To ignore DD when she's in so much pain?

[mrsshelby44]

Every night. Without fail. I put my 4 year old to bed. She has her milk and is meant to go to sleep after that. She'll be in her bed and I'll think she's gone to sleep then it starts.

Muuuum my finger hurts.
Muuuum now my leg hurts and I finger too
Muuuuum I need the toilet because my tummy hurts and my bum bum
Muuuum my fingers still hurting
Muuuuuuuum I feel sick
Mum mum mum muuuum? My toenail hurts
Mummy remember when I felt sick in the car?
I feel car sick but I'm in my bed so I'm bed sick.

I offer her cuddles but I don't want her to rely on me to get to sleep iyswim

She goes to bed at 7;30 and this will go on until 9:30/10 sometimes!

AIBU to ignore her? I'm worried she'll actually be sick/Hurt one day and no one will believe her!

Literally at the point where I don't know what to do. I don't like the thought of her crying herself to sleep although I know it's not going to harm her.

I've tried ignoring her she just gets louder and screams to the point I shout back which i hate myself for!

I dread bed times. She's currently in the bath and I'm about to get her out read a book or two and see if she goes to sleep.

I will grab any advice with both hands!! 🧐

When my younger daughter was about that age I had drama every night. I used to lie down beside her for ten minutes and run my finger over her eyebrows, down her nose, over her cheeks, round her jaw, just over and over until she relaxed. Whisper to her a bit. She'd finally relax and start drifting off to sleep. So... ten minutes instead of an hour of crying and wailing.

My 8 year old still does this occasionally and yes I have missed actual medical issues because it happened so often (bad constipation). I think it's anxiety as she goes through phases and has always been quite clingy/needy as her brothers have each other and she's the youngest. I've tried several approaches and not solved it...

Not everyone can 'just go to sleep' - I can't! Never have been able to.

What is your bedtime routine? Do you read to her? Talk about anything that's worried or annoyed her that day?

Have you tried audio books? Or just letting her look at a book until she falls asleep? Or are you "lights off lie down and close your eyes and go to sleep" because honestly I know VERY few people of any age for whom the latter actually works.

Dc2 wasn’t quite as old but I used to just lie down next to his bed and tell to just go to sleep/stop moving BEFORE he would start with, well anything really.
It seems that curtailing the list (I can’t sleep, it’s too hot, I need to drink etc...) AND being next to him was enough for him to finally give up, relax and fall asleep.

I had this! (but maybe not as extreme) but I think I have the answer!

Put her to bed later 9:30pm+ (not for ever, just until they are in good pattern of sleeping, maybe 2-4 weeks)

Spend the time before bed doing something nice and quiet like colouring pictures or reading a book. 20 mins or so.

Put her to bed and say "bed time, I will be back to check on you" then come back to check on her, ask her about something different like "shall we have rice crispies for breakfast?" then say "I'll just put this towel away (or whatever) I'll come back and check on you" then progressively go longer, if it is too long and she calls you back, initially come back and again have another conversation about the next day, "need to get to sleep first". After a while you will be able to stretch this longer.
For a while I would occasionally mention the next day, "I came to check on you again, but you were asleep"

* this only works if they are tired ready to sleep and they stay in bed *for them to stay in bed, initially you need to be coming back to do the check before she is asking you.

mine now are nearly asleep when their head hits the pillow but they will wait for sleep. if they are a bit overtired or upset they ask me to check on them!

@Graphista
Errr... I dint know. I put my head in the pillow and I just go to sleep. So for some people it is as easy as that...

Having said that, I have tried to explain to dc2 lots of different techniques to relax and fall asleep.
Very few have ever worked.
Ensuring he is cool enough does (so a cool shower does the trick)

My eldest was similar. As loads of others had suggested, she actually didn't need as much sleep as I thought she did, and was essentially bored.
So, she went into her bedroom at the same time, bath, story etc all happened as normal. But then she didn't have to go to bed. I left her light on, and she could look at books, or colour, or play with her playmobile or toy farm. The only rule was she couldn't come out unless it was to use the toilet, and she couldn't disturb me by shouting. Calling out to me for random things meant she had to get into bed and lose that playing time.
After about half an hour, I would go back, put her into bed, and put on an audiobook so she still had something to listen to.

It pretty much worked. After a year or so she started putting herself into bed when she got tired. She's 9 now and I go in if she's still playing at 10 but mostly she's in bed, although she doesn't sleep until 10.30ish.
Trying to make her go to sleep earlier doesn't work and never has. She just doesn't need it, and trying to make it happen simply means she lies there getting bored and that's when calling out for me happens.
So maybe letting her play is the answer. Into her bedroom at the usual time, so you still get the time to sort out dinner for yourself or whatever you need to do, but she is playing. Then an audiobook for actual bedtime, so she still has something to listen to.

Good advice and I would add it's worth saying what you are going to be doing while they are in bed. Something boring but necessary. e.g. 'While you snuggle down I am going to go and order the groceries online. I better go and get that done now, so that we can have x for dinner tomorrow.' Then they don't feel they are missing out on fun and know they need to let you get on.

So she's been in the bath til 7;30

I've put waves white noise on in the living room and the same one on her iPad on her shelf.

I've let her sit with me in the living room instead of her room and read two books together. One Charlie and Lola one about Lola not wanting to go to bed! I asked if she was tired she yawned and said no lol

I've cuddle her and kissed her was playing with her hair whilst reading. I asked her if anything hurts she said erm my tummy no my leg no my finger no actually I have a cut on my hand from school. So We talked about how she got it and I kissed it better. She's not feeling sick tonight (so far)

She was sat on my lap then after 5 minutes asked me to take her into bed! That's never happened!

I carried her into bed and told her I'm just next door and I love her. Asked her to remember all the good fun things we did yesterday and today and that I'm happy she likes spending time with me.

I've given her her milk she asked for the white noise to be turned off so I turned it down a bit.

She's now in bed. Let's see how long for!

I nearly falling asleep myself with this white noise playing!

Don’t know if you already do it but a nice bath before bed is a good way to start winding down. Maybe a baby bath with lavender in it. Oh, and I can’t see anything wrong with milk at bedtime...warm milk is particularly soothing.
Good luck x

Some people find it easy to go to sleep, others don’t. If you’re wound up from the day and your heads still buzzing with everything you’ve done (being a 4 year old is exciting!), you’re not going to go to sleep when your head hits the pillow and if you don’t know how to deal with that, it’s not going to happen.

I use audiobooks for my 5 year old and we have a routine. Shower, teeth, loo, story and then audiobook in bed. She knows she needs to listen to the whole audio book (around 30 minutes) before she can come and ask for another one. It works most of the time. However, some days it doesn’t and on those days I cuddle her. 10 minutes of cuddling must be better than an hour plus of distress for both of you. You won’t be cuddling her to sleep at 25 but having said that, who doesn’t like a cuddle to fall asleep to?

You have to clean her teeth after milk!

There’s nothing wrong with milk at bedtime as long as teeth are brushed afterwards.

So much good advice thank you. Maybe she doesn't need so much sleep. Tomorrow I will try the playing in her room for half an hour.

It's just the constant calling and whinging that I find hard to deal with.

I feel bad now though because thinking about it, I can't just fall asleep I have the tv on or a light. I don't know why i thought as a child she would just go to sleep😔

I just used to read, read, read several of her books, till eyes shut then MY book aloud for a few chapters just to be sure. Know all the Thomas books off by heart !

Hopefully you’ve reached a good solution there Mrshelby. Sounds like a lovely bedtime

Don’t feel bad. It’s so easy to expect a lot from our kids sometimes. We can always change things when something’s not working!

On youtube look up elaine martin. She does sleep stories. My childrens favorate one is bonnie. It really helps them to relax. We also have the books sam the sleep sheep and the rabbit who could not go to sleep. I find by doing this with mine it helps them wind down and relax. I also give my eldist time to tell me any worries or anything she wants to tell me before bed time. We also have the light that go the wall from ikea as they both dont like pitch black.

She's old enough to start to understand that you need her to not lie about being ill because when she is ill, you need to be able to believe her.

My dd was the same! I hated bedtimes!

I came up with ‘mummy’s kisses and bedtime wishes’ where I’d smother her in kisses then we’d wish for a dream together. But she’d have to be in bed at 7pm and asleep by 8pm as that’s when the bedtime fairy would come and sprinkle the dream dust in her eyes (sleep) so if she wasn’t asleep she wouldn’t get the dream. She used to squeeze her eyes tight and concentrate so hard on getting the dream she wanted that she fell asleep easily.

Always claimed to have the dream she wished for the next morning 💕

Worked for her (and my ds) every single night.

AND everything is super hard to deal with when you’re tired yourself. I find my children near impossible when I’m knackered

My dd was like yours. Bedtime was a nightmare. We discovered this amazing CD called "relax kids" it's bedtime meditations for kids to listen to. They imagine things like being Aladdin on a magic carpet etc. For DDs birthday she got a CD player and some CDs including this one. Now every night she has bath, stories and then the CD. I lie with her for 2 mins while she gets settled and then slip out. She goes to sleep in minutes. it's honestly amazing. I don't work for the company or anything :-)

We have also noticed a difference in her behaviour because she is not getting overtired

'It must be awful to have so many pains each night'... I was wondering if you haven't got any pains but you just don't want me to leave you alone...

then work on how she is becoming a big girl and gradually reduce the time spent at bedtime settling her (it is anxiety related not bad behaviour)… rewards for smaller time etc

There is a great book on how to parent the therapeutic way... the tips in there really do work

Brexitwife - I know some can, I said I personally know v few who can do this.

Hopefully, op that's your issues resolved.

Both my DC went through a stage of this, it was exhausting.

In the end I told DD the best cure was to close her eyes, stop talking and listen to the world go by (I didn't say sleep because that was always met with "but mummy I can't sleep") and every time she whinged I ignored her as long as I could and if she got too loud I just said "you can't hear the world if you are talking", she dozed off eventually but I had to be really tough for a few days which I struggled with.

With DS I told him the story of the boy who cried wolf and then said "so, do you know what this story teaches us? If you keep making a fuss about nothing I won't know when there is really something wrong" (I tried it with DD too but it didn't work on her)

Some children struggle with transition, so it might be worth trying a countdown to bedtime, so give her warnings at say 30 mins, 15 and 5 so she can get all the attention and fussing out the way before you actually want her to go to sleep.

Also tell her she can take herself to the loo, she probably won't have tummy ache and keep needing it once its not an excuse to call you through.

You will know the difference between something actually really wrong and her just whining to stay up, edu's advice about telling her you'll check in 20 minutes is good. magic spray (water in a spray bottle) or magic paper (wet kitchen roll) also works quite well for telling the difference between actual hurt and attention seeking, lots of kids suddenly have pains when they think it will get them attention/out of something.

Good luck, its a horrible stage but she will grow out of it eventually.