Separation anxiety- what’s normal?

[AMooseOnAHoose]

My 17 month old has what I think is quite bad separation anxiety. It’s worse with my husband and she screams and screams if he leaves a room until he comes back, cuddles and distraction from me don’t work, she doesn’t want to know. She sometimes gets upset if I leave a room but not as bad.

She is very shy around other people, even friends and family we see regularly, just wants to sit on our laps and takes ages to get up and start exploring.

Id say she’s been like this since she was at least 12 months old, if not before. Starting nursery seemed to make it worse although she is now fine at drop off.

We did sleep train her (never left her for longer than 10 minutes and never if she was really screaming) and she still cries when we put her to bed but we go in after 2/3 mins and settle her and then she goes to sleep so maybe 5-10 minutes of crying every night before bed.

I suppose I just want some reassurance that this is normal or should I be worried? It’s making it very hard when we’re both at home with her as we both have to be in the room with her, one of us can’t pop in and out doing other things as it leads to so much screaming.

I have a 16 month old. Sleep training didn't work if your child is crying every evening.

We did Ferber at 6 months and it worked great, tears for 3 evenings, but it stopped working after 9 months. Separation anxiety kicked in. So I don't judge sleep training but you do need to recognize when it's not working.

I now settle him to sleep every evening. We're past the whole "sleep association" phase. He stays asleep (mostly, needs a re-settle around 4/5am some nights).

I can't imagine leaving him to cry in bed every evening, that's incredibly cruel and very possibly making it worse. You're constantly abandoning her, every single evening, of course she's anxious.

Well we sleep trained because I was suicidal with sleep deprivation and our marriage was on the rocks. So yeah 5 minutes of crying at night then sleeping through is worth it in my opinion.

They say parenting is hard but how do you make the decision between giving your child separation anxiety and ending it all? I suppose if I topped myself she could have another parent who will sit with her all night.

I can’t comment on how normal or not this is but my 2.5yr old DS has had pretty bad separation anxiety since about 16 months old and we’ve never sleep trained. I have many friends who have sleep trained have very independent kids, so I would try and separate these two issues and try and alleviate any guilt you might have from sleep training.

He cries at every drop off, requests I do everything, and constantly needs me in the same room as him. I obviously don’t pander to his every whim, but I totally get how exhausting it can be. I’ve decided it’s just a feature of their personality and nothing that you (or I) have done to encourage.
We are seeing some improvements here and there and many kids grow out of these phases so fingers crossed she will too.

But this is not the newborn days anymore. You don't need to leave her to cry every night or kill yourself over sever sleep deprivation. She's older and will sleep better anyway. And whether you like it or not, the sleep training isn't working if she's crying to sleep every evening.

You don’t know what you’re talking about. Before sleep training it was taking us an hour plus every night to get her to sleep, lying next to her cot holding her hand. And she would wake multiple times every night and take an hour to get back to sleep again.
Now she cries for 3 minutes, has a cuddle then grizzles and moans for a minute or 2 then goes to sleep and sleeps through.

youre reinforcing her separation anxiety if shes crying every night before falling asleep. sleep training isnt the way to create a secure attachment

I think the sleep training debate here is a misnomer, and a little bit of sobbing/self soothing crying before going to sleep is not unusual.

What IS unusual is the screaming whenever someone leaves the room. I'm afraid I can't offer any solutions, but she's old enough to be trained out of that for sure.