Toddler sleep regressions – what are they, when they happen, and how to help your toddler sleep? Today’s post will explain everything you need to know about toddler sleep regressions.
Baby and toddler sleep is an ever-shifting, ever-changing thing, isn’t it? Just when you think you’re done with sleep training, done with nap time drama, done with night wakings — you find out you’re not. Something happens (an illness, a bout of teething, a vacation, etc.), and everything falls apart.
And it’s so discouraging. So normal, but so very, very discouraging.
Sometimes, you can trace the blip in your little one’s sleep to an obvious factor (like a recent vacation, for example.) Other times, though, the blip seems to come out of nowhere. In cases like that, you can usually blame a sleep regression.
We’ve written about sleep regressions pretty extensively, so if you’ve been reading The Baby Sleep Site for any length of time, you probably know at least a little bit about when they happen and what they are.
In today’s post, we’re going to put aside the “baby” sleep regressions (the ones that happen at 4 months and at 8, 9, or 10 months) and focus on the two toddler sleep regressions. We’ll look at when the two most common toddler sleep regressions happen, why they occur, what kinds of problems they cause, and how you can cope.
Toddler Sleep Regressions: What Are They and When Do They Happen?
Most people use the term “sleep regression” to mean that a baby or toddler, who’s been sleeping well, suddenly (often without any warning) begins waking frequently at night and/or refusing to nap during the day. These regressions usually last for a period of time (anywhere from 2 – 6 weeks); then, your baby or toddler’s sleep should return to its normal patterns. (The exception to that rule is the 3/4 month regression; those changes to your baby’s sleep patterns are permanent.)
There are two regressions that happen during toddlerhood: one happens around 18 months, and the other happens right around the 2-year mark.
Toddler Sleep Regression – 18 Month Sleep Regression
All sleep regressions can be traced to a baby’s physical and mental development at that particular stage. At 18 months, some of these physical and developmental milestones contribute to the sleep regression:
- Teething (many toddlers are cutting their 4 canine teeth around 18 months)
- Separation anxiety (this tends to peak and be at its worst from 10-18 months)
- Growing sense of independence (18 month olds are learning to exert their own wills, and are likely to resist doing something they don’t want to do — like going to bed)
Truth be told, the 18-month regression is a really, really tough one. Why? Because as we’ve written before, there’s a “discipline factor” involved in this regression that wasn’t part of the earlier sleep regressions:
Being sleep-deprived always makes parenting harder. Add to this the fact that your 18 month old is likely starting to throw temper tantrums and exhibiting plenty of defiant, oppositional behavior, and parenting can seem downright impossible! The stress of dealing with your toddler’s behavior compounds the exhaustion you’re already feeling.
What’s more, these two elements (your toddler’s newfound sleeplessness and your toddler’s oppositional behavior) can end up influencing each other. Your toddler’s willful behavior can lead him to refuse naps or to shriek stubbornly for you each time he wakes at night. And of course, the lack of sleep caused by this regression can make your little one cranky, which leads to more tantrums and temper fits.
For more details about the 18 month sleep regression, check out this article.
A Look At the 2 Year Sleep Regression
The 18 month sleep regression is tough, but the 2 year sleep regression is no picnic, either! There are a number of factors that contribute to your 2 year old’s sleep regression:
- Awake time is getting longer (this explains why your 2 year old’s sleep schedule may suddenly start falling apart)
- Separation anxiety may resurface (separation anxiety tends to improve after 18 months, but it may suddenly re-appear when your toddler is about 2)
- Naps may suddenly stop (we usually advise parents to treat their 2 year old’s naptime resistance as a phase, and to avoid eliminating naps altogether)
- Big transitions may be happening at home (many 2 year olds are facing transitions like moving to a big kid bed, awaiting the birth of a new sibling, or potty training — and all of these transitions disrupt sleep)
- Nighttime fears appear at this age (your imaginative 2 year old may suddenly feel afraid of the dark, or of monsters in the closet, and that can affect naps and bedtime)
For more details about this sleep regression, check out our post about the 2 Year Sleep Regression.
Toddler Sleep Regressions: How to Deal With Them
There’s no “cure” for sleep regressions, unfortunately. But there are ways you can work to minimize your toddler’s sleeplessness (and your own!):
- Set clear boundaries and limits with your toddler, especially at nap time and bedtime. This will help nip any sleep-related tantrums in the bud.
- Don’t rush into altering your toddler’s schedule, or dropping naps. Sleep regressions do pass eventually, and as Nicole has pointed out in past articles, it usually isn’t a good idea to create new, long-term habits for a short-term phase.
- Do your best to remain consistent, and remind yourself that this phase won’t last forever. 😉
- Be careful about chalking everything up to this sleep regression (or any other regression phase, for that matter!) If you’ve spent the last year and a half waiting for your “baby” to outgrow her poor sleep habits, you’re dealing with more than just a sleep regression. Instead, it may be time for you to tackle your toddler’s sleep issues head-on.
Heather says
Our son has been a great sleeper. He’s 27 months old and started his regression during the visit of his grandparents after his sister was born. We’re starting week 4 of his regression. He usually goes to bed at 530 pm sleeps till 530 am and naps from 11-1. It’s been a great schedule but now he won’t nap. He still sleeps during his regular time. He’s also going through a language and creativity explosion. Is it possible this is temporary because of all the changes in his life? People keep saying he must be done with napping but he has napped at least two times a week even while the regression has lasted. I just think he’s too young to give it up but am still so exhausted with a new born and a non napping toddler. I would just really appreciate some feedback. Thanks so much!
Debbye @ The Baby Sleep Site says
Hi @Heather – Thank you for writing, and congrats on your new baby! Sorry that you are having a tough time with your toddlers naps though! We understand how tough sleep issues can be when you have a newborn and a toddler! I’d recommend this article, to help determine if your little guy is actually ready to drop his nap (he is still a bit young!), and how to handle that transition:
https://www.babysleepsite.com/toddlers/toddler-done-napping-3-signs/
If you’re unsure, keep offering that nap and hopefully things will smooth out and he’ll be napping again soon once things are back into a “usual” routine.
Good luck Heather!
Dawn says
Hi, so my daughter is 20 months. And normally, with the exception of illness, she sleeps through the night. She goes to bed at 8p and wakes up between 8a and 9a. The last few weeks have been different. She went through allergy testing that took her off antihistamines that she is used to everyday and then she had a double ear infection. We are now a week from both and she isnt sleeping. She will fall asleep grest at bedtime and naptime. But around 2am she wakes up screaming. We can get her calm and back to sleep but once we lay her in her bed she wakes up screaming all over again. I dont what her to get used to sleeping in my bed so I dont want to bring her in with me, but my husband and I are exhausted. Please tell me this is separation anxiety and it wont last long. What else can we try?
Debbye @ The Baby Sleep Site says
Hi @Dawn – Thanks for writing and I am sorry that you are struggling with your daughter’s sleep at night! The change/removal of her medications, and then an ear infection could cause even the best toddler sleepers to regress! have you checked her ears again? You may want to be sure that the infections are totally cleared, as that may be still causing discomfort and the waking. If her ears are all better now, perhaps give it just a little more time to settle, and try not to create any new sleep habits that you will need to work on once she is all healthy. It would be hard to say if it is separation anxiety or lingering effects from the illness and the removal of the antihistamines and becoming a habit. Hang in there and if she is still waking in another week, and she gets a clean bill of health from her Dr, you can slowly and gently work on helping her fall back to sleep without as much help from you.
Please contact us if you’d like one on one help with this, and I do help that things smooth out on their own and very very soon!
IV says
Hi, our 21 month old used to sleep through the night from about 7:15 pm to about 6:30am, and he would take a nap for about an hour around 1130. For the last week or so he has been really fighting the nap, threw up in bed yesterday from crying. He has also been waking up around 3 or 4 am and asking for mama and then 30 minutes later tryingnto get back to bed (sometimes successfully sometimes not). We have fought the urge to go in, simply because we’re afraid to aggravate the wakefulness/sleeplessness. Can you please help us sort this ouut?
Janelle Reid says
Hi @IV, I’m so sorry to hear you’ve been struggling recently with your son’s sleep. We would love to help. First of all, here is a link to a free guide with tips to help your child sleep through the night: https://www.babysleepsite.com/sleep-through-night-free-ebook/
Since you already had him sleeping through the night and he seems to be regressing, you may find the guide isn’t as helpful as you’d like, and if this is the case I’d suggest looking into getting personalized sleep help through one of our packages since it does seems like there may be a few things going on. I’m confident our highly trained sleep consultants could help you meet your goals and getting him sleeping again once looking at your full son’s full sleep history and routine. Here is a link to read more about our personalized services: https://www.babysleepsite.com/baby-toddler-sleep-consulting-services/
I hope things turn around for you soon! Please let us know if you have any questions or need anything else.
Shannon says
We need help.
We agree that most ‘sleep refressions’ are a phase; however we are at our 3 1/2 month mark and need to get our nights back and sleep. Our 2 1/2 would sleep beautifully all night up until we changed her room to a big girls room with a day bed. Now she is up until 9 to 10pm everynight, with multiple wakes during the night. When we do not give her a nap she falls asleep by 7:40 and sleeps right through until 7am the next morning. We figured this was just phase and feel naps are still important however as we head into our 4 months of frustration where do we stand?
What do we do.
Danielle says
Hi Shannon,
Thanks for using The Baby Sleep Site as a resource! I’m sorry to hear you’re struggling with the 2 year-old sleep regression. We have an article all about this specific regression that may help you work through it here: https://www.babysleepsite.com/sleep-regression-2/2-year-old-sleep-regression/
I am not a sleep consultant, but toddlers can drop a nap anywhere between 3-5 years-old, and the occasional child does permanently drop the nap earlier. If your daughter is sleeping better without the nap consistently, and her behavior is good throughout the day, she may just be one of those children. If you don’t feel you need a full consultation but do need help working out a schedule that works for you all, you may consider joining the Members Area to participate in the weekly chats with a sleep consultant. That’s often a great fit for less complex sleep questions, when you want the help of a trained consultant. I hope this helps – good luck!
Rowena says
I really need HELP! I am so DESPERATE and one EXHAUSTED Mama! My 14month old son has been an amazing sleeper since he was 8 weeks old. I sleep trained at 8 weeks by time he was 10weeks old he was sleeping 7pm to 8am. We had some sleep regression here and there but he managed to soothe himself back to sleep.
These past 2 weeks has been so difficult for us! We do the same exact bed time routine but by time it’s time to put him to his crib. He’s screaming bloody murder and just hysterical. Which never happened before. He mastered putting himself to sleep after books and bottle. I have never used the Feber Method (CIO) but I tried it because I had no choice, it didn’t work with him. He could’ve last an hour if I left him. Now he’s refusing nap! He just hysterical and screaming wanting to help by me. However, with my husband he’ll rock our son for a bit, put him down in his crib and stay in his room until he falls asleep. But with me, he just wants me to hold him and as soon as I put him down to his crib. He wakes up crying!
I know teething has a factor to it but I gave him Motrin- didn’t work!
What am I doing wrong? What else can I do to help him sleep? Any other method I can to use? Do I need to sleep train him again? When is this going to be over? Please tell me this is temporary! HELP!
Debbye @ The Baby Sleep Site says
Hi @Rowena – Thank you for writing, and I am SO sorry that sleep has become so rough lately!! We know how tough this can be – and exhausting! Since this sounds like it may have started abruptly, did you check with your little guy’s pediatrician? Ruling out an ear infection or other health issues causing the issues would be a good first step! However, since he is falling asleep better for your husband, it may be a habit too, that you can work on changing with some more sleep coaching! If you would like one-on-one help with this, we would be happy to help! Please consider our Personalized Sleep Consultation packages where one of our trained expert sleep consultants will craft a Personalized Sleep Plan for you and your son based on both your unique family history and on our own experience working with tens of thousands of parents from around the world. Then, your consultant will help you implement the plan and answer any follow-up questions you may have. The consultant will also make changes to the plan as necessary. You can read about all of our sleep consultation packages and purchase directly online here:
https://www.babysleepsite.com/services
I hope that things smooth out! Good luck and please contact us if you have any questions or if you need any assistance!
Hana says
My 21 month old has always been a pretty good sleeper. He lays down around 7:30pm and wakes around 7:30/8am. He has put himself to sleep in his crib since 10 months for naps and bedtime.
Within the last few weeks, he has been having multiple MOTN wake-ups, to which I usually ignore and he will go back to sleep within 1- 5 minutes tops.
It is increasingly becoming more frequent, along with fussy evenings, and a weird nap schedule!
He takes 2 hour naps normally. Lately they have been closer to 3 most days, and then some days he won’t go down at all after spending hours in his crib..
He has been laying down about half an hour later for naps, not sure if that is the issue or not.
I am due in 2 weeks with baby #3 and didn’t think my toddler would be an issue!
Debbye @ The Baby Sleep Site says
Hi @Hana – Thank you for writing and congrats on baby #3 arriving very soon!! I am sorry to hear that your toddler is now struggling with his naps and with night wakings! That is tough!! Without having a sleep consultant taking a full sleep history and an in depth look at everything related to sleep for him, it is tough to say, but as a general rule, I would recommend being as consistent as you can, and working to get him back to the schedule that was working for you. Toddlers can really throw us for a loop, and it is pretty common to see issues close to the 2 year birthday! Hang in there, and I hope things smooth out quickly! We are here to help if you do need more assistance at any time! : )
Shayla Bronson says
My daughter is 24 months old and for the last couple weeks her night time sleep has been awful given she has had a cold, cough and was teething right before she got sick has probably everything thing to do with this, i feel I might be creating a sleep monster. She wakes up from the hours of 12am to 4am (screaming bloody murder, that we have gotten complaints from our neighbors several times) we call those her witching hours because she did the same as a little baby but it was a little easier to handle because I could soothe her by breast feeding her, however now she will just scream till she starts coughing then she will cough dramatically till she almost pukes and I literally have to wake her completely up (which ends up turning into a dramatic ordeal) to get her to calm down.
She will then ask for a drink and I will tell her after your drink it’s time for sleep and she will say ok sleep! Then we will be ok for about 30 to 45 mins and will be back at it again and again, because of this she ends up sleeping till 1030- 11 am which throws her nap time back till like 4pm 5pm even sometimes 6pm or she wont even take a nap. The drink I use as a bribe to get her to go back to sleep, but if I try to stand firm and not give her another.drink she will scream so loud and so forcefully her entire body goes stiff like a board and its 2 am and it not only effects me but people In my building because she wakes them up as well she sleeps in my bed because she wont sleep in her bed anymore which is something else that started when she turned 2… I hope I’m not creating permanent sleeping patterns like her insisting on 15 drinks every 30 mins through the night.
Getting interrupted sleep through the entire night is draining me and her as well she wakes up looking so tired and I so badly just want us to sleep through an entire night please help!!!!!
Janelle Reid says
Hi @Shayla Bronson, I’m so sorry to hear you’ve been struggling with your daughter’s sleep. I’m sure it’s extra stressful knowing the people in your building are getting annoyed over it (I wish they’d give you a break on that!). Hang in there! We would love to help. First off, you may want to read through our free guide with tips to help with toddler sleep challenges: https://www.babysleepsite.com/toddler-sleep-tips You may find though, that the article is not specific enough for your situation, so what I’d really recommend is working with one of our sleep consultants who can help walk you through this step by step. Maybe with a plan you can leave your neighbors little notes with ear plugs and a “Thank you for your patience!” note and let them know you have a plan in action and hope to see improvement soon. 🙂 Here is a link to the options of working with our sleep consulting team: https://www.babysleepsite.com/baby-toddler-sleep-consulting-services/
I know there’s a lot of options on there so if you have questions or feel you’d like a more in-between option, let us know! We have a ton of resources to work with a wide range of budgets so contact us directly at [email protected] if you need! I hope this helps.
Nicole Caballero says
Hello, my daughter is 25 months old. She was sleep trained, gerber method.She has slept through the night most of her time being 1 years old, she did get am 18 month old regression but it lasted only about a week. Now at 25m she wakes up multiple times a night. After midnight to 1am she wakes up every 20-45minutes until 7am. This has been going on for 3 weeks now.
-She’s not teething, I keep checking
-we tried to change her white noise to lullaby music
-we bought a soft mattress topper
-we bought essential oils
-we tried cutting her nap
-we tried bringing back her nap but just for 1 hour instead of two.
-researching she may not be ready to cut her nap since she naps so easily and has an easier day.
– we tried changing her milk to non dairy
– tried giving her her favorite stuffed animal to sleep with
-tried buying a new duvet cover
Please give me some tips, thank you
Janelle Reid says
Hi @Nicole Caballero, thanks for writing to us. I’m so sorry that you have suddenly been struggling with your daughter’s sleep! It sounds like you’re certainly doing your research, and I’d agree that it’s likely too early to drop the nap just yet, most children drop it between 3-4 years. Here is a link to download a guide for toddler sleep tips: https://www.babysleepsite.com/toddler-sleep-tips
This is definitely a more challenging age than when they were little since they have more opinions and the ability to let you know about them. If you find you need more help, let us know. We have a variety of other resources from ebooks all the way to one-on-one personalize sleep consulting that can help. For more information on our resources please feel free to contact us directly anytime at [email protected]. Hang in there!
Holly says
My almost 22 month has had a cold for a little over a week. Since then, he’s been having a terrible time going to sleep. Usually myself or my husband has to sit with him until he falls asleep. Sometimes for hours. We have an 8 week old baby too so it makes it tricky to do this! If we don’t he sobs and can really work himself into a panic. Any suggestions?
Danielle says
Hi Holly,
Thank you for using The Baby Sleep Site as a resource. I’m sorry to hear your son is having such trouble falling asleep with his cold! If you haven’t yet, you might want to check in with your pediatrician about the possibility of an ear infection, or another complication that could be making it harder for him to fall asleep. In general, we recommend supporting a baby through the illness, but doing as little as you can additional to your usual routine, to prevent him from forming new sleep associations. We have an article on handling illness here: https://www.babysleepsite.com/baby-sleep-needs/how-illness-affects-baby-toddler-sleep/
Otherwise, doing something like checking in on him, and promising to come back in 10 minutes (and actually coming back), can sometimes be a good way to help a child understand that you can’t sit with him, but you will make sure he’s okay 🙂 Hope this helps, and that he feels better soon!
Val says
Hi !
My 14 month old has been on a refusal of naps for about a week now she’ll fall asleep and wake up 20 minutes later which is unlike her. She’ll wake up suddenly crying her eyes out at night not sure why. This is really messing with our day to day schedule!
Danielle says
Hi Val,
Thanks for your comment! Sorry to hear you’re dealing with nap refusal – that is definitely one of the toughest things! If she’s definitely healthy, and you’ve ruled issues like an ear infection, you may be looking at a nap transition (depending on her current schedule). They often present like this. We have an article on nap transitions to help here: https://www.babysleepsite.com/baby-naps-2/how-to-manage-baby-toddler-nap-transitions/
At this age, things like growth spurts and teething can also still throw off naps, but these usually resolve within 2 weeks. If you’re still having trouble after that time, and don’t think it’s a nap transition, please write us at [email protected] – we’d be happy to offer more resources!