Transcript: Naps!
 

Hi!
Welcome to the Us And Kids Podcast. I am your host, Jan Talen. I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist, a wife, a mom, and a grandma. This Us And Kids podcast is about how to be married forever while you parent together. Even if one of you likes to nap and the other one does not. 'Cause, you know, even the little things are not always easy things.

And so I encourage you to subscribe toUs And Kids in your favorite podcasting app, that way, every week or every other week, you'll get a little boost that will keep you both on track. It will give you some good things to talk about and help you both with your parenting and with your marriage at the same time.  When you listen you help both your marriage and your home life to be fulfilling and so very, very good.

And you're right today, we're going to talk about napping. Now you can have all sorts of different emotional reactions around this, like, “Oh, I'd love to nap!”, or “They always nap way too long”, or “That kid who of mine does not know how to take a nap!”

You can go all over the place with napping conversations. So today we're just going to talk a little bit, mostly from a general place, because napping is good for kiddos. It's often also good for adults. It helps us relax. It often reducesstress and some fatigue.

I am rather unusual, I think in some ways, because I can take a three minute nap. I can take a seven minute nap. I can take a 15 minute nap. I rarely feel like I have the time, but I also can take a two hour nap. 

Napping provides a little bit of space for relaxing. It gives us permission to check out, which gives our body and our brain and our hormones room to reset. As we nap, it also reduces the fatigue, not just the physical fatigue, but also that mental fatigue of, "I can't make another decision"... And, “ I'm not sure what decisions I just made, but I'm not sure they were great.” 
Even a little, tiny nap, like my three minute nap, (which means that I probably have gone into the bathroom or into a personal space) helps me to unwind and reset. I just put my head down in my hands for a few minutes and close my eyes. Roll my eyeballs around a little bit, take some low, slow, deep breaths and clear my brain.  This lets the hormones, the stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline settle out so that I can think again. When that happens, then of course I am more relaxed and in a better mood. 
And usually if my mood is better than I feel like I'm a little more efficient, I'm just remembering what to do. I'm able to carry it through without going, "Why did I walk in that room again? What was I going to do? Oh, shoot. Where are my keys?"

When we're rested and we get rid of some of that cortisol and adrenaline, it allows the dopamine, the norepinephrine and the serotonin and the melatonin to work together in order to keep that electrical circuitry running clearly and smoothly.

This is true for adults. It's also true for kiddos. You and I know that, for your kiddos, there can often be a witching hour, or a witching, magical moment. It means that if we push the nap past 11:20am (or whatever magical time your kiddo has), that the glorious two and a half, three hour afternoon nap of that young toddler won't happen.
And then we learn that there are just little windows of time for our kiddos where their circadian rhythm is in just the right place to tuck them in bed. And if we're wise, and we have control over the schedule in some way or another, we work to make sure that we take advantage of that sleeping space so that your kiddo, along with you perhaps can relax, and be rejuvenated.

Are there drawbacks to napping?
Well, some people would say so because they are not getting anything done when they’re napping. So they believe they are better off just pushing through the fatigue. And, sometimes it's true.
And for some people they say, no, I can't nap during the day, I won't sleep at night. If those approaches are true for you, then hang on to what you know, because napping is an optional behavior.

Sleeping at night is the more important behavioral choice for mental health, for mood stability, and for relationship growth, because napping can have some negative spaces. 

For some people, they will say that they need at least 20 minutes, after a nap, to really wake up.  So now, a 20 minute nap is a 40 minute process and that can impact how your daily schedule is arranged.
I have a little grandson (about 3 ½ years old) who I see on Mondays. When rest time is almost done, I go upstairs, and if he has fallen asleep,  my wisest choice is to open the door, say, “Hey, we're going to go get the kids from school pretty quick.” And then I walk away because he is going to pull his blankie over his head and curl back up. He needs a few minutes, but now I can go in the next room where the little baby is sleeping and I can slowly turn on the light and begin to pack up her things for going home. So I slowly put the things we’ve unpacked back in the backpack as she slowly wakes up from her nap, because she's quite happily snuggled in as well.  

The Mom for the little baby is all good with her little one’s nap times. The Mom with the little 3  ½  year old asks me to not let him sleep too long because he's not going to go to sleep at night. And this is true for kiddos. It's also true for us adults, that sometimes how long we nap and when we nap can impact our nighttime sleep routine.  So it is often wise to know how to best manage the daytime so that you can know when your kiddos should be sleeping or be waking up.
I don't feel real bad that I'm waking up my 3 ½  year old grandson because I know he really wants to sleep at night and he just got relaxed enough during quiet time to just fall asleep with his blankie. In 10 minutes or so he is pretty much waking up and ready to go and get his cousin from daycare. He's eager to do that. And so he'll wake up when I say, “Come on, let’s go to school, let's go get the kids!”

How do I know when to nap or when to not nap? And some of that is for you and for your kiddos to know their bodies, to know your body. Sometimes we can feel a cold coming on, or we can feel that the day has been emotionally very heavy and often that can create this new fatigue and can make us sleepy. It's part of our brain and our bodies saying, “There's so much coming in at me I can't figure it all out and I need to reset." And in that resetting often a nap is not a bad idea. 
It's not a bad idea to consider a nap when you're overwhelmed, because it gets you out of the way and lets your body naturally do the reset that it needs. I usually take a nap as a part of my daily routine. Now it might be a five minute nap, but what I know is that it clears my brain and boosts me into the next section of the day.  It may not work for you, but I know that it works for me.

Some people will say I don't take a nap, but I can still feel that I need that boost. Sooften a walk outside or doing something mundane (or fun) for 15-20 minutes will also help your brain reset.  Do whatever you think you need in terms of being able to boost up your energy and help your brain and your emotions work well together to make it to the end of the day. It is a good idea.

Some people will say, I need a protein snack somewhere mid morning and mid afternoon. I'm sort of hoping that you aren't thinking that you would prefer pot, alcohol or cigarettes for that mid-day boost! Those are not your healthiest choices. I realized they can be your now and then choices, but really let's look at this in a way that shows our kids and helps our kids and us be our best, available and present selves.  This could mean that you make the ability to reset a part of the day and an accepted space to be in.

So now you're definitely wondering, “What's the best way to take a nap? I've never been a nap taker. Oh, what's the best way to do this? Maybe I want to try.” Here you go.
A few little tips. This is more for adults than for kiddos because kiddos are busy growing and resetting their brains and absorbing way more things than we are.  So this is more for adults.
Keep your nap short, the longer you nap, the more likely you have missed the circadian rhythm closing part of your sleep cycles. And you're going to feel groggy.
10 to 20 minutes is often a really smart timeframe.
It's possible that kiddos want to sleep longer, of course. And it's possible that our teenagers will like longer naps. They also are doing a lot of growing and a lot of brain rework, and that happens when they sleep. 

When should you nap? We would probably say, for most of us in the Americas, before 3:00 PM. The Circadian patterns that regulate your hormones and brain energy to be awake or asleep are going to be confused if you sleep much past 3pm because they don't know when to turn your brain down when it comes to a more normal nighttime sleep pattern that is intended to be very restorative and restful

Napping is usually best done in a quiet and fairly dark space. That doesn't always work, but sometimes ear plugs, sometimes a face mask to cover your eyes can help when there is other activity around. For me, I often told my kids, “I am taking a seven minute nap.” And this is in the days of windup timers, so they could hear it go click, click, click. They could see when it was approaching zero and they knew not to wake up mom, unless there is blood that requires more than a Band-Aid and a fire. We never had to use a Band-Aid while I was taking my short nips and we never had a fire, but the instructions were, “Don't wake me up!”   I was going to be asleep for seven minutes and usually I had set the kids up for success during these 7 minutes with their books, or legos and other individual, quiet play things.  Of course, I didn't do this when the toddlers were running around, I did this when the toddlers were sleeping. My 7,10 and 12 year olds could manage my short nap. And it made me a better mom.

When I was at my better/best mom space, it helped my kids be better kids. Remember that our kids are going to follow us. And if we are crabby and sort of just off kilter, because we are too tired, we end up  misbehaving as adults. We're too loud. We're too short. We're too rude with our kids. They then learn that when they're tired, they can behave the same.  And wonder why we are crabby about their behavior when, a few hours ago, we gave them the “I’m just tired” excuse.  Work to give them a composed and desirable model to copy.  By taking a few minutes to rest your own body and mind you demonstrate to your kiddos as well, that taking good care of themselves is an important thing to do. And it's important for the relationships around you.

I'm sure by now you're thinking about what lullabies you can find and what kind of soft music you'd like to play, and that maybe it's rest time..because we have been talking about sleeping so much, that maybe, now...you are tired!  So a few final thoughts...

Encourage your kiddos, and your spouse in the house with you to take good care of yourself. Our brains work best when they're awake.
Work to help each other with good food, with good sleep habits and patterns, and with calmness within your house.
I'm cheering for you.
I want to encourage you to take a look at the Us and Kids website because our Us And Kids Communication Program is up and ready for your perusal, but also for your purchase. It will be the most effective and efficient way to grow both your marriage and your parenting skills at the same time.  It is worth your look, worth the effort.

If you have questions about it, of course you can email me at [email protected] and I'll be the one to reply to your email and help you understand and see once if that program is a good fit for you.
Once again, always pleased that you stopped by for a few minutes to pick up this podcast and incorporate part of it into your life.

I'm cheering for you and hoping that your November is full of great fall colors and great fall fun!

We'll talk soon.