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Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Worried about my son’s sleep

30 replies

Theheadmasterritual · 07/07/2021 21:13

He’s almost 3 years old and he’s constantly tired and grumpy during the day, as most nights he won’t go to sleep until gone 9pm. Sometimes nearer 10, which for a child of his age isn’t great. We take him up at 7/7:30 and give him a bath, read him a story and usually lay with him until he falls asleep, we’ve been doing this since he was tiny and back then I breastfed him too. He also has a milk before bed (cows milk now).
The past couple of months he’s been running around the room, jumping on the bed, talking at the top of his voice, turning the lights on and off and generally just not going to sleep until sometimes 10pm.
We are both working quite intense and difficult jobs and don’t get any down time in the evening because of this, we take it in turns to put him to bed but it means one or the other of us doesn’t get an evening and we can never spend it together.
He also wakes up at 6:30 everyday, sometimes earlier, so he’s getting very little sleep overall. He rarely wakes in the night. Today he had a nap for an hour and a half, but it’s always in the mid afternoon, so 2ish and occasionally he can’t be roused until 4/4:30pm which is what happened today. I kept waking him and he kept laying back down and going to sleep. I can never get him to have a nap any earlier, he just fights his tiredness, even in the car.
He’s upstairs with his dad now and I can hear him running around, throwing things, shouting and laughing.
I don’t know what we’re doing wrong, we try and keep a good routine in place, bath, book and bed but it’s just not working Sad
I just want us to have an evening together and for him to not be constantly grumpy and moody because he’s so tired.

OP posts:
HumpHumpWhale · 07/07/2021 21:48

Drop the nap. And start bedtime later for a while until he's going to sleep fast, then start gradually moving it up to the time you actually want it to be.
Nap transitions are BRUTAL. With my oldest he was still going to bed fine, but getting up for the day at 4am. Youngest was staying up late like yours. Neither is fun, but staying up late was actually easier to sort!

Orangeinmybluelightcup · 07/07/2021 21:49

My sister had this with her little one, she was adamant he needed the nap, but yeah it had to go! Chicken and egg situating really. I agree with pp you keep him awake any which way you can. Be out of the house at the park. No car. No TV. Any time after 6pm can be bedtime.

AgentJohnson · 07/07/2021 22:03

You’re not doing anything wrong but you need to break the cycle. Take the lightbulb out. Make napping in the car difficult, if it’s a longish drive break up the journey by doing a food shop.

I used to walk with DD after dinner, just to knacker her out.

It is a phase, a very brutal one.

Bathsandnaps · 07/07/2021 22:09

You could pop him down for a 30 minute nap at 11, like a power nap.
Consider starting bedtime earlier, at about 6,down for 6.45

OnTheBenchOfDoom · 07/07/2021 22:30

Is his room dark? My two had and still have blackout blinds and blackout curtains. If they kept turning the light on I would take the bulb out or turn off upstairs lights at the consumer unit. Tell him it's broken now.

Completely ignore him, no eye contact, no talking. Be boring as hell.

Definitely shorten his nap time. Remove clothing if you have to, I used to put a chocolate biscuit under Ds2's nose, that worked.

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