how do you deal with bedtime with toddler and 5 mo sharing a room?

[connyrabbit]

DS2 is 5 months old and he's still sleeping in our room but we'd quite like to move him to his room (he is outgrowing his moses basket), which is also DS1's who is almost 3.

DS1 goes to bed between 8 and 8.30, with a story and I sing some gentle songs. That is, when all goes well and there is no resistance. If he's not happy with the idea of bedtime he can be quite vocal, in and out of bed etc.
DS2 usually goes to bed quite easily, anytime from 7.30, as long as the surroundings are quiet. Yes, that is where the problem is.

Also DS1 has either nightmares, too hot, too cold, thirsty, blocked nose, you name it. There is always something that wakes him up at night.

And obviously DS2 is still waking up at night once or twice for a feed.

DS1 was moved into his own room when he was one month old (he was making so much noise he woke us up all the time - humming, chewing, squeaking in his sleep), so still having DS2 in our room feels really long.

So here is the background, and I am not even mentioning the problem of naptime...!

Thanks all!

I did it when my DD was 3, DS was 18m and DD was 6m.

disaster ! After a week I put DD6m back in our room. They were disturbing each other too much. Neither managed to get into a deep sleep,(the 3 year old did no problem ) I was up all night.

Others might have had a good experience, but mine was not

Thanks for your reply onEdge. Yep, that's what I'm expecting. But it does work for some people, I'd like to know how they do it!

Well my 2 boys are in the same room. I tried it when DS2 was 6 months, DS1 kept climbing into the cot (poking him through the bars wasn't enough!). I tried it again when DS2 was 1, same thing happened. Tried it again when DS2 was 15 months, yep, you guessed it, DS1 climbed into the cot and was dragging him around by his neck.

DS2 was in our room until he was 20 months old and I felt he had a fighting chance of fending off DS1, or at least could make enough noise to let us know what was going on.

DS1 was just so excited at sharing his room he couldn't leave DS2 alone. The excitement wore off after 3 months .

That's probably not what you wanted to hear! I'm sure someone has a positive room sharing story!

Second night here, DS is 3 and DD is 6 months, so far (hollow laugh emoticon) and in the certain knowledge it will now go totally wrong; it was fine last night, will let you know.....

2.5 yrs between my 2, but DD didn't move out of our room until she was nearly one.

To start with I worried about getting them both settled, but it seemed to work ok, mainly because DD still fed to sleep to start with. DS's bedtime routine was the usual story, tuck up and then leave him to it. He seemed capable of sleeping through any kind of shenanigans that DD was going through (and still is). DD still wants us sitting by the bed while she goes to sleep though.

Mr Bloom, your experience sounds exactly like what's cooking for us. DS1 will climb into the cot the minute I leave them on their own. And then god knows what he'll do to DS2, with the best of intentions!

emskaboo, I know it hasn't been long (best of luck with the rest), who do you put in bed first? Same time? Do you wait until one is asleep to put the other to bed?

DDs have been sharing a room since DD1 was 16 months and DD2 8 weeks. It has actually gone remarkably well; I bf DD2 whilst DH reads bedtime stories with DD1 (they're 24 months and 10 months respectively now). They are both able to sleep through the other one making a noise (for the most part - very occasionally they set each other off, but that's rare) and even if I'm putting them to bed on my own they both settle pretty well - DD1 will climb in to bed whilst I feed DD2. We haven't really had any nightmare nights as a result of them sharing; any bad nights have been due to other factors.

Just wanted you to know that it can work well

I put DD down first; DS waits in my and DH's room with a book. Then I go back to him read him a story and sneak him in to bed!

We put DD at 4 months into room with DS (18 mths). We fit her into his routine. She woke him when she woke for feeds at first but he learned to ignore it and roll over back to sleep. By 6 months she was sleeping through and so was he.

We would find him standing in his cot as if propping up a bar, talking to her while she lay on her back staring at him from across the room. And so began a (mostly) beautiful sibling relationship.

I have three DCs and we've never had any problems at all with room-sharing.

DD1 moved in with DS1 as soon as she was sleeping through the night (10 weeks), and then when DD2 arrived she moved in with DD1, and DS1 got his own room.

They didn't disturb each other at all, but often the older one would climb into the cot and I'd find two (or even three) DCs cuddled up together. Even if one woke in the night it would rarely wake up the other one. I've changed wet sheets etc. with the light on, and the other sibling snoring away oblivious.

Now we have a 4-bed house, they each have their own room, but the DDs still often choose to sleep together in the same bed!

ok so there are a few positive stories here - we'll give it a try then. I'm just nervous of DS1 trying to climb into the cot (he's in a toddler bed now so nothing can keep him in if he doesn't want to), because I know he wants to and he is able to do it.

Emskaboo, I'll try your method. How did your third night go BTW?

Last night not so great, but nothing to do with them sharing! DD has just started rolling and keeps getting stuck and waking herself up. DS slept through it all though, phew. Good luck

It depends on the DCs! You can only give it a go and then decide whether the disturbance of having the baby in your room is worse than the chaos of them sharing or vice versa!!

My 2 are 5 and 3yo now and have tried twice to put them in the same room now (we do have enough rooms for them to have their own bedrooms but really need to change the small room into an office for DH). Its been a total nightmare.
DS1 can only sleep with the door shut and in complete darkness. DS2 can only sleep with the door wide open and the hall light left on. DS2 goes to sleep the minute his head hits the pillow. DS1 potters about his room for a while before fallling asleep, chattering to himself and singing etc.

When they shared (and we stuck it out for about 3 months of hell just in case it suddenly settled down!) they were both kept awake for a couple of hours every evening after being put to bed because they were disturning each other. They were overtired and we were all ratty!

Expecting DC3 soon so we will have to attempt it again in the near future, but at the moment I am thinkking that the new baby will have to go into share with one of them rather than DS1 and DS2 attempting to share again as they are just not compatible!!

I guess we were lucky then! I suppose I always assumed it would work; like a lot of people with more kids than bedrooms we had little choice!

I think it all depends on how easily your DCs can settle themselves, particularly after the odd middle-of-the-night disturbance. From an early age we tried to "train" the DCs to get themselves to sleep, without the aid of rocking/feeding/lights etc, and this really paid off when they started to share rooms.

My now 3 and 4 year olds have shared a room since DD2 was a day old. DD1 was just about to turn 1 when DD2 was born. I had DD2's cot positioned as soon as you went in the room, and in the night I would go in pick her up and take her out the room to feed and then return her. DD1 slept through it all, there was never a problem. Now when they don't have to share a room they still do as they like it, and there isn't a problem. I have had a good experience as obviously DD1 was young at the start but I was genuinely surprised as I was expecting all sorts of problems but there weren't.

DD is 28 months and DS 9 months and have just moved DS from our room into DD's. Working really well. It helps that DD is still in her cotbed, she could climb out if she really wanted to but never has, I think she likes it being enclosed.

We get them ready for bed, DS has a last bottle of milk just before 7pm then a quick baby book, brush teeth, into the sleeping bag and into his cotbed. On a good day DH is getting DD ready, or if I'm alone she just watches some cbeebies while I sort DS out. DD then has her stories and teeth and then into bed too. DS is often asleep in the 5 minutes it takes to read, last night he stirred awake when I put DD down but he is calm and they both drifted off to sleep fine.

In the mornings they chat to each other. It's cute. I ignore them until 7am unless one of them is really asking for us, as opposed to chatting away loudly to themselves. I think the time together seeing each other but safely behind bars might help them - DS pulls DD's hair and weighs the same as her now, and she can be pushy towards him when he grabs her toys, so parallel cotbeds is a calm space to interact for them both