My daughter is 13 months old. She has always been a great sleeper, usually sleeping 11-12 hours each night. For the past two weeks, she’s been getting up randomly, at various times throughout the night, calling for “Mama.” She’s doesn’t cry, as long as I come into her room. When I walk in the room, she begins to laugh and jump in excitement. She doesn’t appear to be in pain, but wants to play. I’ve been taking her out of her crib, letting her play on the floor for about 15-20 minutes, then she seems ready to go back to sleep. I don’t engage with her, talk with her or turn the light on. Obviously, I’d like to deal with the root cause of why she’s waking up and get her back into the habit of sleeping through the night. I’m not a huge fan of crying it out, but I don’t want to create or support bad habits. Any thoughts/tips would be much appreciated.
Hi A.,
You may want to stop taking her out of her crib and letting her play; she's being rewarded for getting up in the middle of th night. If she wakes; its up to her to go back to sleep; you have to ignore it. Any response from you will just encourage the getting up. When she realizes that its not working any more she should stop
I agree with the other advice here. Make sure she has his teddy or something to sleep with, and when she wakes up, let her play with her own toy in her own crib - don't go in and get her up. According to the book "On Becoming Babywise," babies will frequently wake up and talk to themselves or play for up to 45 minutes in the middle of the night before going back to sleep.
If she is crying and calling for you, give her a few minutes to try to put herself to sleep. I'm not a fan of letting my son cry-it-out either (certainly not to the extent that "Babywise" recommends), but sometimes that is the only way to teach them! So I set a time-limit. I let my son cry-it-out for no more than 10 minutes, beginning when he starts to seriously scream (not when he begins to whimper). Sometimes I give in a little earlier, but I try not to go in before 5 minutes are up, so that he has a chance to try to put himself back to sleep - and sometimes he does. This will probably get worse for a couple of days before it gets better, because you have been letting her out to play and when she doesn't get the reaction she expects, she may raise it up a notch. Good luck!
Hey A.,
You might check her for pin worms. It is gross, but they come out at night along the anus, and they itch. If often wakes kids who otherwise are good sleepers, and they don't know why. Ask your doctor about how to check.
M.
Hi A. I read a book not to long ago and it said to ignore them, if you even go in she will see that she got your attention and it will continue. It won't hurt her to cry a little and if she has her favorite lovie with her she will probably go right back to sleep. My granddaughters lovie is simply a 12"X12" piece of soft material that she sleeps with. It even has a little printed on decal on the corner.
By going in and letting her play outside of her crib, you are reinforcing her behavior. Let her go, she is fine in her crib. My son does this periodically. He will wake up and "party" for anywhere from 1-2 hours and go back to sleep. He sings, plays with his dog and turns on his rainforest. I let him go. Sometimes he cries a bit before falling back to sleep, but he does. It does seem that these incidents conincide with new teeth.
Take it from a mom who went WAY too long catering to middle of the night wims; you need to preserve your own sleep cycle and hers. She needs to learn how to put herself back to sleep without you coming in at all. She will learn how on her own but if you go in and help her she will continue to need you. SELF SOOTH very important!
You should enforce that night-time is for sleeping not for playing and talking. When she wakes up and calls for you, go to her and ask if she's ok, offer her water, check her diaper and put her back in her bed. Keep it quiet, turn on only as much light as you need. Eventually she will stop. Good luck
It stinks you actually took her out and let her play because now she's learned that she's allowed to do it and it is going to be a few difficult power struggles between you and her before she learns that the behavior is no longer acceptable. You're going to have to let her get mad and cry it out because she's going to try to find out how loud she has to scream and cry before you let her get out and play again. Every child will wake their parents up in the middle of the night if they're allowed to. At that age I completely promote the cry it out method. If you're not willing to do that, it's going to be much harder. My daughter didn't stop waking up at night until I finally let her cry it out. I'd tried everything else, going in and rubbing her back, turning on her musical aquarium, laying her down over and over, nothing worked. She definitely tried her hardest to get me to come into the room the first night I decided to try letting her cry it out, but 3 nights later she was sleeping the whole night through.
