Can't Seem to Keep 3 Yr Old in Bedroom or Bed at Night

Put him to bed a little bit earlier. Kids sleep better, fall asleep faster, and sleep longer when they go to bed early. My aunt's 4 year old goes to bed at 6:30 at night and sleeps till 7 the next morning. It doesn't work for everyone, my kids are night owls and late sleepers. But I would try moving his bedtime up and see if that helps. Even by 20 or 30 minutes, might make all the difference.

I have a 2 yr old who was booted from her crib into a toddler bed at 20 months due to the arrival of a new baby. After almost 6 months of her being able to get out of bed by herself, we've tried all kinds of things. We started with leaving her door open so she didn't freak that she was in there by herself. We allowed her to be able to come and go between her room and ours as she needed. She would get in bed with us, stay for a little while, and go back to hers eventually. It was like a game to her. I could hear her giggling on her way back to her room. We let this go on for about a week, but by then she was starting to turn on the tv at 4am and that was a little much for me. Then I started to close the door after an hour. I would put her in to bed by 8, leave the door ajar, and then tell her to go back to bed (NICELY and SOFTLY) every time she got up. By 9 she would usually be in there to stay, adn by the time I went to bed I would close the door so she couldn't wander the house while I was sleeping. After a few weeks of that, we just started closing the door when we put her in there. She would come to the door and start to cry adn yell. The first couple nights were the worst! Be prepared for a couple of bad nights just to get things started. I sat at the bedroom door - on the outside so she couldn't see me, and every time she came to the door crying and trying to open it, I CALMLY told her it was "Night-night and time to go to bed. Get back in bed please." The first night this lasted until 11pm. The next night until 10pm. Now I just have to give her a few reminders and it only lasts about 10 minutes - and it's not hysterical crying, just a little whine sometimes. She just needs to be able to hear that I'm still out there, even though she can't see me. As for waking up in the middle of the night, she still does that too. We've had to do the same thing as the night routine. Start slowly with consoling them in their bed, stay for a few minutes, then leave to the outside of the door. Keep reminding them that it is still night and they need to go back to bed. After a few days, they should get it and it should get easier - hopefully. And it is ok for them to cry - they will put themselves back to bed when they are done - they've just gotten themselves into a routine that they know we will come and get them and they get to be awake, watch tv, cuddle. Yeah, you feel loved, but by morning when you're exhausted you're not able to spread the love. :)
Hope this helps.

My 7 year old daughter was just like this. I kept up the normal routine which ended with reading a book, sometimes more than one depending upon the length. I started taking my own book in her room and reading it. When she would get out of bed, I would put her back in without any words about it and then keep reading my own book to myself. I scooted further and further towards the door every night (I would sit on the floor). I guess she learned that she wasn't going to get just what she wanted and that she was going to be put back in bed anyway and as the process went along, she just started staying in bed and eventually falling asleep pretty quickly. It didn't take a week to succeed!

I bought a small boom box at WalMart for my daughter when she was 4. She listens to "Fairy Story" by Shirley Barber every night. (A book on CD). The reader has a very soothing voice and there are light chimes in the background. She falls asleep before the story is even half way done...and I leave it on repeat so it plays throughout the night. It has really helped her to be able to go back to sleep immediately if she wakes up in the middle of the night. (I have even used it myself on sleepless nights!) We tried another CD by the same author with 3 stories on it, but found if you just replay the same one every night, it helps her to fall asleep within 5 to 10 minutes.

My son is a very active four year old, and he started having the same problem about a year ago. What ended up helping him wind-down seemed counter-intuitive at the time, but really did work. At the suggestion of a cousin (who also has two little boys) we extended his bedtime routine to include a short "show" before getting in bed. I have a selection of videos that are 15 minute shows or less (Thomas is a good one because they're only about 5 minutes each, and we also have Blues Clues and Little Einsteins). He loves watching TV, so the new routine was to have a bath, get on jammies, brush teeth, then come to the living room to watch one show of his choice. Laying on the couch watching a quiet, mellow show seemed to help him relax and wind-down, so that when it was over and time for a book and bed he seemed more willing to stay in bed and relax. He isn't always tired when he gets in bed, but he really likes the routine and being able to watch his bed-time show as a reward for getting ready for bed without a tantrum has really worked for him.

There's a great book: Good Night, Sleep Tight by Kim West and Joanne Kenen, if memory serves. It describes in detail a process much like what your poster Susan W talked about, where you move closer and closer to the door each night. Our son was younger than yours when we did it (much older than most of our friends' kids who were sleeping on their own just fine at that point), but it made a HUGE difference very quickly.

The whole bedtime thing has been a long process for us, but we did eventually get to a place where we can do our routine and kiss him goodnight and leave. We go check on him, but now he's often asleep before we even make it in there once. (Believe me, we had to build up to that!)

There's hope! ;)

M.,
We were having the same problem with our 3 year old son. He would be fine throughout the whole bedtime routine and then when it was finally time to put his head down to sleep, there were tears and fussing. We couldn't just let him cry, as he shares a room with his 1 year old brother. We made a sleep chart for him. For every night that he stays in his bed quietly and goes to sleep, he gets a sticker in the morning on his chart, we let him pick out his own stickers. After a certain number of nights,( whatever you think is a good amount, we started with a week) he got to go pick oout a new spiderman action figure, a dream come true for him. When he would start fussing, we would just say, "UH OH I hope you can get a sticker in the morning." That would be enough to settle him down for the night. Good luck, I hope something works soon for you, I know how tiring it is.

I am wondering why you can't just stay with him until he does fall asleep? We are told our kids have to be independent & fall asleep in their own, but why? Even if they "become addicted" which is what many parents fear, they will eventually fall asleep on their own. Most adults can't even "self-soothe" and need someone in the bed with them to fall asleep. Why do we often hold our kids to a different standard? They are only little for such a short time and what a wonderful way to relax and take a break from the world yourself!

M.-
I would suggest that you find him a teddy bear that he really likes or another stuffed animal that is special that he only sleeps with at night, and maybe a special blanket too. Or even go let him pick out new ones that are special nighttime things that he only gets when he goes to sleep like a big boy. My son is four and when he gets grouchy at bedtime we just have to go and find stripey (his little stuffed zebra) and his pooh bear blanket and he goes right to sleep. Also, just remember to be strict with your routine and make sure he knows that when you say it's bedtime, you mean it. Stick to your routine and don't faulter.

M.: I feel your pain. I have a 5 year old son and it was at 3 yrs old that we started having problems with him getting out of bed and in to ours. He was driving me crazy. He still does some nights. He is a night owl. Here is my advice. My son has done much better this past year because I am living in an area where he is getting more physical activity between 3 pm and 8:30 pm. I have two daughters 8 and 9 and it was very disruptive to their sleeping patterns too. Wearing him out was the only thing that seemed to help along with limiting his sugar intake close to bed time. I have also noticed that if he is tired and we do not make it a lights our, but just that he has to be in his bed, reading books, watching a quiet video, etc. He eventually goes to sleep on his own. As for your exhaustion. Take turns being in charge of getting him down. Don't try to do it together or you will both be tired. If you switch it up, at least one of you will be rested. Hope this helps.

We discovered bedtime greatly improved when we began waking our then 3 and 18 month old girls up a half an hour earlier and doing bedtime an hour earlier. I'd experiment with waking him up earlier in the mornings. We learned too that if we put our girls down before they were tired (seemingly pleasant and wide awake, but they'd fall asleep fairly quickly) then bedtime went so much more smooth than if we waited until they were sleepy.

Later as they got older we discovered that a good way to cut out the "stay with me" and calling out for us was to assure the kids that we'd set a timer for 10 minutes and then come check on them again. It cut out the not-so-fun calling out, getting out of bed, and asking for us to stay with them. And 9 times out of 10 they'd fall asleep before we checked on them at that 10 minutes, knowing they were being watched over.

We have a routine similar to yours, and I figured out that when my girls are calling me back in the room and wandering around, that I didn't spend any one on one time with them during the dayand they crave that security of mommy at night. We also started riding bikes and taking walks together in the middle of the day, and started quit time instead of a nap. If our 3 year old naps, she will not fall asleep very easily. We started doing a back scratch after their story and then I say goodnight to their bodies (I gently touch their eyes, nose mouth ears, all the way down to their toes) they love it, and by that time are so sleepy that they just snuggle in and go down. I set up that back scratch with after this it's sleeping time.

We had the same issue with our son and have about the same rotine as you. The only difference is that we have added rocking with mommy for a short while before going to bed. That way he still got to cuddle and we didn't have to lay down with him. Before we started rocking, about 2-3 times per week my husband would have to go lay down with him until he fell asleep. It's been a little over a year since he had this issue and now, even though we still rock most nights, he will go to sleep without it if he has to.