Five year old gets in my bed every night and then kicks me awake. What do I do?

[Roadtripper88]

I don’t mind my five year old coming in if he’s had a bad dream or just needs to be close etc. but he sleeps horizontally and then kicks me awake! He’s a really fitful sleeper. It’s exhausting.

i have tried bribery to get him to stay in bed, but it doesn’t work. I have tried reasoning with him “you’re exhausting me because you kick me awake”, but it doesn’t work.

what do I do?

I am so tired that taking him back to his room every single time just doesn’t work. I don’t have the energy for it.

i know these days will soon pass and I’ll miss them (sort of), but I just want to not be kicked awake anymore!

Go and sleep in his bed.

At 5 you need clear boundaries - talk to him during the day and say that he can’t come in to you at night any more. Then you have to commit to taking him back to bed every time he does it. You could shut his bedroom door and hold it if he tries to escape. He needs to know that you’re serious otherwise he will keep on doing it. It’s so hard when you’re exhausted but a few nights of being strict should break the habit.

You need to be too tired for x, y and z. And mean it.

I have this with my 4yo. It works when you consistently put them back in tgeir own bed. Easy to say but hard to do at 2am when you've been woken from a deep sleep. Mine has got much better recently but still not perfect. Hope you are ok, it's tough when you're so tired.

Print out a chart like the one pictured and he can stick a sticker on it when he’s slept in his own bed.
When the chart is full he gets a reward.

When mine went through this I camped downstairs for a week (stair gate at top of the stairs). At first they continued to get in my bed but by the end of the week they stayed in their own.

If it's frequent can you start with a mattress on the floor beside your bed so if they come in they can use that?

Going through this at moment 5 year old often wakes in night & Dad gets into bed with her for quiet life he goes to work at 3am & mainly she stays in her bed but sometimes she creeps into me anytime between 3-5
I know we should return her & sometimes I do but I'm not consistent with it & Dad definitely isn't!

Mattress on your floor so he’s “with” you but not actually in your bed?

I used to tell my 5 year old that if she woke
me in the night, I was too tired the next day to go to the park / take her for ice-cream / do arts and crafts or whatever it was she was pestering me for. That combined with bribery (x number of nights without waking mummy = chose something from the toy shop / a packet of sweeties etc). It worked eventually.

I honestly never in a million years thought I’d say this after years of being kicked awake, but she and I went away recently and had a hotel with a double bed and a single bed, and I really thought she’d want to sleep in beside me in the double, but she said she wanted to sleep by herself and it made my heart hurt just a little.

Could you try a weighted blanket in your bed? It might contain him a bit?