My 5yo DD and the bedtime meltdowns

[MumCanIHaveASnackPlease]

Hi Everyone

Longtime lurker/infrequent poster here looking for some advice with my 5 year old DD

She is generally a lovely little girl, incredibly bright, super confident, very creative, makes friends very easily, other kids seem to gravitate towards her because she’s not afraid to lead.

At school she’s doing brilliantly, teachers are very pleased with her. At home most of the time she’s great, spends most of her time drawing, practicing dancing, colouring etc.

Our major issue is emotional regulation leading to very explosive meltdowns. The big trigger is bed time however this is not the only time that it happens.

We’ve had a solid routine for many years now, Bathtime, downstairs for 15 mins quiet play (Lego, drawing etc) because we found previously she struggled going straight from playing in the bath to lying in bed. Then up to bed, 2 books, kisses and then I sit at her door until she falls asleep.

Recently though this has become a battleground resulting in stalling and manipulating tactics to get me to lie on the bed with her. When I don’t do this all hell breaks loose, trashing the room, hitting me, screaming how much she hates me you name it. once she’s in this absolutely nothing can calm her down.

I have tried discussing during the day with her if something is making her anxious at bed time, this is met with mostly made up stories. I’ve tried creating a calm box with stressballs, fidget and sensory tools to help her regulate, this gets trashed. I’ve tried a worry box where we can talk about anything. That’s upsetting her. This has done nothing. I’ve tried calm music, meditation, mindfulness.

Last night to try and put an end to it I agreed to sit on the bed with her which descended in to an insane meltdown spiral of I do want you here/no I don’t want you here.

She will infrequently meltdown At other times, mostly when she’s asked to do something she doesn’t want to (tidying up) but bed tome
right now has me to a point where I spend my evenings in tears at my own in ability to control it.

all help and even criticism welcome, you can’t be harder on me than I am on myself.

If it's you leaving to sit at the door part that's causing the meltdowns, have you tried something like an audio player instead of leaving her in silence? She might do better drifting off listening to calm stories, music, or there are some bedtime meditations my eldest likes when she's struggling to settle.

We also had some luck with letting them sit looking at books with a little bedside lamp until they were ready to go to sleep – very often they turned out the light within minutes, but it took the heat out of it. (This no longer works with my eldest now that she can read fairly well!)

Thank you! She has songs on so it’s not completely silent. I also have no issue with her reading etc until she’s ready to go to sleep but it’s like she goes in to this mode where she will just create a reason to be upset and then start a fight about nothing. I’m at my wits end.

I'm pretty firm with leaving mine (4YO) to fall asleep at night because she sometimes tries to pick fights / argue with me when I'm leaving the room - usually when she's incredibly tired but struggling with FOMO and trying to draw bedtime out! Like you we have a clear bedtime routine (wee, bath, teeth, play in her room, then read together). If she seems very chatty, we say you can ask two questions and I'll ask you two questions to have a chat before she goes to sleep. But we're clear we're leaving after that - and if she is still trying to keep me in there (rare nowadays), usually me saying "I'm tired, I'm hungry and I have a kitchen to clean - you're not being fair. I'm leaving now. I love you, goodnight" is enough to end the conversation. It sounds to me like your DD is trying to find a line with you and it might be more helpful to both of you to draw a firm one so the end of bedtime is pleasant and clear.

My husband agrees with this and thinks I’ve been too soft in listening to her made up stories and things that she says she’s feeling etc etc. I think my mum was super emotionally unavailable and I’m over compensating to some extent with my kids. So I think you’re right I need to be firmer and just hold the boundary so that she can learn that these negative behaviours don’t have the desired outcomes.

I think we've found, by having the harder boundary, she's more relaxed at bedtime, and we can also speed up / show down bedtime depending on her tiredness. We're also still very responsive to her needs - I went back up 15 minutes after she went to sleep as she wanted her pillow fluffed :) But to me, it's important that she understands that it's time to stay in her bed and go to sleep, and time for me to have a bit of time to myself - and then I want to go to bed too! It's hard and we're all just trying out best! Xx