three yr old wakes up and refuses to go back to sleep

[Jhas]

Argh! Help! Really really hacked off now with fifth night in a row of DS1 waking at say one or two in the morning complaining of a monster under the bed. I check under the bed and tell there's nothing there, then I give him a cuddle and calm him a down. Then he will call me every 15 mins for up to 3 hours with various complaints until I am unable to go to sleep again. I can't just ignore him as he will then wake up my one year old as he knows I will have to deal with that. Very cross right now!

Can you get him a night light (even a small plug in one) and tell him monsters hate the light and won't come near. You're as well to go along with it at the moment, he won't believe they don't exist. What about a nighttime ritual that he can be involved in? Checking his room, inventing a magic spell that you say together that means they can't come in.

My just 4 year old is doing similar, no great advice I'm afraid, just that it's a phase, I hope!!

There is a 'pretend' spray you can buy. I think it's called something like Monster Spray! It's probably just water. The idea is the child can spray their room before bed. Might be worth a shot! A fun game anyway.

Dd2 did this for a while, I ended up going in the first time she called out then sitting outside her door and told her it was sleep time every time she called out. After about 3 days she realised she wasn't getting anything else and started sleeping through again.