How can I fix my two year old? Sleep deprivation

[Calypso321]

Hi everyone,

I’m really struggling with my 2.3 year old DS. His sleep has become so complicated I don’t know what to do, I’m surviving on around 4 hours broken sleep most nights of the week at the moment.

The two daily sleep options I’ve whittled down to are:

1. He has a nap for around 1 hour after his lunch around 12:30-13:30. But he then will absolutely not go to bed until 10pm no matter what we try, he just isn’t tired until that time. He wakes maybe twice in the night with this option, re-settling quickly (which is fine).
2. He has no nap. He then can’t make it through the day, falls to sleep in the evening around 17:30-18:00. He then wakes every 90 minutes until about 2am. He is then wide awake from 2am-4am wanting to play. Eventually goes back to sleep for a couple of hours.

So it’s either he has a nap but doesn’t go to bed until 10pm, meaning DH and I have no evening or time together/no time to get any household jobs done/have any kind of life. Or he doesn’t nap but then wakes constantly through the first bit of the night, then has a split night 2am-4am.

What do we do?!!!! My husband is great and pulls his weight. We have a 3.5 year DS too that still wakes 3-4 times a night, which DH does on his own whilst I deal with youngest DS.

To add more complication, yesterday he napped 10am-12pm. Went to sleep for the night at 20:30pm. But has now been awake since 3am, completely wide awake, trying to see if I can get him to drop back off. I just don’t understand and need some help.

This has been going on for about 2 months now and I’m so so tired. For context he goes to nursery 3 mornings a week, has a full day with my mum, and one afternoon with DH - whilst I work.

Hi this sounds tough. I don’t have any personal experience myself but a friend went through something similar. What seemed to work was either cap the nap to 30 minutes so they get some some rest but hopefully not enough to affect sleep.
other thing is gradually being bedtime earlier. So with 30 min nap aim for 9pm bedtime. Head up 8:15/ wind down and tucked in 8:40 hopefully asleep by 9. Then following night move earlier by 10 mins

other thing to think about is how does he fall asleep. If it is independently then don’t rush in when he wakes give him some time.

also change the goal in your head the aim isn’t for him to sleep just to stay quietly in his room. It’s less frustrating for all parties that way. Sleep then naturally tends to come

Is he getting plenty of exercise and fresh air (sunlight) Eating well? You possibly won't want to admit if he's sedentary and eating badly but these would probably be the biggest factors. If he is, see a GP?

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And also no screen time, particularly near bed.

Is he full? Has he drank enough? Is there enough time between eating and bed?

Does he have a bath/story? Are his windows fully blacked out? What lights do you have? I recommend red?
Do you pick him up when he stirs?

Hi, yep he is non-stop. We go out in the morning and afternoon for exercise and play - lots of outside time in the park/dog walks etc.

He also eats really well, always has. Lots of fruit and vegetables. He’s doing really well with his speech and is already potty trained. No concerns at all with any other aspect of his life, just the sleep.

They don’t have a lot of screen time, no tablets or anything like that. Just an hour of TV scattered throughout the day so I can prepare meals or have a cup of coffee (to save my sanity). None near bedtime.

He eats really well. Has his tea at about 05:30pm and then also some supper before we go up for bathtime etc. (banana, slice of toast, apple and peanut butter or something like that).

He has a bath and stories in bed. We’ve always been really consistent with bedtime routine. Windows are fully blacked out. They have just a night light on which is a warm yellow colour, but I could try red. Although I can’t see a different coloured lightbulb fixing these issues! Worth a try though.

I don’t pick him up. I give him a few minutes to see if he’ll settle then if he starts getting wound up I sit next to him and tell him it’s time to go back to sleep/it’s not morning yet etc.

Feels like we’ve tried everything!

It's not just fruits and vegetables though, it'll be magnesium, tryptophan etc. tbh op just make a GP appointment.

I would do whatever gets you the most sleep - so the nap and 10 pm bedtime. My kids were never great at going to bed at reasonable time so you have my sympathy. Do you take it in turns to do bedtime ? Could one of you do the household jobs while the other does bedtime and then you swap the next night? Then just spend 30 minutes together catching up before you go to bed?

I can certainly try that, but I can’t imagine the GP having anything to say. He has a balanced diet, has a multivitamin everyday, and is developmentally perfect.

I’m medical myself and just don’t think they’ll be interested. Do you have any literature or anything based on those issue that I could read up on that might help?

I think this might just have to be the way forward! We have two DS so we take it in turns with each of them, alternating between them each night. Once they’re asleep we both come down and do a team effort of getting the kitchen done/washing folded/all of the stuff necessary for life.

If we just had DS2 then we could definitely do it like you suggest. I suppose we might just have to accept that this is life for a few months now. I guess when he is ready to drop the nap things will improve? He’ll be ready to go to bed earlier and not wake constantly in the night.

Hi op, my son has always been a very erratic sleeper and we've had similar issues in the past.

One thing we realised was that evening baths do not work for our ds, they just stimulate him! So instead we used them to keep him going a bit more on days he was flagging with no nap/after a bad night etc. So bath about 4/4.30, keep him in there for as long as he likes/is possible then let him run around in the nip a bit before getting PJ's on etc. That kept him awake enough for tea and then we could start trying to wind him down.

I appreciate this wouldn't work time wise for everyone, I'm 3 days a week and DH does different shifts on rotation so we're not both 9-5 5 Mon - Fri. Also we haven't bathed him daily since was a young toddler.

Another thing that helped was magnesium, lavender smelling foot cream on his feet after supper. I'm not sure if it's the actual cream or just the ritual side of things but it helped.

That is really interesting! He does absolutely love the bath and could easily spend an hour in there playing if we let him. I’m always home with them in an afternoon by 16:30 so I can definitely try that timing wise.

Then do a wind down for bed a bit later on? After supper. I’ll nip out and get some lavender cream at some point today and give this a try. Thank you!

In terms of the magnesium, what did you give him? Is there a supplement appropriate for that age group that I can buy from somewhere? I’ll try anything 🤣

My DD was a bit like this, by 2y3m it was a battle to get her to have even 45 minutes nap and meant a really late bedtime so we just stopped trying to get her to nap. Then if she happened to fall asleep on her own we'd wake her up after half an hour but still expect a later bedtime. By 2y6m she wasn't napping at all, she still does have some days where she drifts off in the afternoon watching TV or in the car but we just wake her up as soon as we notice. She goes to sleep around 8, comes into our bed when she wakes (usually after around 4-6 hours) then sleeps through until about half 6. She did start sleeping through in her own bed a few weeks ago but it seems to have been a temporary thing unfortunately.

With regards to bedtime routine we don't really have any calm down rituals, she plays until it's time to get her ready for bed then we do pjs, teeth and a couple of stories. I think some children don't need as much time to calm down, I know my niece and nephew are often wrestling, jumping around and doing silly dances 5 minutes before being put into bed and they sleep amazingly!

We had massive issues with split nights every night until 2 and a half. I spoke to our health visitor and they had a sleep specialist who was able to give me a plan which has pretty much solved the issues, I was really sceptical but it has worked. We now have a split night twice a month rather than every single night (she’s now nearly 3). Maybe worth trying the HV?

Ds is and was like this. He’s 4 now so 4 years of terrible sleep. He’s even been under a sleep study at hospital who declared ‘ he’s healthy and just needs very little sleep to function’. Great.

The one thing that’s helped a bit the last year is we eat dinner about 6pm, then dh and I take him back outside say 6.45-7.30pm. Either on his bike ( was balance bike first) or scooter. I think it helps get rid of a bit more energy, calms him down a bit and fresh air helps. We have been out every night through winter also unless raining hard. He was already outside and active most the day (he goes to forest nursery 5 mornings also) but this extra 30-45mins later on has helped.

He still takes ages to sleep, but it’s quicker if we let him fall asleep in our bed and sit with him, then move him after. He now usually goes up around 8pm, falls asleep 9pm ish (but can be 10/10.30pm if not settling). He wakes around 1-2am and joins us in bed. Then up for day 5/6am.
It’s not great, but this time last year he was still waking every hour.

We do a banana with supper as often as we can (not every night because he'd get sick of it!) but that with the foot cream is a good combination. The cream we use is feather and down, just a tiny bit on the bottom of the feet.

If you Google sleep promoting foods you'll get quite a few hits, things that have magnesium or help release meletonin.

Definitely try the late afternoon bath then tea and wind down, maybe aim for 7/8pm depending on when he woke up and how he seems.

It's a lot of trial and error and we definitely haven't cracking 100% but at 4.5 he sometimes sleeps through the night and we sometimes even get a bit of an evening!

I’d go with the 10pm option to maximise your sleep!
But do you have to stay with him? Can you not say night and then leave him to fall asleep by himself?
With mine I put him in his cot and then potter about for 20 mins or so putting away washing, doing any jobs I need to do upstairs and then eventually I just wander downstairs. He tends to stay awake a bit longer chatting to his toys in his cot and then eventually falls asleep so if doesn’t matter if it’s a bit later.

Im sorry i hsve nothing to add. My 2 yesr old does sleep but not consistent. Like yourself naps etc really Impact it. I did start following an OT on Instagram who does self regulating activities before bed to try relax him,csn try get her handle if needed.

I am also interested in the lavender magnesium cream info lol. I see child farm do a.spray?

Have you tried a half hour nap? Sorry if that's stating the obvious!

We had these night wakes at 2.3 too. I think it's developmental - it lasted a few weeks, of him being wide awake for hours in the middle of the night, and then passed. We didn't change anything - other than stopping sitting in his room with him, and instead bringing him downstairs to play quietly, as he was wide awake and trying to force sleep was only frustrating us all.

It stopped as quickly as it started, and then two weeks later, he dropped his nap. Bedtime was 6/6:30 for a couple of weeks, which did lead to REALLY early mornings, but it's settled at about 7pm and he wakes at around 5:30/6am, which is okay. He wakes twice overnight, but settles quickly back to sleep, and that's really developmentally normal at this age.

Has it been worse since the clocks have changed? My daughter is nearly 4 and has always been sensitive to the longer days from march to August/September. The first year her bed time creeped and creeped and ended up at 11pm given my bedtime is 10 it was hard work. Now we make sure her curtains are drawn before she goes into her bedroom and we will start closing the curtains downstairs and hour before bed soon to mimic a sunset

We can't to baths before bed and it sends her loopy so we only do it once a week and when we have enough time for her to wind down again afterwards. Consistent bedtime routine has helped and it took a bit of work when she was starting to drop her nap to have a routine that was adaptable but felt the same to her. Our evening routine in home from nursery at 6 and then a bit of food and her meds. On a no nap day we went up to bed at 7 did PJ's and teeth a cup of oat milk and a story on the floor. Then into bed with short story. On a nap day we went up at 7.15 pjs and teeth. A jigsaw and 2 stories on the floor with oat milk then into bed with a longer story. This added half an hour to the bedtime without changing the routine. She probably took 10-15 minutes to go to sleep on a no nap day and 30-45 minutes on a nap day meaning she went to sleep about an hour later than a no nap day.

She has now dropped her nap completely and our routine is up at 7, PJ's and teeth, pull out clothes for morning a story on the floor then a story in bed. She's more lively since the clocks changed and it's now 7.45 before we get her in bed for stories. In winter she's a sleep by 7.45 now it's between 8 and 9. 2-3 times a week she sleeps through 2-3 times she wakes once, 1-2 days she wakes twice and once every week/two weeks she's awake 3+ times