Getting 4yr old to bed at reasonable hour

[Melanie30513]

Hi, really could do with some advice and no judgement. Bit of background info- when my 4yr old was a baby she would only be breastfed to sleep. This was a massive issue as only I could put her down for naps and sleeps and overnight wakes. No one else would do and it meant I couldn’t enjoy going out in the evenings or not being there. To break the boob habit we weaned her at 20 months. But to do this we had to introduce a bottle as a stop gap between boob and cold turkey (we tried cold turkey multiple times and WW3 ensued) so thought we’d take it gradual.

fastforward to 3 weeks ago and finally we have given them up for bedtime. I’m not proud to say she used them to just after turning 4 but also we tried prior to this befor her baby brother was born and it didn’t go well and we didn’t want to take it away when her world was changing with a new sibling coming. Then one thing or another prolonged it. Anyhow they are gone now and my daughter has done very well with it.

onto the problem - she just will not settle at a decent time at night to go to sleep. If she had her bottle she’d be out like a light pretty quick but now she procrastinates, says she can’t sleep (even though she hasn’t tried properly), honestly just every trick under the sun to stay up later. It’s really hard because we don’t want a meltdown so she wakes her brother but also she just won’t settle down. She’s tired as well because you can see it in her eyes.

I go back to work next week and my baby is struggling at nursery to sleep there so we have 1 overtired baby and a 4yr old who won’t sleep until very late.

things we’ve tried:

• bedtime calm down time and routine with books ect - she agrees to go to sleep straight after but doesnt
• tried before bed a good ol dance and jump around to get any sensory needs met
• Tried laying with milk in another beaker to see if that will help but she’s not really interested
• cuddling and being with us. We don’t just leave her on her own to sleep as she needs support.

i am having to wake her in the mornings as she’s not rising naturally and it’s because she’s tired and also after a few days on the trot of this she’s knackered and having tiredness meltdowns but again tonight continues to procrastinate for bedtime. It’s one thing after another - I need to get my babies ready for bed, then my Barbie’s, now I need to read them books. It’s taking an age and a toll on us

One thing I tried when DD was a bit younger than yours (but similar in terms of needing BF to sleep), was totally emptying her room. It looked a bit stark, but it got rid of the ‘I just need to see what Teddy wants for breakfast’ crap.

I’d lie with her in a really tight hug till she was asleep, which I think gives a mix of sensory calm and comfort.

She’s now six and still not a champion sleeper, but things are much better. I still need to do the rugby-player hug occasionally when she’s

We put a stair gate across DDs door and left her to cry. Harsh, but after about 3 days she went to bed and stayed there.

Some gentle music? When we took away the dummy we brought in a speaker instead and played music that distracted her from wanting a dummy, but was also good at creating a relaxing bedtime atmosphere.

Have you tried putting her to bed much earlier? So she has time to mess about, but still get to sleep at a reasonable time. It's a good time to do it while it's still dark early!

@Elizabeta thanks, not a bad idea. But she tends to want to fall asleep in our bed. All over the house she will pull this shit. Oh I just need to see my babies downstairs ect ect. Drives me made

@KnickerlessParsons i was tempted with this as well ha, but then she’ll wake my 10m old and that’s worse having them both awake 🤣

@NuffSaidSam oh this could be a fab idea! She has no idea what time is it so could work. Will try and report back. Thankyou

@Oblivionnnnn yeah I might try this and I did think about trying her toniebbox but also don’t want that to backfire on me and her play with it for ages on end 🫠