Toddler Sleep Troubles

My son is 2 years old, too. We have had him in a toddler bed since he was 18mo. It's not easy at all!! Although, the other day my husband and I bought him one of those push lights that you put up on the wall. We put velcro on the back and on the wall close to where my son's head is when he lays down. We showed my son that he is able to push the light on and off by himself, he liked that. I also bought him a glow worm that lights up and plays songs. Those do help!! I can't promise that he won't come to your room at night, but for me it does cut down on him running to my room like 10 times a night. Now, it's like 3 or 4 times. Sometimes, he will go right to sleep. Hang in there mom...Good Luck!

Ooooh, A., I feel your pain! Its SO stressful to go night after night without sleep, we went FOUR years like that. I too spent many nights sleeping on the floor, and if I DID get to my bed, she'd come get me two or three times per night. It was SO frustrating, I was mad at everyone, my back hurt, I was too tired to do anything about it.

I think you're right, its getting him to put himself to sleep that is the issue here. if you can get that resolved, the night awakenings will likely resolve too.

Here's what I did, its from "Raising Your Spirited Child" by Mary Sheedy Kurchinka (some of the best parenting advice I've ever read, whether your child is "Spirited" or not). It took a few weeks, but the method in there worked great, no crying! We sleep through the night, all in our own beds. Everyone is happier, especially me!

1. Its already been said that its important to have a set bedtime routine. Make sure its something you don't mind doing for YEARS. Keep the routine calm but pleasant for everyone.

2. Once your child is in his bed, keep him calm, no tickling, wrestling, etc. His bed is FOR SLEEPING. (e.g. be boring)

3. But go ahead and stay with him until he is sleepy. This is your time to talk, connect with him, share about your day, cuddle. you said you work alot, so he might be using the nighttime to connect with you. So don't scrimp on this time with him.

4. Here's where you make a change: He needs to practice being alone. So during this connect and cuddle time, You need to make up an excuse to leave the room for a few seconds. ("Mommy has to go potty", "Mommy needs to feed the cat real quick" "Mommy needs a kleenex", "Mommy needs to get your teddy bear") Tell him you will be right back. Leave. Come right back. The first time, just leave for few seconds or so. If he cries a tiny bit, that's OK, but you don't want a full blown cry - that's not sleep inducing!

Then gradually, over a period of weeks, increase the time you are gone. And one miraculous night (sooner than you'll expect) you will come back and he will have fallen asleep all by himself! And once he can fall asleep on his own , he will better equipped to GO BACK TO SLEEP on his own.

By leaving and coming back, you are letting him PRACTICE being alone, and also reinforcing that you will always come back for him. He will learn that its OK to be alone at night, and still feel safe and loved.

The book said it works with babies too (wish I'd have read it four years ago...).

I should also tell you that we "lost" her pacifier during this time. (well I cut one, and the other one genuinely got lost that same day). I think it was contributing to the awakenings.

The process took about 3 weeks with my two year old. It seemed like a long time then, but I'm glad we did it this way.
Best of luck to you, let us know how it turns out.

I have triplets. They are 2 1/2 years old and we are also getting ready to transition to toddler beds. When we transitioned from being rocked to sleep, I used the Super Nanny technique. We would do the same routine every night. When I said "good night" to them I would lay them down with their lovie (stuffed animal) and then I sat by their bed, looking at the floor, and out of their reach. The important thing was not to make eye contact with them but at the same time they could see that I was in the room. The first couple of nights were very hard as they stood in the bed and cried out for me for about 30 minutes but each night was a little better than the night before. Then once they got use to just laying there until they fell asleep then I would sit a little further away from them until eventually I was sitting outside the door. Now our bedtime routine goes so smoothly most nights and I am able to put them to bed and turn and walk out of the room and have some time to myself. I plan on using the same technique if needed when I transition them to the toddler bed.

When he wakes up in the middle of the night, take him back to bed and lay him down, only say "good night" or nothing at all because talking to him is only going to stimulate him and make it harder to go back to sleep. You may still have to sit by his bed until you get him use to falling asleep by himself. When my girls wake-up in the middle of the night either because they hit their head on the side rail or they are tangled in their blankets, I go into their room and lay them down, tell them it is still night-night time and walk out of the room and they go back to sleep, but it took time before we got to this point.

I am also a working mom, but I can say that all the hard work I put into the techniques mentioned above were worth it. For the couple of weeks of long nights and listening to the screaming I am grateful now that I took the time to do it. I was very exhausted initially but now I get to sleep through the night and if I have to get up to tend to one of them I only have to be up for a few minutes and then I go straight back to sleep. It is a lot of hard work but well worth it.

I hope this helps and I would love to hear what worked so that when I start the transition I will have an idea how to get started.

Good Morning A.,

I feel your pain! I wasn't too successful with the toddler years. I ended up letting our daughter sleep with us because I was just too exhausted...

Sometimes, though - rewards seem to help. It's a tough age, but sometimes you can use rewards (bribery) to get the job done!

Good luck to you!

L.

Is there any way that you can hold out until Spring Break, when you can start the process over again? If not can you take a Friday and a Monday off? When you do this, instead of laying on the floor or anywhere with him maybe he can go with you to pick out a big boy night light. Spend a day or two (before you start) talking about how the night light will be plugged in and turned on and how you and his father expect him as a big boy to go to sleep in his own bed all by himself and to stay there. Allow him to talk about his feelings/fears with this. Hear him but also try to get him excited about the night light and being a big boy. Perhaps get him a special snuggle bear. Basically on the night of, talk it up all day long - explaining expectation, perhaps pretend playing around nap time turning on the night light and practice laying in his bed all by himself. Then when bedtime arrives, expect the worst! Expect him to get out of bed and then return him to bed only saying good night (and do your best not to sound angry or frustrated despite the fact that you will be). Silently check in every five minutes - this will provide comfort to know that you are still there...as the crying diminishes, extend the checking in times to 7 minutes, 10 minutes...etc until he is sound asleep. Know that you will go through this process for the next few nights - all through the night! Never have a discussion with him...good night is the most I would say.
Some people also say music helps...so maybe you can incorporate soft music if you think that would help. To eliminate the need for a drink let him know he only gets ONE sippie cup that you will leave on the (whatever) next to his bed.

Most importantly while it breaks your heart, know that you are teaching him a fantastic life long skill of self-soothing and then (and I am sure as a second grade teacher you know better than any of us) BE CONSISTENT! That is one of the most important keys.

I don't envy you this task - it brings tears to my eyes thinking of our time when I had to do this with each of my kids. While it felt so unnatural, I knew it was very important!

Good luck and you and your household will be in my thoughts and prayers!

I think it's important to note that your child really needs you to go to sleep right now. He associates you with sleeping. That doesn't mean you have to continue to sleep with him, but he needs new sleep associations. All kids wake up in the night, but you only know about it if he needs you to go back to sleep.
Make sure he has a very set bedtime routine. This is key. If he has a blanket or stuffed animal (the so-called transition object), encourage him to use it to comfort himself.
If you have been lying next to him on the floor of his room, the next step is sitting in a chair next to his bed. No talking, no touching. Try this for a few nights at bedtime--when he's ok with this step, move your chair to the door of the room, then out into the hall. You'll find that eventually he just needs you to say goodnight, or check on him.
Now this will not solve the night awakening issue right away, so usually the best thing to do for this is to escort him back to bed without talking, give him his transitional object, kiss him and go back to bed. (Might try this first on a weekend.) If there's no talking, whining or pleading, he might still be sleepy enough to go back to sleep.
Of course, this is the gentler method--there's always the "cry it out" method, which worked great when my 11 year old was 2. The idea with either method is to make it so that he associates going to sleep with being in his room, in the dark, by himself--his bed, his blanket, etc. I wasn't quite so "mean" to my younger 2, but my 6 year old still needs me to go through the "goodnight sleep tight don't let the bedbugs bite" routine.

In my opinion the only way you are going to completely break him is too let him cry it out. Consistence is the best thing when it comes to this kinda thing. As long as you keep going back in there he is going to keep wanting you too. You need to completely put him on his own and not even lay in there when you first lay him down. Just a suggestion hope it helps.

Well, I wish I had 'value-add' comments to make, but I don't. I am going to keep an eye on this thread for tips and ideas. We transitioned our 2 1/2 year old into his big boy bed in September and nighttime is still a chore. We do have a nightlight and we do talk during the day about 'night nights' and he knows that we are just down the hall - but it is still a huge task getting him to sleep. For a while he woke up all the time during the night - now it is only when he is not feeling well, so that does getting better with time - I suppose. Good luck to you - I know how hard this is. I too work outside the home and some days just feel like a total zoombie between the newborn and the toddler that screams for mommy at night. :)