To lock my daughter's bedroom door?

[Pizzahutpasta]

Our DD is just about to turn 4. Recently she has started getting up at stupid hours in the morning and playing, really loudly, in her room which wakes us up and also our DS who is 17 months. It can be as early as 4am.

I removed all toys out of her room in the hope it would discourage her. That then lead to her sneaking downstairs in the early hours to play downstairs and has got herself into some pretty dangerous situations.

The last straw was this morning when I woke up to hear noises outside so went to investigate and our DD had unlocked our back door and was playing outside. This was 4.30am.

I want to put a lock on her door - firstly because the lack of sleep of her constantly getting out of bed is killing me and secondly because I'm seriously worried she will injure herself. My DH has said absolutely not to a lock and we are currently not speaking over my suggestion because of a huge row.

AIBU? What's the other solution?

My youngest was opening/or climbing stairgates at 18 months. Nothing could keep her locked in/out of anywhere.

I suggest the glo clock and a small selection of things she's allowed to play with.

Dog gate on the stairs that she can't climb over but I agree keeping her door locked isn't ideal, what if she needs the toilet?

Can you make up a snack box which she can help herself to in the morning, put it in her room once she's asleep and then she can sit and eat/read/colour for an hour or two.

Now the lighter nights are coming in, can you start extending her bedtime? Get her outside in the fresh air in the early evening for a run about? Or is she just one of those kids with an inbuilt alarm and will wake at that time no matter what time she goes to bed?

Other thing is maybe a tablet she can watch with some stuff downloaded.

It must be hard work but once she goes to school she will learn very quickly that getting up that early is a bad idea. You may have a few weeks of a cranky tired child but it will sort itself out in the long term.

Oh and when I fitted a high lock on our front door (DD was also an escapologist) she got a chair and worked it out in one day. Early waking is clearly a sign of great intelligence

I was late sleeping and was also an escapeologist ... :)

I'd put her toys back in her room and fit a lock on the door, provided you have some way of hearing if she becomes distressed. We shut our DD's door at night - she can't open it - but hear through the baby monitor if she needs us.

Just get a hook and eye lock high up on her door. Has she got black out curtains? Have you tr

I ended up putting a small TV on the floor in my bedroom when DS was that sort of age and he watched cartoons while I dozed.

The reality is that we ALL go through phases when we wake up in the night and feel 'awake'
She needs to learn that, even if she feels awake, she needs to stay in bed so she can at least rest. She is also much more likely to fall back asleep (which she needs) tha if she carries in playing.

Yes use a lock it's no different than an 18 month old in a cot.

Sorry - I've got a gro clock, the princess one. She didn't give a toss about it and I gave up on it when she started taking the batteries out.

I am at my wits end with it - I feel like she's going through terrible twos again because she doesn't seem to give a toss about consequences or anything!

Move her bedtime back by at least an hour and fit good blackout blinds at her window.

Star chart, she's old enough to understand that staying quietly in her room until say 6am gets her a star and a reward, if she gets seven stars she gets to do an activity of her choice, swimming, going to the park etc.

Make it together, make it fun and let her take ownership of it. I would also ban any electronic devices, tv etc and try to keep her busy with physical activities which may help to tire her out.

Good luck.

What kind of baby gate do you have that a 4 year old can open? How strong are they? I struggled with ours and I am unfeasibly strong. You maybe need new baby gates.

Yep agree change her bedtime and bedtime routine, fit blackout curtains and give her some leeway as to what she can do in her room when she wakes up. What is her routine?

She is nearly 4 have you discussed any of this with her or just enacted a series of punishments (in her eyes) that she is rallying against. Set boundaries - she can quietly play in her room/look at books/do something safe downstairs

A lock is not going to solve the problem (I suspect it will lead to banging in the room/destruction of the room) and still means you have to sort out the actual issue which she is waking up and not being able to get back to sleep

The putting them back to bed every time doesn't work with every child. I remember doing the same thing when he was a toddler trying to climb on the kitchen worktop. We could spend an entire day in a stand off of him pulling a chair over and starting to climb and me lifting him down, saying 'no' and putting the chair back. Hours and hours and hours of it. Other people only had to do it a dozen times before the child got bored. It was the same with night-time, months of sitting at the top of the stairs silently putting him back had no effect, he still got up.

I don't agree with moving the bed time back.
When my dcs were very tired, that was the time when they struggled to sleep even more.
If anything, waking up early at that age meant an EARLIER bedtime for them.

No helpful suggestions, but just to back you up with the stairgate thing.
Ds2 could open all the stairgates (we had 4 at one point!), by the time he was 4. DD is 2.4 and can open one of the 2 of the gates we currently have. I suspect it was from watching ds2.

My mum used to put two stair gates up, one above the ground-floor one, making it effectively the same height as a door. Worked a treat

My DD could easily open a stairgate at 3 too. Don't know why some people shocked by this.

What wakes her at 4 am? Cold?thirsty? Needs a wee? Particular noises?

Would she settle and go back to sleep if she climbed with you in bed?

Just get the lock. I wouldn't pander to this shit with snack boxes, tablets, toys etc. No, it's too bloody early and she needs to learn that.

DS was an early riser (6-6.30) and putting him to bed later made no difference at all so that's probably not a good solution either.

My brother could climb over the tall gates as a toddler. His room had to have a latch hook thing on because he escaped all the time and was a walking accident! Let's face it, she's safer locked in her room than getting out and being outside at 4.30 am! What are the actual chances of these being a fire at night ever at is the only person who wakes up.

I'd actually be concerned about her behaviour though. Surely most children respond to some sort of sanction or incentive and wouldn't actually leave the house and go outside in the dark to play?

"Would she settle and go back to sleep if she climbed with you in bed?"

Why should OK do this? Surely that's swapping one problem for another, how to get her to stop coming into your bed andnit she thinks she can get OPs bad, that will probably make her even more likely to get up.

I think you just have to put her back to bed, put her back to bed, put her back to bed, put her back to bed until she gets the message. She needs to teach herself to go back to sleep.

What's the difference between a lock and a gate? If you leave a key in any one could get in and the only person in the room shouldn't be getting out anyway.

Oh OP - it sounds hard!!

I have a son who is 3.5 years old and he can open stair gates. I know loads of young children who can open them, I'm surprised some posters have been shocked by this.

My son was a nightmare with his Glo-Clock as even though we explained to him that he wasn't to leave his bed until the sun came out (we have the standard sun/moon display one) it only took him one day to figure out how to manually change the moon scene to the sun scene with the push of a button so he just did that.

Last month me and DH decided to introduce a Reward Chart for his sleep and he has two rules to follow: one is to stay in his bed all night and two is that he can only come into our bedroom when the sun comes out on his clock - which we have now put on a talk shelf that he can't reach.

Every morning that he abided by these rules he got a star sticker on his chart and a Chocolate button. Every time he got 5 stars he got a small toy from the £1 and when he got 20 stars he got an electric car that he wanted. He absolutely loved getting up in the morning and choosing what colour star he wanted to put on his chart and we made such a fuss of him if he won one. From the first night we used it we had pretty much complete success and it only took him about 22 nights to earn his full 20 stars. Me and DH hear him wake up in the morning (sometimes 30 minutes before he's 'allowed' to get up) but he never gets out of bed until the 'sun comes out' and then he excitedly comes running through chattering away about his stars and Chocolate buttons. We let him choose what he wanted his big present to be (the electric car at 20 stars) and we bought it the day we introduced the chart and we kept it in the dining room so he could physically see it waiting for him and I think knowing he was working towards something he really wanted was a big contributing factor to how well he did. He's not long completed the chart, yesterday actually, and do today we started a new one. Over the last three weeks me and DH have had the best sleep we've probably had in about a year!!

Have you tried Reward Charts with your daughter?

You really gave my sympathies because you must be exhausted and exasperated by it. I can understand why you'd think to get a lock because it's the easiest solution and in the midst of sleep deprivation you will do ANYTHING to get some rest. Your DH may not have agreed with you but I don't think he should have reacted the way he did either. I hope you find a solution

4am isn't an early start, it's waking up in the middle of the night! Personally I would not put a lock on the door but I would take the toys away as they seem like a massive incentive to get up and play instead of rolling over and going back to sleep. Whatever room the toys are moved to, that's the room I'd put the lock on, not my child's bedroom.

If you can get something suitable, what about letting her have quiet music on in her room after time X, on condition that she stays in bed / in her room and doesn't disturb others by being noisy. That might give you a tool that you can use to guide her towards "it's 4:30 am you can have the music on once it's 5" or "you have to stay in your room till 6 am. you can choose whether you go back quietly and have music on, or not and you get taken back and no music". or other such lines.

Consistency will be the key, the big difficulty is often making a feasible plan and then sticking to it.

Meant to say, good luck sorting something out that works for you and your family.