CIO for strong willed 2YO?

[Biebs88]

Our little 2yo boy has always been a great sleeper. Bedtime routine is bath, story and milk, song in his room and then he would take himself off to sleep. No whining, no crying.. he would play with his toys or sing to himself but no longer than 15'.
Since a week he has become a little gremlin! Screaming, shouting, asking for more milk/stories/cuddles... I have never let him cry for longer than a minute before and tried sitting in his room but even when he drifts off he will wake up screaming if I try to walk to the door.
If I could I would lay with him all night and not let him get distressed but.. there is a little 6week old girl that I'm breastfeeding and who has her witching hour between 6 and 8 - and toddler's bedtime is of course 7PM 😩.
He will scream his head off when dad tries to take him to bed so i always take him to bed. The last few days I have done CIO - gone in every 3mins to reassure him, blow his nose and say goodnight. He is usually asleep after 30' but my goodness I feel like the worst parent in the world. Especially when he starts shouting 'mummy mummy!!' - it just breaks my heart because it feels like I'm 'choosing' my second one over him but I can see no other way of doing this.

Any words of advice/encouragement or maybe people who have been through the same? Would be greatly appreciated!!

It all sounds like a battle of wills to me. My dd did this at about 19MO and is still doing it to a degree. Excellent sleeper then suddenly decided 'nah I'm not gonna make this so easy for mummy and daddy' What has worked for us is being consistent with bedtime routine and staying with her in her room until she's asleep (which admittedly can be up to half an hour and when it first started was sometimes as much as 2 hours) We stay with her but we don't engage in any games or messing about. She gets a hand on the chest but no more books/songs etc. We read the same book to finish with every night so that she knows that this is it. Most nights she also wakes and ends up in our bed but we just allow this tbh because it just isn't worth the battle. It must be hard when you have an infant as well specially if your toddler demands you but again I would just plough through the tears and make him allow daddy to put him to bed otherwise you're going to struggle as the baby gets older. If you are needed by baby too could you perhaps get a sling and sit them in the room with you whilst you're putting him to sleep? I think it's basically about reassuring them but not allowing them to dictate the terms if that makes sense. I hope you can settle things down again xx

It’s likely to be the change of having a sibling and may soon pass. The No Cry Sleep Solution for Toddlers & Preschoolers might offer an alternative to CIO