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Original poster

really need help 2yr old screaming all night

70 replies

ladythatlunches · 28/05/2013 08:36

Hi, my dc is 2yr 4 months.

Always been a good sleeper, she has a good routine bath milk put down to bed and she falls straight to sleep. Never ever had a problem .....

Until 2 weeks ago. She went to bed as normal. Woke up at 2am crying and screaming. She wouldn't lie back down I gave her a cuddle the she wouldn't get back in bed.

I thought maybe a nightmare so I brang her in bed. She stopped crying but didn't go back to sleep just played with my eye lids and banging my head till 6am when I just got up.

Since then we have had one night where she refussed to go to bed screaming sobbing.
I've tried everything from letting her cry it out. Giving her cuddles. Sleeping in her bed with her. Sleeping in floor next to her, even giving her a drink and calpol.

She is 1 of 5 and having about 2 hours sleep at night is draining me im exhausted.

If anyone can help or offer advice I would be so grateful

OP posts:
Sarah1611 · 29/05/2013 21:25

How's it going now?

preggersbycheggers · 29/05/2013 21:34

We have just been through this. It was an utter nightmare and I totally feel your pain.
I thought initially it was the transfer from cot to bed but I don't think it was. Think it was more developmental and growth spurt issues.
It took a few nights of being hard on him and we also put a stair gate on his door. He would get up in the night, shake it and shout for me but I knew there was nothing wrong. It was also like he had forgotten how to self settle.
I can now put him down for a nap and bedtime and he stays in bed and even just chatters away for a bit.
We occasionally have early morning wakings but things are getting better. I also cut his nap to 1hr 30 mins max and make sure lights are out by 730 PM.
I hope things improve for you.

Original poster
ladythatlunches · 29/05/2013 21:50

She is still going strong :(

OP posts:
Sarah1611 · 29/05/2013 22:02

Keep going! You can (and need to) beat this! She's fine, she's just very cross with you right now.

Original poster
ladythatlunches · 29/05/2013 22:51

Ok so after s hour of more screaming she started coughing and sounds husky.

I went in laid her down tucked her in and turned my back on her. She was fine because I was there then every now and then I moved towards the door. Sge kept sitting up when I moved but lied back down when she saw I was still there.

When i got to door I left it open she said no no I said shhh shhhhh

She went to sleep and snoring.

Not sure who won that round

OP posts:
Sarah1611 · 29/05/2013 23:15

Don't feel bad- sounds like it went well :-) as a general tip, try to avoid lingering in her room if you can. That adds a lot of anticipation into the mix; the child knows at some point you will leave and so concentrates hard as they will be waiting until they need to 'stop you leaving' and will struggle to relax and therefore fall asleep, but in general you stuck to your guns, you should feel pleased with yourself!

If she wakes later, same as before- consistency is key. She needs to know with no doubt whatsoever what you're going to do, and that waking up for it isnt worth it. She will soon no longer feel the need to wake and shout in the night as its pointless- nothing interesting or exciting happens.

Imagine it as an adult- often an adult may wake at random times in the night only to see the time and fall straight back to sleep- barely memorable. The problem often with children is often that they are surprised to have woken up in the night, so they shout and an adult comes in providing lots of entertainment which can then start off a habit for many other nights to come.

Good luck! Keep doing what you're doing! :-D

DewDr0p · 29/05/2013 23:24

Had something similar with ds3 - couldn't get to the bottom of it - started with the onset of teething (came late for us at 15 months) and didn't stop until every single tooth was through. (there were brief periods of respite in between teeth)

Ds also has glue ear and I suspect ears may have been a factor. Although GP checked them and said they were OK.

Has she got all her back teeth? I'd check her gums if not and get her ears checked too.

Before we had our hellish experience with ds I'd possibly have thought you needed to tough it out. Eventually at the total end of my tether I tried that - omg it was awful - it took 2 weeks of him crying for over an hour and a half before it stopped. We had a week or so of better sleep and then it all started again. We ended up co-sleeping and taking it in turns to escape to the spare room every now and then.

Hang on in there OP, I know how hard this is. Btw once his teeth were through ds started sleeping through overnight and has been brilliant ever since (he's nearly 6 now)

Original poster
ladythatlunches · 30/05/2013 07:04

Thank you.

She seams to have all her teeth.

Well she stayed askeep :) didn't wake at her usual 1:30 and just awake now actually happy.

She seams to now have a cough. I think from all the screaming she did she dried her throat out.

OP posts:
Sarah1611 · 30/05/2013 08:09

Great! Honey is good for throats and coughing, will help to soothe at the very least :-)

Original poster
ladythatlunches · 30/05/2013 08:49

She seams to have a full on cold this morning. But happy and ok in her self just cough and snot.

OP posts:
Original poster
ladythatlunches · 30/05/2013 17:47

She went down really well tonight. :)

We got her a peppa pig night light and she wanted to cuddle it in bed so that was fine.

Fingers crossed she behaves tonight dd and ds are have there friends sleeping over tonight.

OP posts:
coronalover · 30/05/2013 18:40

Well done!. I second what Sarah said about consistency.. I've had all kinds of issues with my DS sleeping and as long as you pick a strategy and stick to it you will win in the end :)

Original poster
ladythatlunches · 30/05/2013 20:30

She is still firmly asleep eeeeek.

Tad nervous about going to sleep because she will wake. . I know she will. But I will do what I did last night. Can't let her cry it out tonight because dc's friends are staying.

OP posts:
Sarah1611 · 30/05/2013 21:47

Sounds like its going well :-) remember you now have a bargaining tool with the peppa pig. So if worst comes to worst (she may up the ante as 'the usual' isn't working) and you're more stuck as other children are there, a very clear 'no shouting now, it's sleep time- peppa pig doesn't like it so if you shout then mummy will take her out' will hopefully help you.

Above all- try and be as consistant as possible. Try the exact same thing as yesterday as mentioned but be aware that she may be wise to it! They're so clever these little ones, they learn very quickly!

FourLittleDudes · 30/05/2013 21:53

I have a similar almost 2 year old. He has never slept for longer than 2 hours and screams for almost an hour when he wakes up and discovers I'm not in bed with him. I spend all evening trying to creep out of his room and have usually given up around midnight when he climbs into my bed and carries on flailing around and shouting during the night. He doesn't have a day time nap and hasn't for a year now.

He is one of four - my youngest is just 17 weeks.

Its exhausting.

Ledkr · 30/05/2013 22:14

Well done op. we've had similar with our number 5 also 2.
We had to get tough as well. I also find she's better if all boxes are ticked.
Well fed all day, a nap but not after 3pm.
Fresh air and exercise.
I hate it when she's waking as like your dd she doesn't go back off no matter what.

betterthanthat · 30/05/2013 22:24

Hope you've cracked it! Just wanted to mention that if it does continue, might be worth just bearing in mind it could just possibly be worms (urgh!). Only anecdotal but I know of 2 children of similar ages where this turned out to be the source of night waking and screaming. Once treated the waking stopped. I'm sure its v unlikely but thought worth mentioning.

katefirsttimer · 30/05/2013 22:36

I feel your pain.
When our son comes out of routine for reasons from being poorly to being on trips, he is a night mare to fall back into a routine and often puts up a fight going to bed and wakes in the night full of beans wanting to play.

He was poorly 2 weeks ago, since then hes been waking in the night.
Last night he woke 3 times, eventually we left him crying, more of an angry scream. It was hard leaving him but each time we had checked on him he (a) dry (b) no temp (c) not crying when we was with him.
He screamed for about 20 minutes till he realised we wasn't going to be taking part in a middle-of-the-night play hour. He woke this morning in a lovely mood.

Original poster
ladythatlunches · 31/05/2013 08:53

She slept all night not a peep :)

She has had lots of praise this morning.

It's just awful when they do it as you really don't have a clue what's wrong or how to stop it.

OP posts:
Kiwiinkits · 31/05/2013 09:27

Just to second the poster who said it could be worms. If its worms they'll usually wake about 1-2 hours after going to bed and will be visibly squirming and grizzly. VERY common in two and three year olds.

Original poster
ladythatlunches · 31/05/2013 11:06

No I don't think it is. It was around 1:30am nearly every night and then started playing up going to bed.

No squirming or looking uncomfy just wanted to get up.

OP posts:
Sarah1611 · 31/05/2013 11:47

Yay! That's great! :-) hopefully you'll get lots of interrupted nights now, hooray! xx

Original poster
ladythatlunches · 31/05/2013 12:09

I hope so. :)

We have friends over tonight so hope she behaves

OP posts:
SofiaAmes · 31/05/2013 12:15

I second the suggestion to get her ears checked. Dd did a lot of night waking around that age. Hers were mostly night terrors, so i did more ignoring than most. However at some point they got worse and we were at gp for completely different reason and he checked her ears and it turned out she had a massive ear infection and a fever (ds was my first and always got very very high fevers when he got them, so I hadn't even noticed that dd had fever (it was only a 100 or so and that's a normal temp for ds)).

LittleMilla · 31/05/2013 12:28

We're going through something similar with DS, same age. I posted in sleep a couple of weeks ago.

He managed to let me know in toddler language that the door MUST be left open. The wakings were coinciding with us shutting it too much (I KNOW!!) and if/when he's waking I'm just taking him in to the spare room with me. Averaging about once a week at the moment. ANd like your DD OP, he won't go back down in his room so it's easier to just whip him in to another bed before he wakes up too much.

Really think it's developmental so I'm not overly worried about the odd night in bed with us TBH. We've just tried to be super firm about going to bed - so leave him as much as possible to fuss and faff.

I'm 33 weeks pg with DS2 though so praying that this lovely phase passes quite soon.

Just think - if they've been good up until now, the odd night isn't going to end it all. Right? (she says slightly high-pitched and nervous!)