Another awful bedtime

[marykat2004]

I posted in 'sleep' before and ended up with a thread about physiological problems that could lead to sleep difficulties, like a high palate. But I don't think this is a physical problem; it is a behavioural problem.

My DD is 7. Rather than being easier to put to bed she is more and more difficult. She had her own room from 15 months. Settled herself to sleep by 18 months. She never needed anyone to be in the room while she was going to sleep, and in fact, on holidays where we had to share a hotel room, she would not settle with people in the room.

But now she "wants mummy" all the time. She wants mummy to stay while she goes to sleep. I've tried to sticking to a bedtime routine, tried putting her to bed later because she never falls asleep before 9 anyway. If I leave the room at 9, she seems to be quieter than if I leave the room at 8. if I leave at 8 she will get up and pester me until after 9 anyway.

So, instead of starting a long bedtime routine at 7 with the aim of sleep at 8, we start at 8, with the aim of sleep at 9.

tonight: she read, then I read, then she read again because we hadn't done her homework book yet. I unfortunately dozed off during the last book (DH has been in hospital and I have had a bad cold and am exhausted.) Then I tired to leave at 9. She kept chatting but I said that was enough. I left and shut the door, but I could hear her pestering and whining. Then I lost my temper, went in, and shouted and slammed the door. And now I feel awful.

I'm not expecting any answers. We're being referred to child psychology.

It just feels like the harder I try the worse things get. :(

well tbh while you are waiting to see a specialist there is nothing wrong, imo, with saying bedtime now, and shutting the door and ignoring pestering. She needs sleep, to be able to learn effectively at school and you need her to be abed at a reasonable hour

re jig the bedtime routine so that you do homework (before tea? before bathtime?) and thus reduce opportunities for delaying tactics

NB don't know your history

Sorry, we never usually have homework that late, that was just because we went xmas shopping after school and by the time we'd had our supper and watched a DVD that we had agreed on, it was late. I had promised the dvd, even though she was really badly behaved at dinner time, she calmed down, so we watched it. Actually I insisted on a shorter DVD because it was getting late.

She really doesn't go to sleep before 9. If I put her to bed at 8, it's extra pestering and crying, and often she is even awake at 10. Because she winds herself up, I guess. I don't know. We don't get up until 8.

I found chew marks on her bed, where she had bit the wooden railing. That is recent, in the last few weeks. She said "sorry", but it's not that she had ruined her bed, but that she is that anxious. She said she bit her bed because she "wants mummy". That is really a problem.

I did do a little survery of my own (on here) and it seemed that 7 pm is too early to start bedtime routine for a 7 year old. It's not that unusual to go to sleep at 9, but that's actual sleep at 9.