My Son Won't Stay in His Own Bed

Does he have a night light? My son is 4 and as long as he has a night light on then when he wakes up he will just roll over and go back to sleep. What you need to do instead of bribing is to take something precious away. Warn him, that if he gets out of bed he will lose ____ (whatever his favorite item is) and then won't get it back until he stays in his bed. Be firm and it should all work out. Good Luck :)

Wow, you sound just like me! I am also a 27 year old mother of 2 boys, 3 1/2 and 20 months. My oldest has been doing this since around the time he turned 2 years old. He'll go through periods of sleeping the whole night and then months of getting up at least once or twice. A few times he's been up 8 times! I've resorted to about everything: Rewards, taking away his blankie, and sadly some spankings and occasionally benedryl. We never tried letting him sleep on the floor in our room because he's such a habit forming child we were afraid he'd never outgrow it! That did work for my sister though... her daughter did that a few nights and then just stopped getting up at night. I find that the thing that works best is reminding him right before bed that he only gets up to go potty. I'm just hoping eventually he outgrows it! On the nights he gets up too many times for me to handle I send Daddy in, that tends to do the trick. You got a lot of good advice already, I just wanted to let you know you're not alone.

My daughter is 5 and has been doing this for years. We're torn about what to do - we're growing weary of having our sleep disturbed, and I think it's important for her to start dealing with childhood fears, as she will be starting K in the fall.

The sleeping bag on the floor by the bed is an easy solution if you're not ready to make him sleep alone. My daughter is afraid of things coming through the vents, and none of the cleaver tricks or brainstorming together that others mention worked for her. I tried kindness and understanding (empathy), talking, reasoning, etc., but that didn't work.

We finally resorted to tough love. I explained that I understood her fear, but that she had to trust that we wouldn't put her in a situation that was dangerous for her. Our sleep was important so that we could have fun together during the day. Then when she came into the bedroom at night, we just pushed her back out the door and wouldn't talk to her. She cried, and it was hard, but she came up with another solution on her own.

First she started reading books in the middle of the night until she fell back asleep. But she wasn't getting enough sleep. Now we put her to bed in her bed, but when she wakes up in the middle of the night, she sleeps on the floor in the hallway outside our bedroom door (we keep it closed). She feels safe being closer to us, we have our room to ourselves, we don't get woken up throughout the night, and she gets a full night of sleep.

We still wonder if we're giving her the right amount of support, but I think she feels proud and empowered by her problem solving skills and her ability to spend the night on her own. And I always remind her that it's our job to take care of her, and we wouldn't ask her to do anything that was dangerous to her.

Have you tried winging him off. Get a calendar and mark the days with a star or some type of sticker. Because he may be going to your bed only to be bribed, because this is a way that he will get his prize.Start with every other day. and if he does this for one week then offer the prize. If he doesn't do it every other day for a week then no prize. Is he lonely at this time..if so may be if 2 1/2 year old has a bed partner instead of you and your husband, because if mom and dad can have a partner why can't he.

If he insists on coming into your room, put a sleeping bag by your bed and tell him he can sleep there, but that he may NOT wake you up, or get into your bed anymore. You may try getting into HIS bed, and make it very uncomfortable for him, like rolling on him (without causing harm, of course) and let him know that's how YOU feel when he gets into your bed. Talk to him all day long about how he's going to be a big boy and sleep in his bed tonight, how proud all of you will be, then praise the heck out of him when he does it! It may take several nights, but keep putting him on the floor, or blocking his entrance into your bed and he will get the message. If he's frightened of something in his bedroom, get some monster (shark, spider, whatever) spray and let him spray it around. That consists of colored water in a spray bottle and some strong scent of your choosing, maybe Dad's cologne for comfort. It worked great for my son who insisted there were sharks under his bed. We would spray it, and that darned shark would run (yes, run ; ) out the door before my son got down to look and see it was gone. Maybe if you give your son some power over his elements, he will stay in bed. Worth a try! Good luck. This, too, shall pass........

I had this problem with my daughter when she was about 3. I was getting very little sleep and it was making me cranky. I talked to my mom (whos had 7) and asked if it'd be horrible if I put a lock on his door. I didn't end up putting a handle lock on it, but I did one of those hook n latch locks that i put up at the top. I put that so that she wouldnt accidentally lock herself in (or me out) of her room. I put her to bed the first night and she tried to get out and she freaked out when she found out she couldnt get out. I knew that she would so I talked to her through the door and told her i loved her but she had to stay in her room. It broke my heart when id see her little hands reaching for me under the door but I stood firm. After I knew that she was asleep again I would eventually unlock the lock so in case there was an emergency she could open the door to get out. If your son is doing this every hour you might need to lock the door more to let him know that hes not allowed out. But, in the end, my daughter learned that she needed to stay in her room. Once she learned that I could even let her fall asleep with her door wide open and she'd still stay in there.

On another note, if you're potty training your son and he still is in a diaper or pull up at night, he might be waking up cuz he needs to use the restroom. Try having him use the bathroom when he wakes up and then go back to bed. If that doesnt work try what I said above (or just try what i said above first)

Try the bedtime fairy. She is a lot like the tooth fairy in that when he has stayed in bed for 3 nights in a row, she will put a small toy under his pillow on the 4th night. It can be anything that he likes. I have used just the small toys from the dollar store or even a water balloon kit for us to have a water fight the next day. You can adjust the days if he needs less or more. Then after a couple months, increase the days. And make the "prize" a little bigger. Gift cards to McDonalds for a kids meal is a great one. Make sure you put a calendar up on his door that he can mark off his days. A visual is always great.

I have heard one mother say that she put a little blanket on the floor by her bed in case she got a little visitor in the middle of the night. She would allow the child to sleep on the floor only because the bed was only for daddy and mommy. After several nights of sleeping on the floor, The kids eventially go back to their beds.

My son is 4 and has been sleeping in my bed for over a year now. It started when my husband started travelling for work and I let him have a "sleepover" in our bed and watch movies until we fell asleep. My husband travels alot so the "sleepovers" started happening more and more often. It's gotten to the point where he sleeps with me any night that my husband is out of town and frankly I don't care. I love cuddling with him at night. I know he's only going to be little once and when he's older I will miss those days when he wanted nothing more than to spend every waking (and sleeping) moment with hiis mom.

Sounds like it has become a habit and he is automatically waking up, I mean if he is waking at 3am then he has slept by himself fine for a long period of time. I maybe would suggest a baby gate for his room where or shutting his door completely, when he comes in gently guide him back into his bed. Do a reward chart for every night he successfully stays in his own bed all night. How long has this been going on? Could he be sleep walking? You physically placing him back in his bed then telling him not to get back up..period may help too instead of sending him back to bed. I just wonder why he would wake up after sleeping so well? Does he have to go the bathroom? Good luck.

Have you asked him why he is coming into your bed? You might ask him when it happens (never works for me,but works for my husband) or bring it up at a calm time during the day. When you ask, make sure he knows that he can tell you any reason and you won't be mad about it. If he keeps coming into your room every hour there must be some underlying issue that needs to be resolved. Once you can get him to tell you why he is coming into your bed, then you can start to solve the problem. If it's monsters, then try monster spray. If he's lonely make sure he has stuffed "friends" to keep him company. If something is scaring him see what you can do to make the scary thing go away.
My personal experience is that my son will want to join me in bed for a variety of reasons. Sometimes he thinks his fan is scary -- I turn it off and he goes back to sleep in his own bed. Sometimes he's lonely and I make sure to round up his 2 favorite stuffed friends (a wolf and a triceratops) and put them back in his bed with him. Lately, he wants to come sleep with me because he has seen that his 2 month old sister sleeps with me sometimes (I fall asleep nursing her in bed sometimes, so she is there when he comes and gets me in the morning) -- for that one I told him that he got to sleep with me sometimes when I nursed him and now it is her turn.
Whatever you end up doing, be consistent. If you give in after 3 or 4 times and let him sleep with you then you are just reinforcing the problem. Good luck!

My son is 2 1/2 and we're just now dealing with a version of this problem too. With our son, we used to be able to lay him down at night and then leave the room, and he would stay in bed and fall asleep; now if he is not totally asleep (which takes forever, sometimes) when we leave the room, he gets up and comes running out.
I believe that talking about it with them calmly works much better than bribing in most cases, so we have started talking to him, trying to find out if there is something that is bothering him or he's afraid of, and brainstorming things that would help him self soothe, so he can fall asleep without running to come get us. I suggested maybe listening to music, having a special animal, etc, and what my 21/2 year old son came up with was that after we read a book, etc, and say good night and leave the room he gets to play with two of his little Bob the Builder characters lying in bed, until he gets sleepy, and then put them down and fall asleep. Last night was the first night we tried it, and he only came out once (instead of 3 or 4 times), but it was after 10-15 minutes, rather than after 1 minute, and when my husband put him back in bed and reminded him of the plan, he stayed, and fell asleep! So my suggestion would be to brainstorm with your little guy for something that will self soothe him when he wakes up. Sometimes it's amazing the ideas they come up with!

our little guy does this too, so we put his own sleeping bag on our floor for when he wants to come in.

We've had the same problem with our almost 3 year old son. For two months now he's been getting up 3 or more times after midnight. This week I finally said he could sleep on the floor and he's done that two nights now and seems content. I hate sharing a bed with him, but sharing a room with him is more bearable... I just hope it doesn't last and he will not be "scared" of his own room forever.