the carrier. She won’t nap in her crib, won’t nap in the stroller, not even the car. Don’t get me started on the car. She’s a puke machine in the car. It’s a good thing we’re hardly ever in one.

I am not one of those parents who keeps her baby ON her at all times. I co-slept until she was about four months old, she slept in a crib next to me until six months old and then we sleep trained her into her own crib at seven months. That’s another story. A traumatic one.

She has just never been a good sleeper. She is practically perfect in every other way (no bias here) but the sleep thing has never come easily to her. Which means we have been sleep deprived for two years.

There is no explaining the reality of sleep deprivation. There is no way to truly understand it without experiencing it. It makes total sense that it would be used as a torture device. It’s super effective at making you feel completely insane. Loopy, confused, heavy. You start seeing things crawling across the floor and realize there’s nothing there. You’re dizzy and drowsy, you get tunnel vision every time you stand up too fast. If you’re like my husband, you faint on the subway platform and get hauled out by EMT’s and labeled officially “exhausted.”

Since she’s been in daycare she has had almost no trouble at all with naps. While there, just to clarify. While on-site with them. Occasionally she skips those too but more often than not she will nap just fine at daycare and then not at all on the weekends. It’s horrible. It’s stressful and it’s just not fun. You end up planning your entire day around this thing that will likely not even happen. But, you have to try anyways. Because, otherwise, it means a cranky kid who then has to go to bed extra early which throws all your weekend plans into the gutter.

I have spent entire days trying to get this kid to nap. I wish I was kidding.

Well-meaning parents would give us their best advice. Use a sound machine and blackout curtain, let her cry for a few minutes, run her around right before nap time, don’t nurse her beforehand, nurse her a ton beforehand, play music, go outside, put her in the carrier, put her in the swing, swaddle her, let her appendages be free. There was no shortage of miracle nap cures. But, nothing worked for us.

This past weekend she napped on Saturday but not until 3:00. Which meant a super late bedtime since her typical daycare nap is 12:30. It also meant hours and hours of trying before success. Sunday we had no nap. Not for lack of trying but, my husband and I have decided that we will no longer waste half of the day trying to get her to take a nap she’s refusing to take.

So, we try not to let the nap run the house. The nap will happen or it won’t but either way we’ll make our plans and we’ll live our lives. Thank gods the nighttime sleeping is going well. We’ve had to do a lot of re-sleep training but mostly it has been quite a success (minus a few unavoidable detours and speed bumps).

All I can say, is that I cannot wait to be done with the nap thing entirely. And for those of you who have kids who nap. You probably have no idea how good your life is. Appreciate it. For you are truly blessed.