Toddler waking again at night after holiday

[LokiTheCynicalCat]

Any hints or tips?

Took 18m DS on a week long holiday to visit my family. He hated the travel cot, screamed going in it, and woke at 3am every night after it taking til 9 or 10pm for him to go to sleep. The last few nights I pulled him into my bed when he woke and he slept well next to me.


Now we are home again and although he is back in his routine he is still waking at 3 and 4am sounding heartbroken and wide awake. It takes ages to get him back to sleep. He's usually not wet (but nappy quite full after bedtime milk) so I change him, offer him a drink, etc. attempts to bring him into our bed have failed because Fun Daddy is in it, and there are more things in our room than a B&B or someone's guest room, and he can open the doors to get out into the rest of the flat. So the upset turns into wanting to play.

There's a single bed in his room and once I've tried everything else I stick him back in the cot, get into the single bed, and murmur/shush him from a distance til he's quiet and gives up and goes to sleep.

Any ideas how I can get him to self settle again? Before this he was sleeping from 8 to 7 every night. I'd love my unbroken nights back! And I don't want to get in the habit of offering him a drink in the middle of the night. He doesn't need it.