Is my 3.5 year old getting enough sleep?

[SolasEile]

My DS is sleeping less and less it seems and he is getting very cranky as a result. He dropped his nap when he turned 3 apart from the two days a week that he does preschool and even then he only naps for at most 1 hour. On the days he does nap he is easily awake until 9pm so when he's not in preschool I avoid naps as it's easier to get him down for the night at 7pm. That said, if we go on any long car trip for 30 mins+ he will fall asleep so clearly he is tired without the nap during the day.

The main problem is he is also waking up in the night-time now. Initially I thought this was due to him transitioning to being dry at night but he has been dry for some weeks now and just goes to the bathroom in the morning when he wakes up around 6 / 6:30am. Last night he woke us up - including the baby!! - at 2am crying and asking for water. The night before it was 4am and he was looking for his flashlight. Every night he wakes up at least once for some bogus reason or another. Sometimes he wakes at 5am and doesn't go back to sleep, despite not having napped the day before...

I'm just so bloody tired. My DD was awake for an hour last night from 2-3am after he woke her up. Then she woke me up for the day at 6am and he woke up at 6:30am.

Is this pretty standard for a 3.5 year old? Do I just need to suck it up on the sleep deprivation front? Or should he be sleeping through 7-7? My main issue is that he is actually cranky and tired a lot of the time. If he just didn't need the sleep I wouldn't care but he clearly needs at least 12 hours a night still and probably some days needs a nap but he just can't seem to settle himself to sleep well anymore and these random wake-ups are exhausting him and affecting his behavior. And yes - he does get plenty of physical exercise during the day. He gets outside play every day and runs himself ragged at the park, gymnastics, swimming etc.

Forgot to say - baby DD is 5 months old

Oh, that sounds like hard work on top of the baby waking. I don't think it's very unusual for a child that age to be waking - night terrors can be quite common. He might also be subconsciously regressing a little because of the new(ish) baby.

Can divide and conquer with your DP/DH - if they deal with the 3yr old so you only have to worry about the baby?

I wonder if he is having bad dreams which are disturbing him? Is his room too light (or too dark)? Could there be some kind of noise that's waking him, like the heating/boiler coming on? Too hot or too cold?

Thanks, Culture - it is hard work! But everyone else seems to cope somehow so I'm wondering if I'm just a wimp or if it really is unusual for a 3.5 year old to wake up this much. Part of it seems to be the baby where he sometimes hears me getting up with her - he has ears like a mouse - and he was a little envious of her sleeping in our room.

I've moved DD into her own room early because of this and because she seems to be sleeping better on her own. Initially we had a set-up where DH was sleeping in the spare room (now DD's room) next to DS's room so if he did wake in the night time, he went into my DH. We were getting fed up of sleeping apart though and part of me thought that having DH nearby was giving him an incentive to wake up and go through to get some time with DH. So I moved DD into her own room recently and now when he wakes up he wakes us all up... . It's exhausting.

I just don't know what to do to get him to stay asleep or in his room at least. We had a gate on his room for a while but since he started needing the bathroom early in the morning we took it off to make it easier for him to eventually go to the bathroom independently.

I'm hoping this is just a transition phase and once he gets over needing a nap he'll sleep better at nighttime...

Mine often wakes a couple of times too, he just appears in our bedroom, I carry him back without speaking to him and He goes back off...so not even sure he's properly awake. I've got a 9 month old who is still waking for feeds, so some nights I feel like I am just up and down all night. It is tiring!

I've stopped daytime naps too, otherwise he won't sleep at night, but he gets tired in the day without them.

You're not a wimp! Lots of people will just not be mentioning how their children sleep. My nephew was very similar at this age, and I know of several others too.

Would he respond to a gro clock? Lots of people on here rate them - so he knows that he needs to stay in his room until the clock says he can get up.

My DS is told to go back to bed if he comes in "too early" and he's usually fine with that.
If he has or is crying its a different matter but often than not he's got up for the toilet and is "checking on us".
Very cute but annoying when trying to sleep and all you get is pokes " ug' giss" (hug kiss) and once you've give him them he happily trots back to bed.
Currently teaching him about closed doors (knock and call out) so hopefully be able to get up as planned without a disturbed sleep, no matter how cute the reason.

Thanks for the tips, everyone. We've had a gro clock since he was 2 and he did fine with it for a while but then started ignoring it and getting up at 5 anyway. We would put him back to bed and say 'not until the sun comes up' but he'd just sit in his room wide awake.

The problem got worse with a) DD arriving and DH going into spare room which seemed to only incentivize him to get up for some 1-1 time with Daddy and then b) him learning to stay dry at night.

Last night before he went to bed I was very firm with him and said that he had to stay in bed and go back to sleep if he woke up or otherwise Mamma would be very tired and we wouldn't be able to do anything fun. He didn't get up last night so we gave him loads of praise for that today.

Unfortunately Mamma is tired anyway though because DD was awake from 2-4am last night... 4-5 month sleep regression in full flow.... I guess I will sleep a full night through again some day but right now it doesn't feel like it!

Am thinking I may start a reward chart so if he sleeps through and stays in his room to go back to sleep for 1 week without a break he gets a special treat.