5.5 year old- sleep problems and bad behaviour- PLEASE HELP!

[Norah]

Hi everyone,

Some of you may have read my other thread last week - and as a result I have managed to get my dd to have two full night's sleep with the aid of Medised - don't jump on me for drugging her please - I had enough of that on the other thread !

Problem is - I can't keep giving her Medised - and now I have stopped she is regularly awaking at 10.30 ish and crying - when I go in to her she can't explain why she is crying - she just says she wants a cuddle ! So she gets a cuddle - and then we leave and the crying escalates and she lies there shouting for us - getting crosser and crosser and usually she is awke for well over an hour ! Just when we are going to bed.

She is utterly irrational during this waking - but she is definitely awake and very cross !

As a result of this waking she is really overtired and very stroppy, emotional and difficult during the day.

Nothing seems to work with her - as I type she is in her room having a tantrum with dh holding her door shut (as recommended in 123 Magic book!)

We are both at the end of our tethers here - so if you have had this problem and solved it I would love to hear how ! It all just seems like such a battle at the moment !

Thanks xxx

No-one ?

I would leave her to cry tbh. What about a star chart for each night she sleeps through.

Sorry to hear that you are having problems with your little one sleeping too.

I have a 2 year old who has just gone to sleeping in a bed and has decided that his waking times are midnight and 0200 hrs. I was also advised to give my ds medised, which i did do, but this hasn't stopped him from waking.

My dh has taken it upon himself to give ds medised as a matter of routine before bedtime, which i am not happy about.

Last night I decided not to give medised and ds still woke at his normal times.

I am also at the end of my teether and don't know what to do. We, like yourselves have also tried leaving him to cry, standing outside his room and every time he gets up we put him back to bed, keeping conversation short, holding the door shut, the list goes on and on.

I also considered starting a wall chart but to be honest with you will a 2 year old understand what it is all about !! probably not. It might work for you though, and anything is worth a try at the end of the day.

Unfortunately I have no solutions and logged on to mumsnet to see if anyone else had any useful ideas which I could try.

Good luck !!

Hi Norah, I read your other thread and I don't blame you one bit for using medised for a night or two. I suggested on there you could try handing bedtimes and night wakings over completely to your DP/DH. This worked an absolute dream for us..would you give this a go?

The thing behind it for us is that my DS is just that bit less clingy with his dad and it had a miraculous effect on him, completely stopping his numerous nighttime wanderings to come and get me...

what do you think?

Hi again - thanks for replying !

She is on a star-chart, mainly for the sleeping problems - she gets a star for going to bed nicely (ie. without a tantrum) and another for sleeping through and not waking us before the lamp comes on. Her reward for this week was going to be a Charlie and Lola DVD - but she had lost the chance to get it by Thursday ! Maybe next week !!

Sparklemagic - great idea and I wish it would work - sadly it is Daddy she wants all the time - and him she is always shouting for ! We tend to share the going in to her.

Last night we left her to cry - it seemed to go on for hours - she makes such a racket now !

Tonight she is in bed early as she is very tired - and has had a nice drink of warm "nighttime milk" - so fingers crossed. We have also started the 123 Magic method of discipline today - and although she has been sent her room about 5 times - we think she is responding to it !

Tell me it's a phase !

Lozzylooloo - you have my sympathies - I think we had a spate of it at 2 or 3 too - but it was quite short-lived ! Trying to remember what we did - I do remember a painful time where the only way anyone could get any sleep was to have dd in a readybed on our floor ! Wasn't for long - but I think it got us back on track with sleep anyway ! Actually have just remembered we put the cot back up - and tried agian when she was 3 - she just wasn't ready at 2 ! Sorry - not much help ! Will see if I can remember anything more useful !

ok, so maybe for you guys it could be the other way round, let it always be you who goes in to her. Be consistent, she can have comfort but she cannot have her dad, cannot have both of you. If it's her dad she wants, and she is getting that at the moment, there is every reason for her to continue waking in the night. I don't mean to consign you to being up every night, hopefully this might change things quite quickly, and if it doesn't you could re-think. When me and DH swapped the other way, it worked within two nights.

I would suggest when you go into her, do not talk to her at all. Give her comfort, a cuddle, then when she's not hysterical I would sit down and look away from her, close your eyes and ignore her completely. I think make getting you in her room much less rewarding to her in terms of talk, and attention. Don't ask her why she is crying, don't engage with her at all. be a brick wall!

I'm sure the daytime behaviour will improve when her nights are bettr, and it sounds like you are dealing with it in exactly the right way, so I would just say for the moment, until her sleep is better, make life easier for everyone and ignore as much silliness as you possibly can bear to; when you can't or shouldn't ignore, use the 123 thing.

I'm rambling again, hope some of this helps, and best of luck!

Hi our dd is going through the same, we got her a cd player and play her stories (disney ones ) as she lay down in bed, if she plays up the go off, tapes work too, bit of a hit and miss i think it;s a faze as dd 5 has always been good at sleeping i think it's them asserting themselfs????? good luck xxxxx

Hi Norah, also followed your previous thread. I know you don't want to go on indefinately with the medised, but maybe another couple of days won't hurt to break the habit. Another trick I've done with my three when there have been dificult time is to do this thing I read somewhere called love bombing. You give DD total attentention for a couple of days non stop telling her how wonderful she is, playing etc - nothing else. Works well if any other children go to grannies or somesuch. Then you continue the positive stuff as life goes back to normal, but it means that when you have to clamp down and be a cross mummy, she responds better because she is so absolutely sure of her place in your life. Also you don't feel the same guilt at having to get tough.

I find I ahve to do this from time to time, partly due to having 3 close together and actually it's lovely.

In the meantime CD wise there was a company making CD fairy tales that were sort of meditations to help kids to sleep. The woman making them was on the BBC2 program Dragons Den - sounded good.

sorry for going on.

Hi glassofwine - love bombing sounds interesting ! Am thinking that she is really "playing us" with this behaviour - and there must be something behind it ! Trouble is it's a self prophesying circle - the worse she is the more she gets told off - so the worse she is again ! Love bombing definitely sounds an idea !

She's just been asleep for little over an hour and is currently lying in bed shouting "Daddy.......Daddy....Daddy.....I want a cuddle" followed by much heart-broken crying ! We have been ignoring for 25 mins but now she has moved to the top of the stairs and is sobbing uncontrollbaly ! I know there is nothing wrong with her - I just know !

Have now just yelled up to her her two warnings and she carried on - so now I have said that if I hear her voice again I will cancel her outing with her best friend on Tuesday ! Today we were meant to be going to a safari park and that was cancelled due to last night ! I feel so mean - and I'm not even sure that she gets it !

Am beginning to wish I could run away ! This is toooooooo hard !!!

That would drive me nuts too Norah. Sorry, didn't read your other thread so don't know the whole story. What time does she go to bed?

If I understood correctly, she goes to bed and drops off ok but then wakes up again 10.30ish.

Dd is the same age and goes to bed around 7.45, gets a story, cuddle etc. I leave the room. After a bit she trots out discussing this and that, goes back when I tell her to but reappears again and again. Puts on a story tape, then the other side and finally drops off at about 9.30.

I wonder if she needs less sleep now. I used to put her to bed at 7.30, she'd be fast asleep at 8. The new behaviour started maybe 6 weeks ago.

Norah, time for a v large glass of wine. Best of luck

Hi Ssandy - yes she goes to bed at 7pm and is usually dropping by then - and for the last maybe 3 weeks she has been waking up at 10.30 ish and having a tantrum ! She's always been an early waker - usually about 5.30 - but since this waking up has been happening she's been sleeping until a little later !

The story tape idea sounds good - I have been reluctant to let her have a machine in her room as I thought she was too young (electrics and all that) but maybe I should get some batteries and try it !

She says she doesn't know why she has woken up - and doesn't know why she is crying ! I just say - well don't do it if you don't have a reason ! Have told her the "boy crying wolf story" several times lately !

Maybe she is physically tired - but not ready to sleep ! will try story tapes tomorrow ! Thanks !!

hello nora sorry to read of your troubles but everything is a phase with children its just trying to correct it thats the problem.
My nearly 5 ds knows he goes to bed at 8 and happily tells anyone who wishes to know.
we taught him what 8'0 clock looks like and praise him for going to bed at 8.
he takes a baby cup of milk with him cleans his teeth enroute with more praise and then gets lots of praise if he sleeps all night. some mornings he says "i stayed in my bed allnight long". (but i will admit some mornings we wake with him between us)
If he cries during the night i go in to him stroke his head and say "oh dear never mind its a bad dream its alright, love you and see you in the morning" sometimes it takes the extra be a good boy and stay in you bed and i will see if i can find you a reward in the morning.
But i find if i try to stay calm and give him lots of praise it usually works if not the threat of turning the light off on the landing or shutting the stairgate works. you only have to do it a couple of times but stick to your guns.
hope this helps as we have all been there or about to go there.

hi
any ideas on how to "play" with a 4 1/2 year old?
my dd wakes v early and can be a nightmare to deal with during the day - shouting and screaming and v stroppy! when ds in bed in afternoon i have every intention of playing with dd but am completely stuck for things to do - she never seems to really play with much independently and just watches tv sometimes or moons about ! ideas please as wishing the time away until she starts reception class in september!

sorry - this thread prompted me to add my own "troubles" and didnt start new conversation which i have now done - apologies for posting in the middle of this one!

My dd is 3 and has never been a 'good' sleeper. She currently goes through weeks long phases of waking at 2-3am and staying up for an hour (....yawn).

My dh sometimes says I have to 'do something', but my experience is it only gets worse for her and me if I try to 'stop' her - better (and shorter) to try and ride it out and wait for the phase to pass. There are a few things I have noticed:

1. The lighter the evenings, the later she is tired. So we have a 7.30-8pm winter bedtime and a 8-8.30pm summer bedtime. If she goes to bed after 9pm then she will ALWAYS sleep till morning (but I want an evening with dh sometimes!)

2. She is afraid of monsters and has bad dreams, but can't always tell me while still in the bedroom - so when she wakes I take her round the house to show her it's all OK.

3. The more I try and force her 'not to' the more bad dreams, upset, and general unhappiness for everyone!

4. I learnt recently that young children are not designed to sleep all night, but naturally wake to check that parents are still around. I guess at school age you'd hope that they'd be sleeping a bit longer at night.

I think the most effective thing has been a later bedtime - even though it means a longer day for me and dh, it does mean more total sleep for everyone!