Naptime Poop

Many of my friends have told me that their toddlers (who are the same age as Ryan) have started to give up their naps. If I'm being completely honest, I look forward to naptime every day! I can use the down time and Ryan can use the rest. Last week we had two days where we went through our normal morning routines, classes, and trying to tire Ryan out. When it was time for nap, I put him down and listened to him talk on the monitor for almost two hours. He was not getting tired, and I feared that this could be the start of giving up the nap. He began to whine, so I thought oh well, might as well let him get up. I walked in his room to find him standing up in his crib. The first thing he said to me was, "Mommy, I need a wipe!" I know he is obsessed with washing his hands, but at naptime, really? I asked him why, and he pointed to his sheet and said there were "yuckys" in his bed. I looked closely at a brown smeared mark on his sheet and immediately knew it was poop. I asked him if he had pooped, to which he replied, "Yes!" I took him out of the crib, washed his hands, put him in a clean diaper, changed the sheet, and back to bed he went. He napped for an hour after that. When he woke up we had a nice discussion about pooping. I told him, "Ryan, if you go poop while trying to take a nap, you yell to mommy and say I have a poop." "You are not allowed to put your hands in your diaper to touch your poop, that is yucky." Now, all I have to say to him is,"What are the rules about the diaper?" He says," No hands in the diaper!"

I am so relieved that he is not ready to give up his naps. We are VERY lucky that he will still take three hour naps most days. How do I know that he is not ready to give up his afternoon nap? He told me today, "Mommy, I tired, I need to take a nap." I put him in his crib and he was asleep 10 minutes later.