Co sleeping with 16mo and pregnant with second

[Firstimemum3]

Hi everyone. This is my first time posting, I'm just looking for some reassurance and any advice would be great! My boy is 16 months and I'm currently pregnant with second on the way. We've been co sleeping on and off since he was young but since 7 months he's always slept in bed with me and hubby. It's the only way we can all get a good night. He goes in his toddler bed at 7ish (but takes us about half hour/an hour to get him to sleep) then he'll only last two hours maybe four if we're really lucky, then he gets in with us. When he is in our bed though he sleeps brilliant, don't hear a peep from him. My question is how many of you have carried on co sleeping with more than one child, and does it work or is it a disaster? And have any of your toddlers eventually got better and stayed in there beds longer? I'm not enjoying this pregnancy from worrying so much and getting really down. Thank you so much

[Firstimemum3]

Thought I'd bump my post. Anyone else been in this situation?

[FATEdestiny]

Hi, I have no first-hand experience but my best friend did this with her two children (who are now 8 and 10 years old, so a long time ago).

Her DC1 was a nightmare sleeper. Going to bed in her own room got so brief that it reached the point where they stopped trying and just put her to bed in the parental bed and she slept there full time. She stayed in the parental bed until aged 6 (and the prompt to make her stay in her own bedroom came as a result of her then 5 year old younger brother).

They had DC2 with an 18 month age gap. They were very, very different in attitude towards sleep with DC2, not wanting to make the same mistakes. DC2 slept in his cot from birth, very strict sleep habits established from very early on. He was sleeping through and in his own room from 6 months old, very different to older sister.

Bear in mind that DC1 was in the parental bed right all the way through Dc2 being born, slept through all his night wake-ups and was still in the parental bed when DC2 went into his own room as a small baby. They all just got used to the situation and accepted it. By this time DC1 was too old to solve this without a lot of screaming and distress. Given they now had another baby, they just never wanted to do this so settled for the easiest option (whilst making sure DC2 was better trained in terms of sleep hygiene).

DC2 moved into a Big Boy Bed (from a cot) aged 3 or so and they put a safety gate on his bedroom door, to further avoid DC2 starting to come into their bed as DC1 had. It took until he was around 4 or 5 years old that DC2 started to realise that DC1 was going to bed with Mummy and Daddy and was still in with them when they woke up.

He started getting jealous, quite understandably I think. This was the trigger that led them to enforce DC1 sleeping in her own bedroom, whether she liked it or not. It would have been very unfair to DC2 if hey had not done this, because he felt he was missing out to the night time cuddles his older sister got.