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Behaviour/development

Terrible bedtimes with 20mo

5 replies

timealone · 02/05/2016 20:30

Please help with any advice. My 20mo is a real terror at bedtimes at the moment. Until a couple of weeks ago, he used to sleep about 8pm-6.30am, with a 2-2.5 hour nap in the afternoon. Now he is not going to sleep until near 9pm, even though we start the routine at the same time. Sometimes he is messing around, eg. he won't stay lying down in bed and gets up and comes over to me (I stay in the room or just outside until he is asleep). If I put him back in bed, he giggles and just gets out again. If I close the door he cries.

Dropping his nap would help, but not quite sure he is ready as he goes down relatively easily, and would sleep for 3+ hours if we let him.

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Casmama · 02/05/2016 20:32

Why don't you try reducing his nap to 1 1/2 hrs and see if that makes him a bit more tired at bedtime?

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RNBrie · 02/05/2016 20:36

Cut the nap to 1.5 hours. Do you have a bed time routine that's calming and relaxing?

My 22mo dd definitely can't get through to bed time without a nap but she messes around at bed time if she has more than 1.5hrs. We do have to wake her up from her nap every day. Her preferred routine would be to sleep for 3 hrs at lunch time and go to bed at 10pm but that doesn't work for me!!

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Madcats · 02/05/2016 20:48

20 month olds are normally a 'mare. Hopefully you are confusing this with sleep arrangements.

Are you happy having your tiny son dictate your life until 9pm at night? I wouldn't have been! I can grumble through early mornings because I had a firm 7pm bed time/my time cut off until about the age of 7. As they grow older children can read books, get cereal etc at 6am

Sleep training might not be your thing, but you could certainly build in a bit more activity into the day to get him to feel tired.

Have you tried music and stories...any sort of routine... working towards some super-boring "it is sleep time now"?...?

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timealone · 03/05/2016 20:12

No I'm not really happy with the current situation, but it has been such a sudden shift from a couple of weeks ago that I'm not sure if it is just a phase/nap needs dropping/routine just needs tweaking etc, hence posting on here for advice.

Today he was up late (8am) and ended up not having a nap as he wouldn't go down easily. He was clearly tired in the afternoon/teatime, but made it through until bedtime ok. Messed around a bit after lights out and took him 25 minutes to go to sleep, eventually asleep at 7.45pm.

We've done bits of sleep training thorugh gradual retreat-type strategies before. But I'm not sure there is an easy way to do that now as he is now in a toddler bed and can open doors. If I leave the room, he just follows me. The only option would be to go downstairs and let him cry but I'm not really comfortable with that.

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timealone · 03/05/2016 20:14

Oh, and yes, we have a set bedtime routine: nappy change, pjs on, milk, teeth, 2-3 books, 1 more book in bed, then lights out and Ewan the sheep goes on.

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