suddenly wants to keep the light on?????

[mckenzie]

DS who is nearly 4 and always been a good sleeper (goes to bed no problems, stays there all night and wakes up at a reasonable time) has recently started waking up earlier but we're coping with that.
Now though, he's started asking for the light to be left on and the door to be left open. Just a phase perhaps? Anyone else had this?

Should add that DD arrived just 2 months ago so could be part of the equation.

bump

yes, ds started this at Christmas, just before his 4th birthday. He had always had the door shut previously, with one of those plug in socket lights only. We leave his bedroom door open - in the winter we left the landing light on but now it's light in the evenings we just make sure the other upstairs doors are open so there is light on the landing. For the first month or so he wanted his door open all night, but now we can close it when we go to bed and it doesn't bother him.

Should add that we had a very strict rule that if he messed around/got out of bed because the door was open (which he did a bit at first), we would shut it and that did sort it out.

thanks mrsflowerpot.
I've got a Thomas the Tank plug in somewhere so perhaps I'll turn that out and see if that will be enough light for him

a phase definitely, around this age they become more 'scared' of lots of things

ds1 started doing something similar at about 3.25. - before that had slept happily in the dark with the door shut. Now we have a night light, leave the door open and the hall light on when he goes to sleep, pull the door to and turn off the hall light when we go to bed. It seems to work now with no problems.

both my dd and ds sleep all night with a night light on,they are both frightened of the dark i see no problem in this.They are 6 and 7.My dd would not even go to the loo on her own until recently.

I had this problem myself, it's very common in children (tho for me it lasted into adulthood) I was reading recently that it's not a good idea to have a nightlight on all night as it affects the production of melatonin (I think that's it - the stuff you can take to combat jetlag). Anyway this has implications for childhood diseases. I was using a nightlight for my son (16 mths) but have now bought one of those timer switches so that it goes off at 9pm and comes back on a 6am - it doesn't wake him up fortunately.

The article was def. in the Guardian recently

yeap

dd1 slept like a dream in comlete darkness until about 2.5 when she started asking for lights on and door open. We usually switched light off after she was fast asleep. recently though (now 4) she wakes up crying if there is no light at all, so leave it on all night for her

thanks everyone for all this postings. DS turned his lamp on tonihgt when he went to bed and i just turned if off again and he didn't mention it!

Funny child, obviously forgotten conversation this afternoon in the car

DS "I must have a light on tonight mummy so I can see my toys'.

Me "your eyes will be closed as you'll be asleep so you wont be able to see them anyway"

DS "Dont be silly mummy, I can see things with my closed eyes just as well as I can with my open eyes"

Well of course, why didn't I think of that?