How to tackle 2 different bedtimes with 3 year old and baby

[Moose46]

At my wits end and would appreciate advice please.

We are trying to get our 6 month old to sleep in her cot instead of on us or in our bed. So far failing.

One issue (of many) we are having is the logistics of my 3 year old not going to sleep until 8pm, but obv 6 month old needs earlier.

Struggling both in terms of logistics of how we manage 2 different bedtime routines, but also how loud DC1 is and wakes up DC2.

How does anyone work around this?

I have an extreme velcro baby day and night, and I’m so touched out that it’s now causing me extreme anxiety and the need to escape. I haven’t even been out the house for dinner in the evening for 9 months.

What are your current routines? Do you have a DP who is regularly available?

My youngest is 6 months, and is DC4. How we have juggled things has depended on who needed what and whether we have 2 available parents.

Start DC1’s routine at 7 or just before by doing his bath. DH does that. Meanwhile i am holding DC2 doing whatever she is doing at that time be it having milk or awake or trying to sleep. She is not in a full routine yet so it differs.

We then swap and while DH takes DC2, i do DC1 bedtime stories and cuddle etc and asleep by 8 at the latest.

I then take DC2 back and go to bed at 8pm (have no life or wind-down time at all).

We have tried putting DC2 to sleep in her cot earlier eg 7pm or 7.30pm but she either screams or if she does sleep, DC1 has then woken her up. Sometimes because he knows i’m in there so comes in.

It’s chaos.

Could DH take DC2 out for a walk? We used to do that and DC2 would then sleep in the pram in the hall till about 10, then I was ready to go to bed.

I’m struggling with this too, if solidarity is any help. I used to have it down to a fine art of both having their baths and then go into DS’s room, read them both stories, then ds would get into bed and I would give dd a feed and she’d go to sleep. Great, except now dd uses me as a climbing frame while I attempt to read to ds and it’s chaos. Following for ideas …

I used to have to do a mammoth 45min-1hr breastfeeding in the semi darkness with lullaby music playing to get DC2 asleep. Plonk in bed. DH would sort DC1. A few nights a week I'd pop in and say goodnight to her, or finish off her bedtime with a story and tuck her in etc. She'd go to sleep by 8 usually too. DC2 was still in our bedroom then and DC1 in the middle bedroom at the time but the bathroom is in-between the two, so sound doesn't really carry between the two bedrooms, so that was lucky. Also the lullaby music playing for DC2 helps drown out background noise too.

With my two age 3 and 1, we do tea, quick play, tidy up and stories downstairs then up for a bath both together and get ready for bed. Then all upstairs to eldest bedroom for one more story. Youngest no longer sits for a story but as they already had one downstairs I just let them happily roam around eldest's bedroom. My eldest is used to me dashing across the bedroom every so often to rescue youngest from falling off the drawers/bookcase/armchair/bed/insert your choice item of furniture here, then we just carry on the story 😆 Sometimes my 1yo chooses a book themselves and sits babbles at it. Sometimes they climb in the 3yo's bed and start lobbing teddies.

Sometimes we all join in! It's wonderful chaos and I love it, my favourite time of day! Being realistic, it's such a short time it will pass as quickly as it started and then I'll miss it, looning around at bedtime, and I'll look back on this time fondly.

After stories and looning, we say good night to eldest and then I take the baby (now thoroughly exhausted) and feed them then plonk them in the cot. I leave 1yo babbling in the cot if not asleep already and by the time I pop back to check in 3yo they're usually already asleep too.

if my DH is home we divide and conquer but this is only a couple of times a week!

Embrace the chaos. Join in. Enjoy it while they're small. 🥰

I have a 3 year old and a 6 month old too and we've got in a routine of co sleeping to cause least disruption to our toddler. We sleep trained (I know many are against this) the 3 year old and she has slept through since 7mo so we are planning to do the same with the baby soon. My thoughts are we'll try for 1 night and if it's horrendous we stop but with our DD it was the best thing we ever did for all of us

Thanks but that’s not what we’re looking to do, especially when it’s light outside. And she wouldn’t stay asleep anyway. We really want her to sleep in her bed.

This all started with us holding her all night in shifts because of reflux. But it is destroying us and i am losing my shit every day now.

We also had to sleep train my oldest to get him out of cosleeping. It worked, but he was still a terrible sleeper up until recently. We’ll try it as a last resort. She’s small and only just 6 months.might try the co sleeping as a start to help her with routine even though it doesnt help me get any kind of break.

Sorry you’re going through it too. Just don’t know how to tackle all this