When, if ever, did you put your twins in separate rooms?

[JuliaGulia]

Hi,

We're thinking of putting our 14mo b/g twins in separate rooms. She always wakes up before him and then makes such a fuss, she wakes him up too early leaving him terribly grumpy all day. Sometimes we have to put him back to bed for 30 mins because he's just sobbing with tiredness.

We are also finding that their nap times are becoming less co-ordinated as they get older and whoever wakes first wakes the other one up. They're constantly tired.

Do you think it'll have much of an impact on them? Will they lose any connection they have formed?

JG

Hi JG

Will be interested to see what replies you get as my 2 (12mo b/g) sound very similar. She wakes at 5 something every day and I have to leap out of bed and grab her (and take her into our bed) before she wakes her brother. If she has managed to wake him, he is grumpy all day just like your little boy. She only naps for 30 mins at a time so we get the same problems then. For their afternoon nap we always put her in the pushchair as that way she's downstairs and he's upstairs and he can have a lovely long sleep. She just needs less sleep than him - she probably has on average 1.5 hours less a day. Are you finding that your's keep each other awake a bit as well when you put them down? Mine are now standing and smiling at each other when they should be going to sleep but, to be fair, if we leave them to it they do eventually lie down and go to sleep.

Blimey londonlottie. Do you want to swap? If my pair sleep past 6am I think that's a "lie-in"!!

As for a connection, if my two haven't seen each other for a few hours for some reason e.g. one's been asleep in the cot and the other in the pushchair then they do tend to smile and look excited when they see each other. They don't seem to be particularly pacified by the other's presence though - both will regularly cry for our attention whether or not they're on their own or together in a room.

Mine are in separate rooms at the moment. One was going through a bad patch settling down at bedtime (or rather NOT) a few weeks ago and it was starting to really impact on the other's sleep so we put one cot in our room with us. It felt very strange at first and I have to say they do get excited to see each other in the mornings but I don't think it's having any negative impact (apart from on us! - DH is desperate for her to go back into the nursery).
In our case it's only a temporary arrangement but if we had an extra bedroom I would probably be thinking about separating them into their own rooms permanently in the next few months (they're nearly 1) as they are sadly not among the ranks of angelic twins who are soothed by each other's presence and don't notice each other's howls.

I don't think it will last much longer, we went thru this stage with our b/g twins. Dd has always needed less sleep than her brother, she's first up and rarely has a nap. They're 2.6. The bond becomes much more noticeable once they start talking, i can't imagine them not sharing for years yet! What might happen soon is the girl getting out if the cot, dd learnt at 18 mo so then she could come and plague us instead of waking her brother! Now, I leave books, toys and beakers of water on the floor (sneak in at night!) and they might entertain themselves if we are lucky.
I also gave them naps in different rooms for quite some time so ds got longer. Until dd gave them up before 2, of course.