2yo Not Sleeping

[Needsleep32]

2yo started climbing out of cot, so moved her into a toddler bed. Out of the past 2 weeks, she’s slept ok twice, but every other night we’ve put her down at around her usual bedtime (7/7.30) and she’s refused to sleep until 11/12. All she wants to do is get up and play - and she screams the place down until she gets her way. We live in a flat, and she has a slightly older sibling, so after a bit of screaming we have to let her up or she’ll carry on all evening, waking her sister and annoying the neighbours!

I’m thinking it might be a mixture of 2 year sleep regression and the transition to toddler bed. AIBU to get a bigger cot and try again when she’s 3? Both my husband and my child’s nursery have said this is a bad idea and to stick with it, but argh!!

Should add that we’ve tried no TV before bed, bath and book bedtime routine, duvet cover, sleeping bag, lying down next to her, holding her hand etc. Any tips would be SO appreciated.

She also wakes in the night a couple of times - I don’t mind this so much, as she’s still half asleep at this point so when I put her back in she goes straight back to sleep.

My second was like this. To be honest, it didn't stop until he fully dropped day naps and had plenty of activity during the day. It got to the point where if he even slept for 10 minutes during the day, he was/is impossible to get to sleep at night, even with a full bath/milk/pjs/story routine.

She’s always been a great sleeper, so we weren’t expecting it to be this bad! @BrumBoo What age was yours when they started sleeping normally again?

Our nursery said 19-month-old DS was falling asleep in the pushchair when he wouldn't nap, so I'm doing that at night now. We've been taking him out in the pushchair (well wrapped up) for a walk at 9pm if he isn't asleep by then. I just walk until he falls asleep. Some nights he still wasn't going down but now I put the raincover on (even when not raining) so the air is less intense on his face and now he's asleep in about 10-15 minutes but it's taken 2 months to get to that point. When we get home we have to carefully unpeel him from his blankets and get him upstairs. It's not ideal but better than when he wouldn't sleep at all. We ended up losing our beautiful routine around 2 months ago when we moved house.

My son is 2.5 and exactly like this so we put the side back on his cot! He can climb out but he only does it a few times and then settles down. I ask him periodically if he wants me to take the side off and he says no, I think maybe he likes the security of it? Can you just leave her to play in her room until she tires herself out? keep checking in on her so she knows you aren’t far away but don’t involve yourself in her play at all or get into a conversation. I just tell my son ‘no it’s night time’ and keep popping him back to bed (when we took the side off he just continuously got up for hours which is why we put it back on!). Whatever you choose make sure to do it for a couple of weeks because it takes that long for them to realise you’re going to stick to it.

We have dropped day naps for pretty much this reason. But now he is waking at 5am so really just following for advice!

We put some books and quiet toys in dd rolm when we moved her to a roddler bed and she was allowed to play until she wanted to sleep but she had to be quiet. We also bought a mesh side to attach tot he bed as she didn't like the openess of the toddler bed.

We also have a stair gate on her door so she has to stay in her room

I moved both my DDs in to a full size single bed at that age but with a guard rail the entire length of the side so they couldn’t fall out/get out. Worth a try maybe.

Took the side off my 2 yo’s cot recently and he’s definitely found the transition hard. We had a very difficult first 7-10 days with lots of night waking and crying, now he’s adapted but he does need me to stay in the room while he falls asleep (which he had stopped doing some time ago) and wakes usually once a night, sometimes needing to be resettled and sometimes doing it himself. He’s a big fan of his gro clock (actually a different brand but same thing) which he took to instantly, and that immediately solved getting up too early. So... swings and roundabouts. I’d say hang in there if you can.

@Needsleep32

She’s always been a great sleeper, so we weren’t expecting it to be this bad! *@BrumBoo* What age was yours when they started sleeping normally again?

He still makes a fuss, but he's generally asleep by 8pm. That's absolutely on the condition that he's not napped all day, and has had some form of proper running around time (he fully dropped naps at 2.5 years). Oh, and when he goes through phases of constipation, he often wakes up and farts/chatting for three hours from about 1am, which is fun....

@BrumBoo I’ve actually noticed that on the days she hasn’t had a poo, she’s much worse. She didn’t nap today and she went down fine (completely conked out) at 7, although she only had 6 hours sleep last night so that would be why! Going to aim to go nap free and see what happens.

Thanks all for your comments