At true breaking point with sleep

[Essexmummy88]

Posting here for traffic sorry.

I have a 3 and 2 year old, they are both the worst sleepers. Neither have napped since before turning one, and they are a struggle to get down. Have to sit with Each for half an hour. They go down at 6-7 and by ten both are up. The 3 year old is in a toddler bed to wanders down if I’m still up or into my bed if not. By 3am the 3 year old who is in a cot in my room wakes screeching and comes into my bed too.

They both kick abs fight either side or me poking each other and snatching the duvet, then when this gets boring they begin poking me, pulling my hair and laughing. We are all up abs downstairs by 5am without fail.

I just don’t know what to do anymore, I Am truly exhausted and I don’t have the energy to play with them, I am beginning to resent them which is an awful feeling

About six months ago the perinatal health visitor who I was still seeing referred us to another lady who was an “expert” on sleep who said to put them in their bed/cot and just leave them. I tried it, it didn’t work, and I couldn’t bear it.

Sorry I say it didn’t work, it worked in the sense that they both eventually cried themselves to sleep but I felt horrid.

Please help me! I can’t go on like this, I look and feel ill

I'm of the old school. Crying themselves to sleep for a night or two
so they actually learn sleep and betime means bedtime and have a mother who can play with them and function seems preferable to me.

@AperolWhore

At that age they both should be down for 7pm latest and both napping for 1.5-2 hours per day. Do they have white noise machines in their rooms, pitch black rooms with no lights anywhere and a set bedtime routine such as dinner, bath, story then bed?

I can highly recommend the blissful baby expert and even if you paid for one call with her she would be able to help x

Most three year olds I knew including all my own and friends etc didn’t have a nap of that length at 3pm although I do think in may contribute to over-tiredness in many cases it just depends on the individual child

Also it’s unhelpful to (falsely) state all children of a certain age should be in 7pm by a certain time. They are not machines and it’s not the case that one size fits all.

That sounds very hard.
I do think you are go to have to get stricter though, not to the point of using a dressing gown cord to tie the door shut, but not let them get in your bed and guide them back to their room every single time. Unless, of course, there is something wrong. Don’t engage in any conversations and if they need reassurance briefly give it, but repeat something bland like it’s nighttime now, get back in bed.

Do you have to work?

I know it was and is even worse when my determination to get them to bed for the right reasons became stress and that is transmitted to them making them more wakeful

Why not try keeping them up til 10 for a couple of weeks to see if that works? Surely it couldn't be any worse than than how your lives are now?

You could try putting them down a bit later so that they are tired. My 3yo doesn’t nap and only sleeps just over 10 hours a night. I put him down at 8-8.30 so that he’s not up before 6am.

I find lots of activity in the day helps too.

My 2 year old goes to bed at 8. Earlier and she'd be up again after a few hours having 'finished her nap'.
Can you bribe the 3 year old? My eldest had a star chart to go to bed by herself when she was 3.5 years old.
Sleep deprivation is the worst, you have my sympathy.

I think the advice you were given by your health visitor was actually good. Let them cry it out.

You are at breaking point. That's no good fore your kids.

I promise they won't feel abandoned. Just do it, you have no choice really. I had the same experience as @Skinnymimi

sounds absolutely rubbish. Baths worked up one of mine up too, so we do it in the morning (and they play in the bath whilst I have a cup of tea, so an extra morning break).

We did cry it out (elder dc) and gentle retreat (younger dc) about this age, toddlers have enough experience of you coming back to know you will come back but I know sometimes you just can't. Was miserable though.

Being with them isn't resulting in better sleep is it? If you lay down with them and they took a while to go to sleep and then were out cold for hours, then you'd just keep doing that but this sounds a nightmare.

How are their HV assessments? The 2 year old checks.

I don't know about the bedtimes, sometimes moving bedtime a bit later can help, sometimes it makes no difference.

Can the HV refer you to a sleep clinic? I'm in Scotland and there's a great support line called sleep Scotland which I found useful.

I'd be tempted to try moshi and a gentle retreat (so you are in the room but not in bed with them).

@Essexmummy88

Fair enough to the poster saying 7 is early but I need some sort of alone time and evening to myself so I’m not having them up any later, I can’t.

Presumably your older child is not in bed at 7pm though. Or your useless partner.

Do you need/want the younger ones up at 5am?

There are huge issues in your relationship (from your other thread) so whilst this is not great, you’re not going to be “happy” just by fixing your children’s sleep - they’ll be picking up on the DV/excessive drinking as well.

In that case I would be getting them both up at 10 and putting them on the potty. I don’t think 6:30-7 is early. Mine went at that time at that age. I used to put mine in the cot with a bit of warm milk and a bit of a headstroke. Don’t worry about the milk. I think my dd was 3 and a half before we got rid of that. Nothing wrong with her teeth. It’s soothing and comforting. I’d get rid of the light projector and just have a dim night light.

Hi @Essexmummy88 this is a complete nightmare I really feel for you. I sleep trained using CIO at 4 months so to most of the rest of Mumsnet I’m the devil incarnate. BUT I had a supportive partner to help me out and it was still very tough with our determined little boy. Here’s what I think.

1. Are they getting plenty of fresh air and exercise in the day? Old fashioned it may be, but my experience is that kids (and boys in particular) are like dogs: feed them and run them ragged to make sure they’re tired enough to sleep.

1. A bedtime routine is key, in my experience. My little boy is 2 and 4 months and there’s a sequence of events we follow pretty much every night. He is our only so we do have the luxury of being able to do this but now he knows what happens and what is coming next. For us, it’s dinner around 1800 on return from nursery, some playtime, bath, milk in front of 15 mins of Thomas on telly, teeth brushing, stories, lights out 1930-2000. When We say “teeth” he now knows it’s time to stop watching telly and we are in the home strait before sleep.

But I’m afraid between now and then there’s some crying to be got through - as PPs have said, will probably take 7-10 days. Do you have a anyone who could help?

Some children need to be taught HOW to sleep well and that process can be stressful.

My kids didn’t nap at 3, they certainly wouldn’t have napped for 1.5-2 hours at that age!

Agree about the naps. I think mine had an hour about 11:30 at 2 but definitely none by 3

Well, you may want an evening but I have a very nice one from 7.30/7.45 and then DS doesn't wake at 10 after a "nap" as someone else said.

I think there is an awful lot going on here tbh.

You get one to bed 6.30 for 7pm, older one 7pm for 7.30pm (can your oldest one occupy the 3 year old whilst you put the 2 year old to bed).

I would resettle the 3 year old on their room. They stay in their bed and you can lay on the floor (I would actually have a spare mattress on the floor).

Same with 2 year old they stay in their cot next to your bed. This would be easier if your partner is still around tbh.

I wouldn't be surprised if they are over tired tbh.

When you have a good nights sleep you can be the happy mum with energy to play and enjoy your little people. Stop worrying about leaving them to sleep they will not suffer abandonment issues, after a week or so they will just go to sleep. A three year old may not nap during day but at 2 I’d expect a nap if they won’t at all then 6pm bedtime sounds like a good idea child must be exhausted! How about leaving them asleep in your bed and going into their room to sleep!! Sleep is so important it will be hard at first but make a bedtime routine and stick to it.

I found sleep begets sleep, it sounds counterintuitive but a well rested child sleeps better. So anything you can do to get a nap during the day? A drive, a walk with the buggy, anything which gets a nap in. Then regular bedtime, 7pm is fine. Then let 2yo cry it out they won't do it for more than a night or 2. If the toddler gets up, then boring mantra of 'you need to go back to bed, it's sleep time' and returning to bed, repeat and repeat and repeat, it may be innumerable times at first, but do not give in, they have to understand you mean it and there's no staying up. If this sounds undoable with both, pick baby first then handle toddler once baby is sorted. If you're committed then you could have this sorted within a week.

There is an awful lot going on yes. My older one is not in bed by 7 no but he is a teen now so spending time with him is a pleasure not a constant battle. And he said I’ll spend a lot of time upstairs playing games etc anyway.

I wouldn’t mind the early wakings if I could sleep through so I’m not going to try and make their bedtime later, or force naps, it just won’t happen. I Take them to playgroups every morning and then to the park or a walk round town, there isn’t much more I can do. I’ll have to get tougher.

I remember your other thread. Are you still with your horrifically abusive partner?

I used the Ferber method (the new version book that includes co sleeping and breastfeeding) as was being woken hourly by 2yo and nearly lost my job due to a massive mistake I made being so tired.

If you do it correctly you are not abandoning then, just leaving longer intervals before reassuring then you're still around. It took 4 nights all in, absolutely with it and regretted not doing it sooner.

Sleep deprivation is the worst.

Loads of good advice on here already but for what it's worth my top tips would be:

A sleep clock, both mine have an app on old mobile phones stuck to the wall in their rooms, the sun comes on at a set time, when I started it they both got a treat if they stayed in their beds/tried to go back to sleep until the 'sun came up'. I set it for early to start with (5am) and then crept it later as they got the hang of it.

No lights, or at least an environment that is consistent. They need to see whenever they wake up everything looks the same every time, that way they don't know if it's morning/afternoon or otherwise

A bedtime routine that is done in low light levels and is the same every night. We go upstairs at six with very few lights on for stories. Yawn a lot yourself while you are reading to them even if you have to fake it. Leave them with dinner very quiet relaxing music to get them off.

If they do get up pretend they have woken you up, it's the middle of the night and just put them back to bed, point out the sun isn't up.

Everything with kids takes a while to stick, like others have said on here, pick what you want to try and try it absolutely consistently for at least a week before you give up.

I have two 4 and 6. Both are in bed by 7, asleep by half past and don't come out of their rooms until 7 the next morning. Sometimes though we have glitches where one or both of them tries to push the boundaries.

Good luck OP. Lack of sleep is miserable.

I would also recommend a read of Gina Ford although a lot of mnetters think she is the axis of evil, like any thing pick and choose the bits that you think will work for you.

Thanks to everyone. Lots of ideas I’m going to research now

@DukkaTheHallsWithBoughsOfHolly yes, I caved when I was desperate for help with the children

This sounds exhausting OP, sympathies

I only have the one DS but he was a rubbish sleeper too. Seconding the Groclock recommendation - I got DS one when he was 3.5 and honestly it was miraculous, he just seemed to "get" that he had to stay in bed when the stars were on and stopped shouting out/getting up through the night, or was much easier to settle when he did.

I'd also try putting them to bed an hour or so later and see if that helps with sleeping through.

Good luck - this too shall pass!

Are you sure they don’t need naps? They sound chronically overtired. Even just every couple of days.

DS aged almost 3 doesn’t nap at nursery, and on those nights he’s asleep at 7, sometimes 6.30. On days he has a nap he can lie in his cot until about 8.30ish before falling asleep. We’d usually put him down on those days about 7.30.

They defo sound v tired.