Toddler staying in our room longterm

[Notenoughrooms]

Hiya, I'm a mum of 3. 9, 4 and 2

we are in the process of buying our house from our father in law. So moving isn't really an option, it's a 3 bed. We moved here (renting) while I was pregnant with my now 2 year old. The plan was always for my our 9yo son to have the smaller room, and the younger two girls to eventually share one of the double rooms. That time has now come but since then our 4yo has been diagnosed with autism, and has on occasion thrown herself at/ hit the 2yo.

developmentally our 4 year old is 2 years old so we've decided from a safety perspective it's just not an option to allow them to share a room now/ anytime in the forseable future. So our options are. Our 2 year old is currently in our room in a cot that she's rapidly growing out of.

1. buy a sofa bed and OH and I sleep downstairs In the playroom, (it's not a real option we'd be way to far from the kids to sleep soundly) and 2yo would have our room
2. same set up with 2yo but we sleep on the sofa, OH says his back couldn't take that as a long term solution.
3. We put a toddler bed and have our youngest in with us long term. We are leaning towards this option
4. we could split one of the double rooms and make 2 smaller rooms but it's going to be costly

what would you do in our situation?

If you could turn the play room into a bedroom couldn’t the 9 year old have it?

We did that too him as a suggestion a few months ago and he dosnt want too. Our play room has a door to the back garden and is part of an exstention as the back of the house, if I was 9 I wouldn't want to either really

I'd keep the two year old in with you for the time being and long-term (in the next few years) convert one of the bigger rooms into two or convert the playroom into a bedroom.

I'd split the double room, depending on how you do it it doesn't need to be massively costly. My sister did hers for less than £500, that included a partition wall with doorway, new door and additional light fitting. My eldest niece does need to walk though the youngest's room to get to hers but it works really well

Is your 9yo and 2yo the same sex? Can you move them both into the big room but use furniture to divide it up (kallax for example). Then your 4yo can use the small room. That might buy you a bit more time to then decide how to sort 3 bedrooms before your 9yo gets too big.

Is the playroom big enough to be your bedroom- maybe a future plan? We have done something similar but youngest DC was 10 years old at the time.

Buy a toddler bed and put in your room for 2 year old. He will be fine until he’s 5 in there easily.

Leaves you 2-3 years to save up for dividing other room or converting playroom. You could put a properly pull down bed in cupboard in there for you rather than sofa bed. And by then all children older to sleep upstairs alone.

Maybe in 3 years, your current 4 year old might have calmed down also so younger two can actually share

9 yo boy and 4 and 2 yo girls so 9yo can't share. Thankyou all for your responses. We think we're gonna keep little one with us for a couple of years, and designate an area of our room for her, make it all cute and pink for her. Hopefully in a few years either the girls can go together safely or we will just buy a bigger house.

My OH's grandparents raised 4 children in this house and build the exstension as a extra bedroom originally so it can work, I imagine in a couple of years my son will be begging to have the privacy of a ground floor bedroom, but right now he's a little too young

Just going to prepare our selves for a bed invader In the mornings 😄 at the moment she shouts MAM at full volume from her cot at 5am. when she has the freedom of a toddler bed I imagine that MAM will be directly in my face 😂

Split the double using a bunk bed wall?

if it helps, my son is now 4.5 years. He has his own lovely room, and has never slept the whole night in it yet as returns to ours at some point every night. So many small children prefer sleeping close

Would it work to move the four year old in with you and the 2 year old out? Then you could keep an eye on the four year old.

Keep toddler with you for another 1-2years then reassess. The children will change a lot in this time.

Our 4 year old has slept in her bed and own room since she was 18 months old. She sleeps really well, I think to take her out of her own room now would be unfair on her, youngest has never had her own room so knows no different. Plus getting jumped on by a 2 yo hurts a lot less than a 4yo 😄

Option 3 temporarily. Best option would be to convert the downstairs play room into a bedroom for your eldest and then the girls can have their own rooms upstairs.

You need a proper bed, not a sofa or sofa bed.

Is having a playroom a luxury you need to jettison in favour of being a bedroom (yours if DS isn't comfortable with the door)?