HELP! My 2 1/2 year old son does not like to stay in bed. We have had a bedtime routine in place since he was 1 year old. Storytime in bed with mom and dad followed by our "ride" into his bed and then we tuck him in and say a prayer. After we leave the room that's when his games begin. He will get out of bed endless times as we continue to return him silently to bed with no contact at all. He can do this for over an hour. Meanwhile, mom and dad are getting more and more exhausted. We start at 8:00pm and sometimes do not get him to stay in bed until after 10pm. Then after sleeping for half the night, our son will get out of bed in the middle of the night, somewhere around 2-4am and then we start with the return to bed again. It usually ends with his door being closed so we can finally get some rest. I am exhausted. We have tried this technique of the "silent return to bed" almost 8 months and it has not improved. I don't know what else to do. Everyone says not to lock him in the room and we have tried taking his toys or stuffed animals away but he doesn't care about that, he continues his game of returning to bed. Any suggestions or advice will be greatly appreciated. I am about to call Supernanny to help me so I can get some sleep. Thank you!
Thank you to everyone for all the advice and between all of it hopefully we can start to end this cycle. There are many good ideas and I hope something starts to change.
I know how that is....I have a 3 year old that dont stay in her bed either.....all i do is keep putting her in her bed and tell her that mommy has her own bed and you have your own bed. Big girls stay in there own bed...so as like you im still working on it but that is what I keep doing.
We had the same problem with our son and I know this may sound weird but we turned the doorknob around so it locked on the outside, and we would lock him in for the first 30 min. After he tries the door a few times and can't get out he will stop trying. Then you can unlock the door, just in case he needs to get out. It also helps to have the house quiet for 30 min after you put him in there that way he doesn't think he's missing anything. You may want to try reading him his bedtime stories in his bed that way there is no transfer for him to get worked up over. And from expeirence......sometimes nothing works. If you really want to sleep through the night, make sure there is nothing in his room that he can hurt himself with and just leave the door locked. My son used to stay up until midnight reading books, even though all the lights were out he would pull back the curtains and use the street lamp. There is no harm in them staying up late as long as you get some sleep, so just lock the door and let God take over for 8 hrs.
Good luck,
A.
When my oldest was 2 I had the same problem with her. I had started out putting her to bed at 9pm, but when she continued to get up and down, which would last for up to 2 hours, I decided to start bedtime an hour early. We tried that for about 6 weeks and was still having the same problem. So I tried an hour earlier. It finally got to the point I was putting her in the bed at 7pm and she was usually asleep by 9pm. After about 4 months of this she began going straight to sleep. As far as the getting up in the middle of the night, she never done that. But we had a baby gate up just in case she tried it!
It might be time to cut out the daytime naps if he still takes any, and if not, you may want to have a sleep study done on him. I'm having the same problem with my daughter who is three-we're going next week to St. Vincent's Rehabilitation Center. The number is ###-###-#### for the pediatric sleep disorders center and the email is ____@____.com
I would suggest getting a baby gate and putting that on his room. That's what I've had to do with my daughter. Did you recently take him out of his crib or has he been in the toddler bed for a while? Did he start doing this right after you switched him from the crib? If so, maybe he wasn't ready for the freedom of a toddler bed yet.
The only other suggestion I can offer is for you to sit on his bed with him until he falls asleep, stroking his hair, singing to him or putting on a nighttime cd. Or you could offer to let him look at books while he's laying down-I do that with my daughter and she will fall asleep "reading" to herself.
I have to lay down with my daughter most nights until she falls asleep-or else I leave a small sippy cup of water next to her bed and put the gate up, and she will eventually fall asleep, either in her bed or on the floor next to the gate and then I will go put her in bed once she's sound asleep.
I hope that something I've offered will be of help to you. I know how exhausting it can be. Take care and God bless.
Happy Valentine's Day! :)
~N.
My 2-year and 5-year old share a bedroom and we've had a similar problem for ages. I've found that simply ignoring them as long as they are quietly playing does the trick. I ignore them and most nights they play for an hour or so then climb up into their beds and sleep through the night. My philosophy is that as long as their not running around the room screaming it doesn't hurt anything, the room's dark (except for a night light) and if the older one crashes the baby usually follows suit pretty quickly. They are finally reaching an age where they don't party nearly as long, most nights we're down to about 15 minutes. So with your son try just ignoring him as long as he's staying in his room and being quiet and see how it goes for a couple of nights - if he's doing this for attention he'll stop pretty quick if you're completely ignoring him.
continue with your normal bed time routine. but put a baby gate across the door to his room...some kids get freaked out if they feel "trapped" by a closed door(plus it's a little safer in case of a fire). if he gets up, go to himonce and tell him to get back in bed, then do not go back. if he continues to get up, just ignore him(evenif you are not speaking to him when you put him back to bed, he is still getting what he wants...your attention). the worstthing that will happen is he cries himself to sleep on the floor a couple on nights. he'll eventually figure out that when you say night night you mean business and he'll start going to sleep and staying there.
Is he still taking naps during the day? My daughter did this till we did away with the afternoon naps. If you have to have nap time for yourself or to keep him from being too cranky, then shorten it from 2 hrs to one. My daughter quit taking naps at 18 months. I know it is hard, but sleeping through the night is better. Now she will sleep 12 hours through the night with only the occasional waking to go potty and then straight back to bed with no complaints. She is now three.
