Baffled with 2 yr old

[Heartfulloftea]

Hi all

I'm a long time lurker but first time poster. I was wondering if anyone had any ideas about what might be going on with my (just) 2 year old. For over a year she's gone to bed in her cot happily with her blanket and teddies but on the last week since her second birthday is refusing to go to sleep at night. We've cut her nap to 1.5 hours and she's always awake by 2.30.

She is getting her top set of molars, but all the other ones haven't caused these problems (she's normally an early waking tether). She'll go to sleep quite happily for my husband but if I do it (which I have to as he's away a lot) then she'll shout for me and bounce her in cot.

Honestly it makes NO sense to me! I'm worried if I go in repeatedly with cuddles etc this will become the new norm.

All suggestions gratefully received!

[FATEdestiny]

If she's fine with your husband and messes around with you, it can only be behavioural. Anything else and it wouldn't matter who was putting her to bed, she'd be the same.

Your DH probably established stricter expectations.

I could liken it to our 1 year old cocker spaniel. She sits and begs with those puppy dog eyes when there is food around. She never bothers me though. Why? Because I never, ever give her food from my plate. So she quickly learnt that is she sits well-behaved in front of DH eating, she might get something. But no point with Mum since she'll not fall for those tactics, so she doesn't even try.

You need to set clearer expectations with DD and make sure to stick to them consistantly.

[Heartfulloftea]

Thanks for the response Fate. It's bizarre though as I've put her to bed pretty much exclusively since she's been born and up until 2 weeks ago there was no mucking around. I would give her a kiss and skip out the door, job done.

My husband gets her to go to sleep by saying I'm asleep and so is everyone else and she believes him. Me being there with her seems to wind her up more and I really don't want to establish sitting with her until she goes to sleep.

The alternative seems to be letting her cry until she sleeps, which is very hard. Should I keep going in to restablish the sleep message until she finally passes out? My presence only winds her up more though!

Misery

[FATEdestiny]

What about leaving her dorr open and popping your head in the doorway periodically?

[QuercusQuercus]

We have just had this with our 19 month old. In fact we're still having it occasionally

She was awesome at going to sleep. Nighttime routine then light out, leave room and she'd chunter for a bit then go to sleep. Then abruptly she started refusing to go to sleep unless someone stayed with her. She'd just cry and escalate to screaming. It started with the night put-down (DH's job) and spread to day naps (mine). It got to where DH was having to sit in her room in the dark for 45 minutes every night.

We got her over it by leaving her door open and a dim upstairs light on, then doing gradual withdrawal sleep training. The first couple of nights DH sat in her doorway, then after that on the landing, then just out of sight on the stairs, then snuck downstairs quietly, now we can (mostly) just leave the room as normal. I did the same thing with naps.

Could you try sitting quietly within sight (distant as possible), then retreating night by night? It's a pain in the bum but it worked for us.