Daughter and sleep ruining my life

[Nomosapien]

I know it sounds dramatic but I am at my wits end and becoming depressed as a result of my almost 5 year olds sleep issues.

Shes such a brilliant child but she has been so clingy to me from birth and it’s such a challenge. I have tried everything over the years including crying it out which I am ashamed of but I was desperate. My daughter simply will not fall asleep unless I am in the bed with her. I can’t just be next to her, I can’t be in the room, I need to be physically with her and touching her for her to sleep. My partner (her dad) tries so hard to persist but she will scream for hours until I give in.

I put her to bed at 7pm usually, and I walk out of the room to feed my 5 month old and attempt to have some time with my partner once she has fallen asleep. After 20 minutes of leaving the room she screams until I come up. If I don’t hear immediately, she will come downstairs and cry uncontrollably even once I’m back in bed with her. On a good night she will wake twice and cry for me to come back. Christmas Day I was laying in bed with her for two and a half hours.

She also wakes in the night screaming and thrashing even when I’m in bed with her and it’s been known for her to cry and thrash violently for over an hour and she is utterly inconsolable during this time. Myself and my partner sleep in different rooms as a result.

I have tried explaining why I need to leave the room before she falls asleep so I’m not just disappearing. I have tried reward charts, bribery, positive reinforcement for other good behaviours, sitting next to the bed, sitting outside the bedroom, crying it out (when she was around 9 months), altering her diet and eating windows. She doesn’t nap at all so it’s not that either.

I would really like to hear some advice or experiences from anyone who has a similar child or can objectively offer a view on what I could do that I haven’t thought of.

My mental health is really suffering now.

Bedtime passes
If you think the not sleeping is a psychological thing then you could try something called bedtime tokens / bedtime passes. Start with a family meeting, draw up some sleep rules, get your child to suggest and draw them to give them some ownership.

Agree a reward. We used playmobil, I bought a camping set and split it all up, put the names of all the bits on individual slips of paper in a pot.

Make loads of tokens together. I mean loads. If the child gets up at bedtime or calls you in the night then that's absolutely fine and allowed, but costs 1 token. Put them in a pot by their bed. If there are tokens left in the morning, the child gets a reward. My daughters was whichever bit of the playmobil set was written on the slip of paper she drew out. Like a tombola. One day it would be a person or horse, the next day a fork or spoon! High stakes...

For the first few nights the child needs to succeed. So you need more tokens than they will use. My Daughter used more than 30 the first night. When they're in the swing of it, start to gradually reduce the number of tokens. It took us a few weeks to get down to 6. My daughter started to fail a few times and had to try. We got stuck at this level a while. Eventually we got down to 3 and at some point the system was gradually forgotten.

You can look this up, I believe it's called bedtime passes and there's a few articles out there.

Our main issue was night wakings rather than bedtime, my daughter would wake at 1:30am like a clock and not go back to sleep, sometimes at all. We found she needed to go to bed later for quite a long time then gradually move bedtime earlier in incremental steps. There is a technique used on insomniac adults where you work out how long you can sleep in a block without waking (xhrs), work out what time you need to get up, and don't go to bed until xhrs before then. We did that too. My daughter would sleep 6hrs then wake. We were on with morning at 6am. So if she'd have been an adult she would have stayed up till midnight for a week or more, aiming to sleep 12-6, then started creeping bedtime forward. We did 10pm bedtime.

We also went down the meditation visualisations route which she still uses. She's 8 now.

I hope it works!

Ok - the good news - either this is going to sort itself out eventually or you are definitely never going to have to deal with a teenage pregnancy! (Kidding - sort of - have been there with different nighttime issues - the no teenage pregnancies was my “laugh or cry” solution.)

I don’t have any specific advice - although I do remember a book called “the no cry sleep solution” being good when one of mine was terrible about sleeping. It is more for babies and toddlers but I think the ideas did extend to older kids. The thing I liked about it was it didn’t say “you must do this like this”. And then left me feeling a failure because I put them to bed at 7:03pm rather than 7pm. It just listed a load of things that might help. Some of which did. (A bit. But a bit was more than nothing.)

What I can say for sure though is that this is a temporary problem. It doesn’t feel like it. But there will be a time when you will say “I know it was terrible at the time but I do slightly wish that she would still go to sleep with me - I slightly miss it.”

It is so hard now. But you will get through it.

And that this is nothing to do with what you have or haven’t done as a parent. As my kids get older the more I realise that they are who they are. And that (as long as you don’t actually feed them to a tiger) it doesn’t matter all that much what you do as a parent.

OP I completely feel your pain. My DD is 9 and a half and has basically the same issue. She has never slept though the night of her own accord, always wanted me there.
As a single parent when she was really little I just rolled with it and fell asleep myself with her most the time.
Spent 6 years trying for help and eventually finally got to see a paediatrician who prescribed melatonin plus phenergan which knocks her out - but doesn't solve the issue of her wanting me near. I now have to sit on the floor outside her bedroom waiting for her to go to sleep and don't usually sit down till 9/9:30pm.
Saw a different paediatrician for the last check up who has suggested a sleep study of things haven't improved by the next appointment mid Feb.

I actually think it's an anxiety/ control kind of thing but it's so exhausting and draining to try and break and like you - i feel depressed.

My advice would be to take DC to the doctors and try to get help as soon as you can as it's taken me years and all we have at the moment is a mask for the real issue I feel x

Cmonluv

your son sounds like my niece I will mention to my sister about waking her if she gets a run of night terrors before hand

Her IQ has not been tested but As an example she was learning how to play chess at 7.00 pm on xmas day She had been awake 3 times that night hadn't settled until 8.30 and up at 6.30
She is 5 and a half years old to me I can't get my head round that
I know it's sounds odd but to my mind she us almost too bright. my own two are bright enough but nothing like that!!

Hi OP, firstly you sound like a lovely mum who is doing amazingly, I hope you give yourself credit for how difficult this situation is. My DD wasn’t as extreme as this but we did have difficult bedtimes for a while and I found the method mentioned by a PP of popping out the room for increasing periods of time but keeping your promise to return really worked well. It had super quick results for us in fact (though as I say, our issues weren’t as severe) but we still took it very slowly - first just popping to get something, then the next time to the loo, work your way up until you’re popping down for dinner but with a promise you’ll return - and absolutely do return so she builds up that sense of security that you’re still there. You may have tried this of course. I also agree that she probably would fare better with dad when you’re not home - has this been tested at all? Sending you every strength OP, it really is so difficult x

sending all of you hugs honestly dint know how you do it my sister is also a single parent and an older mum and believe me it's been relentlessly though she is a joy and a gift to have ignoring her sleep issues

It is the way these children are though I believe and nothing to do with people's parenting I honestly didn't realise until my niece came along

My incredibly bright DS was always like this. We eventually at age 6 managed to get him to sleep provided we followed a very very rigid routine that was basically 2hrs long. If we ever strayed from it, he just wouldn't sleep till gone 11 and would be awful the next day. He's also always woken at 5:45am on the dot since he was 1. Every day.

Anyway now at 9 we know that he has ADHD. He wasn't ever hyperactive in the 'traditional' sense but the lady who diagnosed him explained, obviously that it was high brain that was hyperactive... It all clicked. She also explained that people who are ND often don't produce enough melatonin which other people do. So she prescribed it and he now sleeps 8pm till 5:45 every night and just has a normal routine.

It could well be worth reflecting on other aspects of her behaviour and seeking more generalized advice.

Sleep problems don't always mean ND of course, but they can.

The poster who was talking about their chess playing niece though.... That's my son to an absolute t....

My DD is exceptionally bright and was a very difficult sleeper beyond age 5 - she’s 15 now and it’s all a distant memory. Didn’t like being left to go to sleep alone for a long time, and was still waking at night in reception.

My DS who has ADHD is the one who had night terrors at one stage though- but he was very small at the time.

@orangetriangle it's you with the niece. She sounds EXACTLY like my son. Exactly.

His life has changed in a hugely positive way since he was diagnosed.

5 year old should understand that this is not feasible for you especially with a new baby too. I'd go with the harsh approach at this stage I'm afraid. Sit at the end of the bed and say you're staying for 2 minutes then leaving. Stick to your guns. You can do it.

We have a similar, though not as bad situation here. My daughter expects me to stay in the same room as her while she goes to sleep and it’s exhausting. By that time I need a break.

I was taking about it with a friend who said that she had similar with her son, he needed her to lie next to him to go to sleep. She ended up taking him to a therapist who used cognitive behavioural techniques which really helped and solved the problem.

I used to believe in nurture being the main thing, now I believe in nature!

Gosh, my child is exactly the same! Interesting to read about high IQ and never being able to switch off, as my child is exactly like this and also gets night terrors! I roll with it but it is hard!

This was my thought exactly, maybe see your GP.

Has she ever stayed away from you for the night with grandparents or anyone?
Would anyone be willing to try having her for the night?
Just wondering if it could be built up to be a big adventure for her to stay somewhere else and help break the cycle that way.

He can add, subtract, multiple and divide into double digits, taught himself, just seems to get numbers and how they work. Can tell time despite not being taught. Will say things like, oh if it's 2 miles to this place and the sat nav says it'll be 6 mins that means we could drive there and back and it'll be 4 miles in 12 minutes. And has to extrapolate every thought in that way.

He started playing the switch with his dad aged 3 when I was pregnant and very poorly, he'd completed Mario Odyssey in a crazy short time and now has elaborate worlds in animal crossing and Minecraft.

One of the ways I help him settle to sleep si to start asking him progressively harder sums u til he's distracted enough to fall asleep by accident.

A lot of his brain power is used for less than ideal purposes as his ADHD means if he's interested he'll memorize everything and if not he just won't bother. As such I think he knows everything pokemon and their entire detailed histories and evolutions.

Anyway he never sleeps before 11pm, we're awaiting a sleep nurse referral in next. Couple fk weeks for medication. Those complaining they don't get to stop until 9.39, 9.30 is my dream.

And we've tried everything for years, it's been a complicated road which I've only recently accepted we need help with

You can do that all you like but with a kid who is trying to sleep but genuinely can't as d wants to do the right thing but can't the level of distress this causes is considerable.

This was dd. Velcro baby who initially couldn't be put down, then could, but would wake and come into our bed. Working ft meant it was easier to suck it up, but I fucking hated it and was exhausted for years- especially as older dc was an early riser.

She used to have night terrors and still sleepwalks. Wouldn't say she's exceptionally bright, or has a brain that's always on the go though. She was just needy. Then suddenly, around age 6, she stopped. No idea why. The sleep I've had in the last 6 years has been amazing. I thinkI'm still catching up.

Thank you all for your input.

I’m awake feeding my son but wanted to respond to a few things!

Regarding Co sleeping, this is what we do and have done her whole life. As a very young baby she would cry until she was blue if I put her in the car seat, Moses basket, pram or passed her to another person including her father. Co sleeping is the only way we survived!

She is very intelligent and funny. Her humour is very advanced for her age and she is quick witted. She is thriving at school. Her personality is huge, everyone we meet comments on it. I am so proud of her for so many reasons and I do believe that she is just a very intense personality type which helps me cope.

Regarding how many hours sleep she needs, she will sleep 7-7 providing I am with her in the bed, she needs a lot of sleep and so I don’t feel she’s going to bed too early.

I have approached the health visitor twice regarding her sleep and night terrors and they were useless. I haven’t yet gone tried the GP route so I will do this.

I do believe there are hints of ADHD in her behaviour and a stranger at the school once commented how she knows how hard it is to have a neurodiverse child when she saw my daughter having a meltdown. The school haven’t raised any concern, she is very well behaved there but will usually become highly emotional at school pick up. I do feel she masks a lot of her real feelings in school but don’t all children to some extent? I may sound naive there!

The waking and crying has always happened and is not a new thing. I was conscious that I didn’t want to change anything too drastically when my son was born because I didn’t want her to feel pushed out. When she was young I would just go to bed with her and stay there, but now I cannot do this. There are things I need to do in the evening and I am studying a diploma which I can only work on in the evenings.

Thank you for your comments, I feel less alone. I don’t know anyone personally who has a child that struggles with sleeping to this extent!

@Nannydoodles she has slept at my mums house twice. We have tried many other times but most of the time she cries and begs to be picked up and my poor mum ends up phoning me feeling upset and guilty. We always pick her up because I don’t like her being so distressed and also don’t want my mum to be overwhelmed. The two occasions she stayed with my mum, she woke frequently and needed to be in the bed with her as well!

I did this with my 3.5yo, including being sat on the landing with my feet in DCs bedroom so I was still there.

Now I put them to bed, say night and I'll come back in 5mins ("no mummy, 6minutes!") and I make sure that I always do.

It's definitely a long game!

Oh dear, it does sound hard!! You have my sympathy but remember it is only a temporary phase although that doesn’t help you now.
Definitely try the GP next, there may be something they can suggest.
I think it’s another problem made worse by lockdown unfortunately, so many young children now seem to have missed the early socialising and being away from their parents for periods of time. 💐💐

You poor thing.
Seek medical advice. There could be benefits of using Melatonin or other suitable medication.
You can not be without sleep - your needs are just as great as your daughter's sleep needs.

Have you tried having your husband be the one to ALWAYS get up to her? (while you sleep with headphones) Her need for YOU has to be overcome in the long term.

I would happily have my niece overnight but she won't stay overnight though I have her on lots of other occasions . Part of this I think is due to lickdown as I had her overnight as a small baby. I know her really well and she only lives round the corner my own 2 are grown up so would happily have her overnight but I don't want to upset het
Interesting how a lot if these kids have night terrors . I babysat her one evening and she woke in the evening and had one. omg never seen anything like it. You couldn't get anywhere near her shouting screaming lashing out. It was awful and if you ask her about it in the morning she doesn't remember. Also talks in her sleep and will go and for example pick.up a random object in her room and for example if it's a brush will say I need to brush my hair but she is asleep remembers nothing about it in the morning
Can get overwhelmed in the day if too much going on but worked out now to give her or tablet and or TV and that seems to regulate her!
Is also keen for a switch
Perfectly behaved at school and is flying already at end of year 1 stage and has only just started in year 1. One of these kids that is good at everything sport art as well as academia but boy is she competitive and always wants to be the best at everything
If only she would bl**dy well sleep
Harder sums as she is going to sleep it is then thanks for that idea we usually have to keep saying to her switch your brain off!!
Not keen on going down the medication route but then it's not me dealing with it