Baby falling out of cot!

[zaarin2003]

Hi there,

Slight problem - our son who is 15mo and standing but not walking has taken to reaching over the side of his cot. He reaches so far that on two occasions now he has toppled over the side and landed on the floor. He's not been hurt, but it could happen. He is not walking yet, just standing and not well (he is a twin).

The cot is roughly 50cm from floor to the top of the mattress where his feet rest and the top of the bars/slats/barriers surrounding the cot are at least another 30-40cm high above the mattress. So in total he is falling almost a metre - if we removed the barriers around the cot, leaving it like a normal bed with no enclosure, he would only be falling 50cm from mattress to floor but it would happen regularly.

Bearing in mind he is not yet walking and we naturally can't trust him to canter about his room without supervision, my question is what we should do.

Do we;

a) leave it as it is - he's going to fall out sometimes and he'll learn quickly to be more careful. Plus he'll hopefully be walking soon which will help his balance;
b) get a toddler bed - it won't have any/high barriers so he'll be falling a shorter distance just off the mattress to the floor, however he'll be out of there all the time and we can't leave him alone;
c) get a cot with higher barriers, which seems a bit silly considering the older he gets the nearer he gets to needing a toddler bed anyway; or
d) something else??

Any advice would be greatly appreciated! The main things to bear in mind are that he's toppling out over the barriers of his cot, stands but cannot walk, is 15mo, is showing no signs of talking at all and has little common sense. ;-)

Thanks!

Matt

Can you drop the cot down any further? Sometimes they have different levels. Other than that can you take the side off the cot to make it into a toddler bed? Put cushions on the floor in case he rolls out and put a stairgate on the door to his room? I have a tall one too and he is already climbing up onto the sofa so I know it won't be long til he is getting out of his cot.

Good luck! Hope you find the answer.

My first perfect child never once tried to climb out of her cot so it was a bit of a shock when dd2 was launching herself over the side at a ridiculously early age.

We ended up putting her in a bed. She could walk though. At fecking nine months.

He has to learn that he is not allowed to get out of his bed or cot. Obviously this is easier said than done! (Massive understatement)

Have you told him off for doing it? And praised the other twin for not doing it?

What kind of bed did you get? Just a regular bed or [[http://www.strictlybedsandbunks.co.uk/short-beds.html
children's bed]]? I hope you can adjust this lower so it will become a toddler bed.
Please don't remove the barrier. If you can't adjust the bed, find a contractor or furniture store that can shorten the legs of the bed for you. If you dont want this option, then the best thing that you can do is to put rubber matting all over so he wont get hurt should he fall down.

He is 15 months so he is well on the way to walking anytime soon. So if he wanders around the room with no supervision make sure though that you have baby proofed the room (i.e covered all electrical outlets, locked cabinets,etc)

I would consider thinking about a toddler bed, they arent too high of the ground so he wont hurt himself if he falls out again, and now you can get some crazy themes. We had a princess one from www.childrensfunkyfurniture.com/junior-beds . You can get the ones with a small rail so he won't fall out during the night but maybe he is just bored and is trying to get to his toys??? If you get a toddler bed you could try experimenting with one night leaving the railing off, the other night putting it back on.