Bedroom sharing problems 8/5/3 year old

[Moomoo2376]

Hi,
I have three boys aged 8, 5 and 3. We are moving house soon so have an opportunity to move the rooms around to see if we can find a better fit. Our situation now is that our 8 year old has his own room and the 5 and 3 year old share. Our 3 year old wakes up in the night and gets into my bed until morning but my 5 year old still complains that his younger brother wakes him up.
my 8 year old has always shared a room and has been on his own for the last 7 months, he likes his space but is also happy to share because he doesn’t like being alone (he gets scared) lately there’s been a bit of a gang up on the 3 year old, he’s a bold character being the youngest of 4 and the older two play together and exclude him at times, where he is 3 he still doesn’t understand there games but wants to play and the older two just want to play and find him annoying at the minute to be honest. Also my 5 year old is trying to assert himself and tries to shut him out the room which obviously he can’t because it’s his room too!

(I do promise beyond this they are all brilliant kids 😂😂)

With all this going on we were thinking it might be best to move the 8 year old and 5 year old together and give the 3 year old his own room OR do we keep it as it is and wait for the 3 year old to catch up developmentally so his brothers see him more as a friend to play with rather than an annoyance.

has anyone else had experience with with something similar or found a way that works well? Or any advice with it all?
there bedtime routine is the 5/3 year old to up at 6 for story and bed and the 8 year old goes up between 6-7 for bedtime at 8 but has an hour to chill in his room first

thanks in advance!

If you are moving house will the house ultimately have 3 separate rooms for them? I have 2 DS with a slightly smaller age gap (2.5 years) and they shared from the get go until the eldest hit about 13.
I agree that it may be easier in the short term to have the 5 and 8 share but then once the 3 year old gets sorted and stops waking the 5 year old, you could swap it back.
They will really ideally need separate bedrooms when they get a bit older. So once your 8 year old hits secondary school /teens. He may want somewhere to do homework and also once they hit puberty then that gets harder to share as rhe younger can be a bit insensitive to those changes (pointing out hair, waking up early at weekend, wanting to still play lego etc). So I think if you can't long term give them separate rooms you are going to have to keep swapping rooms around every few years

Is the 4th child a girl? How many bedrooms in the new house?

So, the middle boy always has to share? It seems a little unfair.

Parent of 3 grown lads here.
I would say whatever combination you choose, make it clear that it is not permanent, so that no one feels they are entitled to the solo room. The youngest one will adapt his behaviour soon enough, meanwhile no one is allowed to be unkind to a sibling, and any meanness needs to dealt with promptly. That said, in your case it sounds like 5 & 8 would share comfortably, the only issue being bedtime. If you can deal with that, then there's not a problem. You could try keeping the oldest downstairs/in your room until his brother goes to sleep? You know your DC best.

The house is a four bed and our daughter is 11 so has her own room. Obviously in an ideal world all my children would have their own rooms but 5 bed houses are out of our price range so we’ve gone for a huge 4 bed with lots of living space and a huge garden with the idea that we will continue to have our family time and enough space for the house to flow. so play areas and study areas are somewhere we can provide without them being in the rooms, my question is age wise what have others seen fit best I suppose. We are lucky enough to be able to have that to be honest! With the ages of our children and the biggest gap being 11 and 3 there will be a time where they can have their own rooms however currently whilst it may seem unfair it is the reality for many families.

thanks for the answers. I think swapping over rooms might work well over time, it’s something I used to do with my brother all the time when we were younger when we fancied a change of scenery!

Thank you for that message it’s very helpful to hear those experiences! You’re absolutely right about the meanness, it makes my heart hurt to be honest but like you say dealing with it promptly is the best way. Thanks again for your reply!

So we are about to move. Children 16,10,4 girls. And 7 year old boy.

3 rooms.

Our boy must have his own room due to his needs.

So leaves us 16,10,4 girls and 2 rooms.

We had a lot of debates about this. But our 4 year old is a terrible sleeper (GDD,ASD) some nights she's up to early hours. She was sharing with our 10 year old. However we have made the decision to put 16,10 in same room and youngest also has own room for everyone's sanity so the older girls get solid sleep as well.

Are these play areas and study areas multiple different rooms? Could you not combine them so at least the kids can all have their own bedrooms?
Seems really unfair that a 5 year old doesn't have their own space and gets woken up regularly, my 5 year old often goes to his bedroom if he wants a break from his sister, she's almost 3 but is full on from the moment she wakes up, does your 5YO have anywhere he can just be by himself if he wants?

It will be designated areas as the spaces in the downstairs allow that. He says he gets woken up regularly but I’m not sure how true that is when my 3 year old wakes up and gets into my bed in the night, I think he’s just trying to communicate that he’s unhappy sharing with the 3 year old which is why we thought maybe the 5 and 8 could share instead and trial that for a while and see how they get on. I remember when my 8 and 5 year old were 5 and 3 and they didn’t get on all the time due to the ages but now they are very close. It’s certainly a tricky one with lots to consider!

Just a thought to add to the mix, the ones that share will have the biggest room, maybe the idea of a partition wall or something might do well? This might be easier with the 8 and 5 as they understand and respect boundaries more easily than my 3 year old? I don’t really want to build a wall but if anyone’s got ideas on ways to separate a space like that it might be helpful! Could do different wall colours for each child then so it’s like a proper space for them?

I've seen things on Instagram where bunkbeds divide the room. E.g. bunk with sides in middle of the room, would depend on your windows. Quick Google found this but I've seen better examples toohttps://funkybunkbeds.com/product/room-divider-bunk-bed/

That bunk bed looks a fab idea. Just a word of caution on bunks. My 2 DS are massive (exDH is also) and outgrew their bunks at a relatively early stage so check weight and height limits if you are both tall parents !

You can use ikea kallax units with boxes/baskets to divide the space (they need to be attached to the wall).

Before moving into the new house, could you build something like the pic below.