no sleep routine/restless child

[forestfern]

My little girl is 25mth old. We moved abroad 3mth ago, sleep has been chaotic since. The childrem now speak French around her. She has also mixed with Italian children. She has picked up some Fre ch words already.

Prior to this she would sleep from 8.30pm until 8pm with 5min wake at 3-4 am for milk. She climbed out of the cot as soon as we got here and so had to go onto a matress. She is very restless in the night and I would wake to find her all over the room. She always banged around int he cot, so it no surprise to find this. She also stood up and stretched all the time in the womb which was very painful, then pushed herself right down into the corner, which meant painful sleep from very early on in the pregnancy.

Once she realised that the cot boundaries were down, plus the disorientation of the move, and yet a furthur one since, she will not go to bed. She falls out of her bed, and hurt her mouth once. She can be up until 12pm adn awake at 5pm. Sometimes she would like to catch up sleep in the day, but I dont allow it. She usually has 1 and half hours in the day and needs it, at about 1 until 2.30pm. Sometimes she wont sleep until 5pm though, which adds problems.

She usually has to come into our bed now too. Sometimes she likes to sleep on the sofa, which maybe she recognises from her home in England. She has an incredibly good memory and can navigate herself around towns to play structures only once visitied better than I can!!

She is very restless at night and often you get a foot in the face as she tries to find the headboards, she often likes to sleep against a barrier. She keeps hitting us in the face with her lamb and I have seen her play with it in the day saying "sleep" and then tossing and turning it in the same way with restless, though not unhappy, sighs? One night she was up all night laughing, singing and talking until 6.30am!! She is still up now at 11pm. She seems happy though, mostly jumping and giggling, but not always, sometimes exhausted and fighting it with some head banging. We are both exhausted. I have to take her to the playground for 3hours daily and even this is not enough.

There is often noise in the house since they are building next door, I know this frightens her, but she seems generally just wanting to be awake. She has started to hate her bath since the move too.

It could be the disruptions, but she just seems to have an abnormal amount of energy, also eats very little! My husband was sedated as a child and my brother only ever needed 6hrs sleep per night and used to sing throught he night. My mother said I didn't like going to bed but it never became a big problem. I wonder if it is a genetic thing.

I have tried everything that I can think of. Books, firm words, firmer words, pretending to go to sleep with her , letting her sleep in our bed, tiring her out running 30 times round the house, spending hours at playgrounds, restricting telly and dvd to half an hour daily. I think she needs a toddler dance class but they dont do them for ones so young. She could do with running around with a group of children all day but there are no sibs. I do my best with the playgrounds and mother and toddler groups. It seems to me that she has the energy levels of a child of about 5yr old, who would hopefully have a group of friends to play with?

She is having a pretty stimulating time. I take her out a lot too since I have lost my gardens and it prevents me from feeling homesick. She might be homesick too, or sense that I am. There has been talk of returning home also and I dont know how much they really understand at this age. My husband would have to fly back for weekends. She did pick up the toy airoplane after one of these discussions?

Maybe it is just multifactorial. Any ideas would be greatlly appreciated!!! We have absolutely no time for ourselves at the moment, and about two nights sleep since we got here.

Help! Here she is now asking to look at www.noddy.com at 12pm. Good online games there, by the way.

Thanks for reading.

[tracyk]

Hi Forestfern
I am having similar probs with my ds 26mo after having moved from England to Scotland, from cot to single bed and from 1 nursery to 2 seperate nurseries.
Although his sleep probs are not nearly as bad as yours.
Maybe she is getting too much stimulation?
What was her routine back home? ds tends to have his best routine on a sat. when he goes swimming in the morning to finish around 12ish, then he can have a long nap 12.30-2.30 and then into bed for sleeping at 7.45pm ish.
During the week though it is a bit hit or miss. I am trying at the mo to force his nap at 1pm by driving at that time (he won't entertain staying in his room at lunchtime). And hopefully he'll have enough to keep him going in the afternoon but not too much that he won't sleep at night.
We put a stairgate on his doorway as it was a nightly battle to get him to stay in his room. He thought it was a great game to see if he could sneak out the patio doors!
They are coming to an age now when they can be bribed - roll on soon!
But I tend to let him howl behind the stairgate till he has tired himself enough to have less resistance to being put into bed. He also still gets a bottle of milk with a teat which I know he uses as a comfort to settle himself to sleep.