Cried for 90 mins

This ^ It’s too early to go downstairs. Don’t make a rod for your back. Put him in bed with you and both go back to sleep.

Where's the support though? Fucks sake, single mum asks for advice on a parenting forum called Mumsnet. Could it be any clearer? I would have thought advice can be delivered kindly, whatever the opinion.

A child that age cannot conceptualise that 'it's 4am', they have no concept of '4am'.

I disagree, you don't teach a child that 4am is an appropriate time to get up?! Otherwise you will have this problem for years to come. No way. It's not morning.

But he's awake and not tired. It doesn't make a difference that it's 'too early', he only understands that he's awake and not tired and wants to get up. If you left a toddler in a cot for an hour in the middle of the day, alone, with nothing to do, they would also cry the whole time. You wouldn't say he was 'angry because he's not getting what he wants', you would recognise that it was neglectful.

OP you did nothing wrong. Your childs needs were met, sometimes they can't have what they want when it's not good for them.

This is no different to a child having a tantrum because they want some chocolate, sure they are upset but you don't just give it them!

You don't give in to a child wanting screens/to go downstairs at 4am, there is no benefit to them, it's not good for them and they need to learn this. They can snuggle in their bed with their toys. This isn't a newborn this is a 2 year old who likely can understand a parent saying no it's not morning yet this is sleep time.

But she didn't put him back to bed, she took him out and gave him a telephone to watch in her bed, which is incredibly stimulating, before putting him back into his cot and expecting him to go back to sleep. That was clearly never going to work and the consequence was that the child was left crying for 90 mins.

OP if you can't settle a child and they're ready to get up, then you get up with them - that's what being a parent is. You don't just dump them in their cot and leave them to cry for over an hour.

That's the sort of behaviour that leads to all sorts of issues with attachment if done over and over. If you went into his room a couple of times then you weren't sleeping anyway so you might as well have taken him downstairs.

Also people have no idea if their child is ill - they could have a sore throat, head ache, tooth ache, had a nightmare and you wouldn't know.

There is some really shite parenting on here IMO. No wonder so many kids end up with mental health issues. How kids are treated at this age really impacts them as they get older, their behaviour and their self esteem.

No it sounds like he wanted the phone /a screen!!!

You did nothing wrong. He wanted to go downstairs, you said no because it's too early and didn't give in to his tantrum.

If mine wake up before 7 which is rare, they are put back to bed because it isn't morning yet.

He's going to want the phone every night when he's bored and can't sleep and wants to get up.
Good luck with that. In your 1.2m high bed. 🙄

I would check the child and make sure he was fine and then leave him.
I would try not to cuddle him too much or give him too much attention at the time. I'd just check him, make sure no temperature, nappy doesn't need changing etc and leave him alone once I know he's well and just looking for attention.

I know there are big differences in people's opinions on this but I need my sleep. Even when I was off on maternity and did not need to get up for work, I would not entertain being up all night settling a child. I made sure the child was ok and I would leave them to cry it off and train them to settle themselves.
If there is nothing wrong with the child they wake and they are bored and want attention or I dunno, maybe they are scared but they need to learn there is nothing to be afraid of and they need to learn to get themselves back to sleep by themselves. Otherwise you could be stuck doing this for years with them.

When the child was a baby I'd do all this of course but by the time I moved them out of my room, typically by 1 yr old, I expected them to start to settle themselves. I moved my third child out earlier as I was a bit more relaxed and confident at that stage but 1 yr is the recommended age for moving them into their own rooms afaik.

My first and last kids cooperated reasonably well but my middle child was just an early riser and it was very challenging but I am not up for entertainment at these hours. If they are not unwell they need to settle/entertain themselves, they can stay awake or go to sleep, I don't care, but they're not getting me up if there's nothing wrong with them.

My DS is like this. He sometimes wakes up in the middle of the night and decides it’s time to wake up. We go in resettle him (tuck him in, tap him, give him water or his toy). I will see if he resettled and if he’s still crying we sometimes put him into our bed.

Quite often he does not settle in our bed and just wriggles around. Then I will move him back into his bed and he will cry. I will go back and check in but ultimately we say to him it’s not wake up time and it’s bedtime. Usually a long night but we do get to a point where it’s you just need to go to sleep and eventually he falls back asleep.

He was crying because he wanted to go downstairs or watch your phone . You need to put a stop to this now or he will carry on every morning at 4am playing up as he’s learnt he gets to watch the phone in your bed now if he cries at that time. You need to keep going back into his room and tell him no go to sleep it’s not time to get up and don’t take him out of his bed or into your bed for entertainment or he will carry on!

all of you lot going on about night terrors can you not read the op?!?! There is nothing in this that shows its night terrors! It’s a small child who’s woken up early and wants to go downstairs/watch tv or whatever when it’s too early!

there is a stark difference between sad, unwell, in pain, wet, afraid (all of which are understandable) and 'angry because I am not getting what I want'.
Notwithstanding the non parenting 'just whip a phone out' strategy which has probable contributed to this problem.

I would not let any of my children cry if they just need me. All you taught him is that you will ignore him if he's sad.

Exactly but I expect you'll get a 'what the fuck' as well 😆

Put your phone away! Why would you hand an overstimulated child a highly addictive device in the middle of the night and expect him to go back to sleep.

It sounds to me like he was up and wanting to explore. It’s fine to keep him upstairs until a reasonable time.

i assume you can tell the difference between him being in genuine distress or crying because he wants something. Trust your instincts. And as other have said, you can get him a clock to start practice when wake up and get out of bed time is.

it might be good to have some quiet toys he can sit with to distract him if he true this regularly.

Don’t be doing that. 2.5 year olds should not be looking at phones! Especially at night.

Could you get a cd player or something and play some soft lullaby music for him?

Terrible twos. No reason not to go downstairs, put on TV - or recorded suitable soothing programme (is 'In the night garden' still a thing?) - make yourself tea or coffee and sit with toddler. Make sure everywhere is warm, of course. Once settled go back to bed. Do you do paid work outside the home during the day? If so you need to stop this happening but night terrors (this sounds a possibility) can be very frightening for a small child.
I know the standard advice is give a drink and a cuddle and put back to bed - rinse and repeat till child learns waking in the night is pointless - but a screaming child is distressing (even if you are pretty sure they are being manipulative which 2 year olds are perfectly capable of) so I would deal with the screaming before worrying about encouraging getting up in the night.
Poor you.

Sometimes you have to do what you have to do. Keep up the good work I say, its not easy knowing what to do when you're stressed out by your child's crying and not wanting to set a precedent for every night. I feel for you. My DS didn't sleep and no two nights were the same so no advice really but fwiw taking him downstairs because he asked to isn't the right answer either.

Unfortunately being a parent means sometimes being uncomfortable for your children.

You stay with him, saying it's still night time, come for a cuddle etc. Give him a drink or a quick snack or whatever. That's just the basics of parenting.

What you don't do is leave a toddler to cry alone for an hour.

My DS is nearly 2 and has no concept of time. It’s dark when we start our day regardless of whether it’s 4 or 6am because it’s that time of year. He just knows that he’s not tired so he wants to go and play. We go down with him at that point because leaving him to cry by himself for well over an hour is not acceptable to us. Having the odd day start mega early is part of parenting and something that’s happened with all three of my kids. The older two both sleep through the night because they know mummy or daddy are right there if they need us.

You clearly think you did the right thing though so I don’t know why I’m bothering.

It’s the physiology of sleep - at 2:15 or 3:15 a healthy toddler should be able to get back to sleep easily enough so a parent’s job at this time is to facilitate that. By 4:15 some children are going to find it much harder to sleep again thanks to hormones / the circadian system. 10 minutes looking at a screen will make it harder still. I’m not saying I would be at all happy to be up at 4:15, but you might be fighting a losing battle.

If one of mine woke early (as opposed to the middle of the night) I’d give myself a max of 10/15mins to try and get them back to sleep (dark room, white noise, cuddles etc) and if it hadn’t worked by then I knew I was wasting my time. What I wouldn’t do is shut them in their room for 2 hours listening to them cry.