3 year old wont stay in bed at night. HELP!!

[Mangomanila]

My 3 year old DD gets out of bed 4-5 times a night. Sometimes spurious reasons (bunny fallen out of bed), mainly just wanting cuddles. We have never let her sleep in our room. When we take her back (supernanny style) she is back in a few minutes later. We have tried rewards charts, sanctions to no effect. DD not bothered about toys being taken away etc. We tried putting the rails back on the cot bed, but she can climb over. She has a gro-clock but ignores it. We are considering a stairgate on her room but she would open/ climb over it. Or scream.

Any ideas?

Is this as she is going to bed or waking up in night?

Both. Goes to bed at 7 (no naps in the day). Usual routine milk, teeth,books, bed. Sometimes goes to sleep but often screams and up and down stairs (suspect over tired).

Then from midnight til morning in and out of our room. To be honest, this is a much bigger problem than the going to bed bit!

Could you go a bit harder line on the reward charts? E.g. you can only watch TV tomorrow if you don't get up in the night (or perhaps use this after the first time she gets up) - or something else that she's super keen on. DS doesn't watch a lot of TV and taking it away is a great sanction. GroClock has had some success for us (although no means perfect), but we found it helped to read the story that came with it really regularly - every night to start with. It will get better. DS now 4 and we still go through weeks where he is up 2 or 3 times most nights, but in between we get a few weeks of good sleep. A year ago it was hideous - 5 or 6 times downstairs in the evening every night and at least 2 or three visits in the night. I can entirely empathise. The darker evenings/mornings coming up might help as well .

Personally, I'm a big fan of the 'rapid return' technique - although that's not to say that using it turned DS into a perfect sleeper, but it did set boundaries for him which had some positive effect.

Our dd1 did this but she liked the bedroom door open. We said we would close the door if she didn't stay put and that seemed to work

I started a similar thread a while back about this. My DD (3.10) has always been a brilliant sleeper, but suddenly changed over the last couple of months. Settled fine, went straight to sleep, but by 4/5am she was coming in to our room, we were taking her back etc sometimes up to 4/5 times a night. It was exhausting.
It turned out she was just over tired. We have been putting her to bed 30-40 minutes earlier than her usual 7pm bedtime and problem solved. I was always worried about doing this in case she woke even earlier, but I'm so glad we did. May be worth a try?

Thanks so much for all the advice and support. Yesterday, I was so hacked off that I took away all 'big girl' privaledges (no play doh, DVDs, biscuit). Also told her we were going to do the door shutting (1 min first time up/ crying, 2 mins the next etc). Something got through to her as she slept 7-7!! Fingers crossed it lasts. Think will try the half hour earlier to bed if not. In our case, think it shows she will do it when she decides to. And only then!

I'm so pleased she got a good night! Bet you were still awake wondering where she was though! Have a good day

Yes- nearly went in to check on her. Ha ha! Feels like a different world today

Yeh