Why isn't my child sleeping?

[Throwawaytoday]

Dd is 5.

She's a good sleeper. Usually in bed at 7:30, asleep by 8pm, wakes up 7am in school days, 8am at the weekend.

But for the last week she's been finding it hard to go to sleep, often still awake at 9 or 10pm.

I'd usually think it was the heat, but our house is reasonably cool (her room is 22 degrees).

Admittedly she hasn't had a very active day today (too hot outside) but every other day this week she's been super busy and active.

Every few nights she complains of a headache, only late at night, only when she's already awake, and seems to go away very quickly.

I just admit, I'm fraying a bit at seams, just because I know that if she doesn't sleep until 10pm she's grumpy by the following day.

Over tired
Out of routine
Hot

Dd 4 has been similar. But in the end i knew she was fighting it to a certain extent. So I said ok so if you dont go to bed now then tomorrow you go to bed before your brother.
And it will get earlier and earlier.

It seemed to work...

I think 'out of routine' is probably it...

We're five weeks into the school holidays. Her weeks have been a mix of; family holiday, home with us, clubs during the day, etc. And she's getting up later as clubs start at 9 (so she can sleep until 8 if rather than being woken at 7.15).

Yeah, you're probably entirely right.

But when you're in the midst of it it feels so interminable!!

Get her to use her brain tomorrow. Sometimes I need to be mentally as well as physically tired, so you never know, it might help.

I'll give that a good go @hotfroth ... she loves writing and maths, but is a reluctant reader (which is totally alien to me), I'll get her to read me her last story before bed.

The similarity between small children nd dogs never fails to surprise me ☺️

I'll stop short of serving her snacks in a Kong.

If mine weren't tired, they went to bed at normal time but were allowed to keep the light on and look at favourite books.
They weren't allowed to get out of bed and play or go into each other's bedrooms, nor allowed to call out to each other. They had a bedside lamp each with inline on/off switches so didn't need to get out of bed to turn out the light, and also a nightlight which stayed on all night.
I don't know if mine were particularly well behaved (I doubt it) but they were good kids and this solution worked a treat for us.

I'm relatively relaxed about her staying in her room, reading, playing with something, listening to a CD, so long as she's at least in or near her bed, so she can fall asleep when the time's right.

It's the getting up, stomping down the hall, and increasingly spurious reasons to be up that are wearing me down. She's just gone to sleep, she must've got up 10 times since 8pm. For reasons varying from needing a cuddle (gave her one) to needing a wee (she can do that without assistance) to her bedside lamp being broken (she turned it off), and needing a poo (she didn't). It just means my evening is punctuated by listening-out for her stompy feet, and pausing the TV so she doesn't see anything unsuitable.

Just keep sending her back up on her own. She'll get fed up of it in the end. Make it clear she can go to the toilet without coming downstairs to tell you about it (it's her ploy for getting your attention), you are tired and need your own quiet time without her. I doubt if I'd have cuddled her either, that's another ploy to stay downstairs. Don't engage in conversations. Be consistent and give her the same message every time, it's a battle of wills really. And I wouldn't worry about her being tired in the mornings, it will sort itself out.

Oh, and the headache sounds like another ploy. I might be tempted to give her Calpol or whatever before bed and say it's so she won't have a headache. Actually, I find I sleep well after taking paracetamol so giving her some calpol before bed might actually help her drift off.

Hi all. I hope you’re all well.

I have a 15 month old baby girl (I have an older boy too) that has always been a nightmare at night. She wakes up every 2 hours screaming Bloody murder. She is a joy throughout the day but it’s as if when it hits 8pm she turns into the child of Satan. She has a good night time routine (bath, feed and bed), she goes to sleep at around 7.30pm, she is up for the day at around 7am. The problems is without fail she will be up Atleast every 2 hours. The only way to settle her would be to put her on the breast. I have tried abstaining from doing this a few nights but she goes into hysterics. I have tried feeding her extra food (solids and breast milk) at night before bed but this didn’t work.

She also has a 2 hour nap in the afternoon at nursery so I don’t think she is over tired and can’t sleep.

any help or advice or what I can do to break this 2 hourish cycle. We never had this issue with my son.

I might add that I don’t think this is separation anxiety related as even when I co sleep with her she still wakes up screaming bloody murder.