2.9 DS not sleeping, it's endless..Help!!

[Mooncupflowethover]

Hi all. Having a nightmare with my D.S (2.9) at the mo. He goes to bed at 7pm, cries for cuddles, stories etc until 9pmish (we read him a story etc when we put him to bed). He eventually drifts off and then wakes again an hour later.

Then the awful bloody nights start with relentless screaming 'I want a cuddle, kiss, don't feel well (9 times out of 10 he's fine, all smiles and jumping around when we go in to check), want a story, I'm scared' etc.

We took him in bed with us in desperation, but he won't sleep, he keeps us up all night with questions, poking us, patting our faces, generally being a pain. If we put him back in his own bed he's screams like he's fit to burst.

This has been going on for months now and I'm really at the end of my tether with it.
We keep the landing light on as he doesn't like the dark (tried switching it off and the meltdown was truly spectacular!)

So, has anyone got any advice on how to deal with this? Before I crack up!!

oh dear this sounds like m idea of a nightmare.
just like when your ds was a newborn, try different things. if the general cries are because hes scared, lonely etc maybe up the time during the day you spend 1 to 1 with him on the sofa having cuddles with a book or whatever.
i know what hes saying would suggest otherwise but is he too cold/hot?
my ds is 2.7 and i can ask him questions and he will answer properly with whats bothering him. are you able to do that with him?
does he have a bedtime routine in as much of bath cuddles book etc? maybe over/under tired? sorry just trying to throw some possibilities out there im sure you have tried all these

wish I had some advice but I have a similar nearly 3 year old (although your experience sounds much worse )

I may get slammed for this but, hey ho, once we tried all the usual things, we have him phenergan (sedative - had it on prescription for DS2) just to get him to have a couple of good night's sleep and get him out of the habit - which I'm sure it just has become.

I think sometimes they get over tired - I guess yours may not have a day time nap now? It's a tricky age but it won't go on for ever (I hope)

Tell him he can only come in to bed with you if he goes to sleep. If he mucks around you'll take him back to his own room and if he cries you will ignore him and not come to him. Tell him all this - the deal is you will co-sleep if he will sleep, not otherwise. And stick to it.

easier said than done though bibbity isn't it?
Mine screams the place down and wakes up the others - it's not worth all 3 DSs being woken up.

Our DS 3yrs doesn't like the dark either. We have one of those Tomy monitors that has a nightlight, as well as the feature that we can talk back to him over the monitor from whatever room we're in with the parent unit.

DS has a CD that he likes to listen to each night (Wiggles) and each night after DH reads him his bedtime stories and tucks him in, he makes sure the monitor with nightlight is on, and turns on the CD. Initially, DS listened to the CD a number of times before falling asleep. But not usually he listens to it once through and that's it. He sometimes plays quietly (or not so quietly ) in his room or on his bed for a bit before sleeping. He also has a couple musical toys that light up that he can use in the middle of the night if he wakes up. If he gets upset, sometimes we can simply speak calmly to him over the monitor (reasuring him and such) and he will settle and go back to sleep. Other times, he'll ask for the CD to be turned back on again, and he'll listen and then fall asleep again.

I think for DS, he sometimes just needs to hear our voice, or have a little white noise or background noise to fall asleep to. (believe me, it took us quite a while to get the right combination of nighttime stuff sorted!!)

We don't ever cosleep - the only time DS EVER sat still while sitting or laying on our bed was when he had a stomach flu and was vomiting everywhere and too weak and ill to be all over the place.

Oh, and if it helps, DS starts bedtime routine about 5:30-5:45 and is in bed by 6:00-6:15. Any later than this, and he walks around the living saying "bedtime bedtime".. something he never did prior to getting this sorted out. Some nights he is asleep by 6:15-6:30, other nights he is happily playing and chatting to himself at 7:30-8:00 before he falls asleep. We just quietly check on him and listen over the monitor to make sure he's okay.

Do you have any idea why he is getting up?
My DD started this around the time she dropped her daytime nap (2.5yo). I think she was so overtired by 7. So we tried a number of different things:

1. We stopped eating together at 6, and moved her tea to 4.30 and started giving her a glass of milk at about 5.30. Bath at 6, bed at 6.30.

1. We had problems getting her to stay in bed for long enough to go to sleep so we used a selection of story CDs which she could choose.

1. We stopped getting into a dialogue with her once she was in bed. Even now (she is 3.5), once she's in bed its a quick goodnight and then door closed. If she starts getting up or asking questions etc, the door is promptly closed and she is told that we will chat in the morning.

1. We bought a glo-clock sleep trainer which is a nightlight that changes from day to night and then to day again in the morning. It has really helped with early waking.

1. We bought one of those torch nightlights (disney) and told her she could play in her room with the torch if she woke up early.

1. We gave her stickers for not getting out of bed.

1. At its worst, we put the stair gate across, went downstairs and ignored her until the crying got too bad and then went up, put her in bed and then back down again etc etc.

BTW all these techniques were used over a year to deal with various sleep issues - not going to sleep for hours, getting up lots of times in the night, getting up ridiculously early. We are now finally at a place where she sleeps brilliantly between 7 and 7......for now [fingers crossed emoticon]

BTW, forgot to mention that we got ourselves in a right pickle by letting DD get in bed with us if she woke up really early. All that happened was she got up earlier and earlier cos she was so keen to get in our bed! In the end she was coming in at 2am and asking to get in bed.