They HATE sleep / me and it's ruining our lives together

[SleepingStandingUp]

DTwins slept ok until q few months ago. T2 started screaming whenever you put him in the cot at bedtime so we were having him downstairs until he fell asleep them transferring him. It self resolved so i take no credit.

Then for the month or so, if either of them wakes in the night, they just won't settle back in their cot. Fine, they're taken to our bed and we co sleep. It's usually one at a time, sometimes transfer one back to get the other out.

But not, they just don't go back to sleep. 1 am T1 was awake from. Started in our bed but kept getting out and wanted to go down. Tried chair and milk. Tried letting him play. Got him back into cot with milk without screaming. Later 15 minutes and he woke his brother. Put T2 in bed with DH but he didn't settle and i had them both down stairs by 4.30. T1 flaked at 7.30 and just got up. T2 went up at 9.30 and is still asleep. I normally try to keep to normal naps but they had so little sleep last night.

Night before T1 woke at 4 but largely settled with me

Night before T2 Woke at 3 and was awake hours in our bed.

DH is Sleeping through it but gets up at 6 and has them and i sleep til 8. Even if he got up with them, i wouldn't sleep through their noise / tossing and turning and he'll leave me to sleep as late as i need at the weekend. He also sorts our eldests meds at 11pm so i can go up whenever i want so this isn't a DH bashing thread.

But i just don't know how to sort them. They go down fine at naps and bedtime with very little bedtime routine

Oh god thsts long.

Tl:dr when the 20 month old twins wake in the night they refuse to go back to sleep. Im so tired i then can't do anything fun in the day with ds, 6. Dh lets me sleep as much as he can

How old are they? Is it a sleep regression age? Anything else going on like teething, starting nursery/childminder etc?

Do they sleep in the same room and is there scope to change that?

Have you tried white noise, night weaning, a night light, or anything like that?

That sounds hideous, I’m sorry OP.
I’m no expert but only thing could be to look very closely amount of day time sleep - I’m guessing ideally one nap 1.5-2 hours after lunch should be enough then surely they would need to sleep at night. Also checking stuff like room darkness and room temp.
But to be honest if I could afford it I’d probably throw money at a sleep consultant

20 months.

Teething but its been going on foreverever and it doesn't seem an issue at other times.

No childcare etc, I'm a SAHM.

Share a small room hence pulling them out before they wake the other one. No options, its a 3 bed house. They'll go into beds and swap with DS at some point but frankly they're dangerous atm. Climb everything even with night vision, get under the baby gate etc.

Tried fancy night light, didn't seem to make much difference.

Discussed trying white noise but they go down fine at bedtime so honestly not sure it'll work.
Night light so its not pitch black on.
Normally they'd settle with a bottle of water. But that creates it's own issues with nappies as they soak through. They can get through a lot of water overnight on a bad night but now even that doesn't work

Im always in a bind with sleep in th day. Do i limit it or let them catch up? But yesterday neither had long naps as it was a buggy nap and still didn't sleep

How much daytime sleep? My 15 month old seems to only need about 10hrs night sleep (8-6 approx), and he still wakes sometimes so no expert. But he only naps once for 1-2 hrs usually, he can nap as long as he likes but it’s very rare he naps longer than 2hrs per day.

In between I would also ask how active? Mine needs about 6hrs between naps and sleep and if he hasn’t had chance to run about isn’t even at all tired.

Anything from ab hour to 3 if left to it. But even when its short like last night, there's no obvious knock on so I'm always worried if i restrict sleep they'll end up sleep deprived and ill

They don't sit still. Constantly scaling or trying to escape. We prob do need more fresh air but i struggle having three loose beyond home abd then at home its a battle of garden being a sun trap / rain

Re daytime naps, I'm a form believer in the phrase 'sleep begets sleep'. Just don't let them nap past 4pm! If possible, they could do with a long nap midmorning ISH. Overtired kids are a nightmare.

They go down anything from 11-12, so up by 2-3. Term time they have to be up by 2.15 regardless. Ive been trying to channel sleep begets sleep with letting them bap so long but then i worry we don't get enough 1 on 2 time outside of school runs and maybe that's why they're not really talking yet (although t1 pushed t2 down the slide and said DOWN 🤣🤣)

I'm so sorry SleepingStandingUp, that is very hard, especially with two. Do they definitely still need a nap? My youngest dropped their nap at 23 months, just started screaming in the cot at nap time after previously going down fine and sleeping for a couple of hours. Then they wouldn't go to bed at night if they had an accidental nap in the day. I thought it was too young, but they never started napping again.

Pampers are the only nappies that don't leak in the middle of the night for us.

Def need a nap, they're miserable otherwise by midday and they go down ok at nap time.

To top it off, t2 can now climb out his cot. Under the baby gate. Down the stairs.

Shoot me now

It could be the two year sleep regression?

Oh no! They've been putting all their energy into learning climbing skills. I've noticed with mine that they tended to concentrate on either gross motor or talking, but aren't at the same level on both.

I hope it gets better soon.

Well we took the sides off today and from what i can hear they're destroying the room. Trying to balance going in every 3 seconds and them getting attention for no sleep and leaving them. Cupboards coming out tomorrow tho

I honestly think you need to keep them in their own room. And own beds. I understand that's a risk, that they wake the other one. But you're screwed anyway, really. Bringing them in with you is not enabling you to get any more sleep, and is reinforcing this habit that they get up and play, essentially.

When they wake, tell them it's night now. Nothing happens. Keep the room dark. They get up, you take them back to bed. Repeat. You'll be up all night. But fingers crossed they'll learn this way. At the mo there's no reason it'll change.

20m is tricky, they can get out of bed, communicate etc, but they're too young to bribe!!! You're going to have to be super calm and super consistent.

Is it worth putting 6yo in with you for a bit, and putting them in separate rooms?

Re day sleep, I would say a good solid nap and an early bedtime. Sleep deprivation / sleep debt usually makes night time sleep worse.

There's no way k can have 6 yo in with us, no room for a bed and he does NOT co sleep well 🤣

We’re going through the same with our 19 month old back to bloody co sleeping. He’s now in toddler bed so if he’s desperate he can just get up and sleep where he wants. He has never slept through not once. I really sympathise with you.. it’s not fun and especially not running on no sleep. Let me know if you work it out.. we’re trying milk feed to sleep as usual (going to sleep is never an issue) and keeping his light on during the night on a dim setting.. not holding out much hope but got to try!

Well they trashed the room, so sent them down. Tidied up and they had a play. Then they got tired hysterical so carried them up with milk and they stayed. So exhaustion might be the answer lol

I hope they stay in bed for you tonight. How much milk are they having over the day and night? Do they eat well? Could they be hungry? I'm still having to give mine a bottle and a half before bed to help them sleep. Think I have created a habit from babyhood, where I always made sure they had lots of milk in the day so they woke less at night. Backfired in toddlerhood as they are milk crazy and have never been a good eater due to refusing spoon feeding, I'm cutting back the last day bottle and they are upset in the day.

They have 7oz roughly for nap and then bed, bed time bottle generally gets refilled with water, they're nightmares for waking for water in the night.
They eat ok, nap is 11.30 so tend to have breakfast, snack, milk and nap, light lunch, dinner, milk and bed. They used to be great eaters but they've def hit the picky stage. Still little chubby monsters tho 🤣

Could you
a) move bedtime back a bit like yesterday so they are exhausted. Once they start settling ok gradually move forward 15 mins to a time that suits.
B) I would have their beds either side, read and then sit on the floor or chair in the middle of the two beds until they go to sleep. Semi ignore them, just resettle.
C) only let them have milk downstairs, not in bedroom so they dissociate it with bed