My 23 Month Old Does Not Want to Go to Bed

Put her in bed, walk out.

When she gets back up, put her in bed and say "It's bedtime. Stay in bed." and walk out (even if she is crying) closing the door behind you.

When she gets up again, put her in bed and say "Stay in bed." and walk out. Close the door.

If she gets up again, say nothing and put her back in bed. Walk out and shut the door.

Keep putting her in there and walking out without saying a word to her. Don't give her any attention (even negative attention is enough to keep some kids going).

You may have a few difficult nights but if you are consistent and keep your cool there will be improvement.

Do this at naptime as well.

Best Wishes!

E.

She's going into the terrible twos - she's going to start testing you on every single issue, if she hasn't already. Your only hope is to stay strong, Mommy! Do NOT be drawn into an argument with a 2 year old! It's a slippery slope!

My advice is that you stick to your usual routine for bedtime (bath, story, whatever). (I don't know what her bedtime is, but you might want to even make it a little earlier, before she gets TOO tired and cranky.) When it's time for bed, put her in bed. If she cries a little, let her. If she climbs out of bed, quickly put her back in bed (interact as little as possible while doing this). Point is, do not let her "win" by letting her out of her room, into your bed, stay up with the grown-ups, etc. It's bedtime and she needs to be in bed, period.

If she hasn't started doing this already, she will probably think of new and creative ways to postpone bedtime - thirsty, hungry, wants to give Daddy one more hug, wants another story, etc. Don't be fooled - your darling child knows exactly what she's doing here! Just be firm about your routine and within a week or two she will stop fighting bedtime so much because she will realize that it is not negotiable, and that what you say, goes.

I know that sounds kind of harsh, but really it's not. Kids actually do love to have a set of rules to follow, and in my humble opinion, bedtime is the one thing that will set a young child up for success. They have no hope of having a good day if they didn't get a good night's sleep. Stay the course, and good luck!

Hi A.!

Toddlers at this age can be so hard!

First of all though, I have never experienced any of my kids "pretending" to be frightened about something in the middle of the night. If they came out of their rooms scared, then it was real. I think that she is genuinely scared of something. Have you laid in her room to "spy" and see what she see's when she's in her bed? There could be a noise, a shadow, or something that truly does scare her.

It's probably mostly because of a new baby in the home :o) At 4 months old, your son is probably getting the bulk of your attention. Your daughter's age combined with the adjustment of having a new baby in the house are very hard for everyone.

Your daughter simply just needs you to make her feel that she's just as important as the baby :o) It sounds like a good place to start with her, is at her bedtime :o)

I hope it all works out soon :o)

:o) N.

A.,

I think her "all of a sudden" is a reaction to her new brother. Get her involved with his activities when ever possible. "Could you help mommy and hand me brother's diaper?” "Let's put brother down for a nap?” "We need to be very quiet so he can sleep." “You’re such a good Big Sister.”

Talk to her about staying in bed before she goes down. Get all the preliminaries done (drink of water, potty, story etc.) Remind her before you leave the room…”No getting out of bed without permission.” “Good night Big Sister”, see you in the morning.

We had the same problem with our little girl. She would NOT stay in her bed at first. What worked for us, was we told her she had to stay in her bed, said our goodnights, and left, leaving the door open slightly. She of course immediately got up, we escorted her back and did it again. The first 2 or 3 times we told her good night and explained that she needed to sleep in her bed. After that, we just kept taking her back to bed but didn't keep talking to her about it, just helped her into the bed. Now, not to scare you but this lasted for 4 hours for her. She is amazingly stubborn, and still is, (she's 3 now). But I have to say, even though we were in for a long marathon, it worked! From then on she stayed in her bed. Oh, if she's acting scared, I would make sure she has a night light. Good luck! Since you have a baby too, I would bring in reinforcements :-)

Oh my, I could never imagine ignoring my child when she needs me. Your child is actually acting completely naturally. Historically, two year olds would never have made it past toddlerhood if they slept physically separated from their parents at night. It's normal for her to feel frightened and stressed about being apart from you, especially with the new added stress of another child in the home.

You can teach her that you won't respond to her fears and her feelings (by locking her in her room, ignoring her, etc), and it's true that after a while she'll learn that she might as well stop asking you to. So it will 'work' in the sense that she won't bother reaching out for your comfort and reassurance when she's frightened and unsure.

Or you can just be more available to her, more responsive to her, and reinforce her trust that you will always be there to help her and to guide her during difficult times.

My sister has one of those zipper tent things that goes over the crib so her son can't get out and wander around. It unzips from the outside. Maybe that would work to at least keep her contained, though I can't say about the fit. My daughter is very strong willed as well so I've just had to learn to outlast her. Good luck, C.

about 2 weeks ago i posted almost the same question. most people said just be strong and within a week my child will be going to bed easily and and staying asleep. i can tel you i has 3 weeks of 2 hour fits at bedtime and 2 hour fits at 3am. it was very very hard. then one day it just stopped. i don't know what changed. but i did stick to my guns. every time he got out of bed i put him back, sometimes with a swat on the behind. my mom and fiance live in the same home with us, we all took turns doing the same process which let him know the rules are the rules no matter who comes into the room. i did have to leave his door open because he kicked it and that just wasn't worth the fight to me. my son is very strong willed so i also bought book titled parenting the strong willed child. this has helped us through the day as well. good luck. i think the most important thing to do is to be consistant no matter how long it takes and nothing works or every child. keep trying different variations until you find what works!

I have two boys at about the same age split as yours and the same thing happened to me. I understand it is common for a previously sleep-trained baby to start sleeping badly at around two. Here's what I did. For a year-and-a-half I tried every trick in the books: reward charts, bigger rewards, rewards + taking toys away, staying in the room until he fell asleep, backing out of the room a little more each nigh, involving his teacher who would say she was so proud of him when he slept well... we have always had a bedtime routine that we stick to : milk + books+teeth then bed. Then I tried the Super Nannie trick of marching the kid back into the room without saying a word. I would do that 40 times at bedtime then another 20 times in the middle of the night for weeks. Eventually I talked to a cousin who I consider very knowledgeable about all things parenting and who's husband is a therapist who works with children and they said "Lock the door" This was shocking to me at first. But I finally had to do something drastic.

On the first night with the door locked my 3-and-a-half year old climbed into his brother's crib (we had taken the baby out of the room just to be safe) and fell asleep without saying a word. The second night he tried the doorknob a few times and then went back to sleep in his own bed. The third night he said that if we left the door open he would stay in his bed, and he did.

Oh my goodness,I am having exactly the same problem.my daughter is almost 23 months and we have another girl,5 months old.my older wakes up in the morning hours and screams until I go into her room.she IS tired and at first I thought there are more teeth coming in but now that I've read all these answers I can c it's not just me having this issue.I am so relieved.was about to through in the towel :0(