ds 2.5 wont sleep at all - HELP!

[tummytickler]

We are exhausted, please help - I dont know what to do! Dh wont listen to me!
ds is 2.5 years - youngest of 4 dc's.

Recently he either wont go to bed at bed time (this is usually if he has fallen asleep in the buggy during the day - so i have tried to stop this as far as possible!), or if he does he wakes at about 1am and stays awake til 5 or 6am.
We try to put him back in bed, but he shares a room with his older brother. When we do this we have screaming and him climbing out his cot (thud!) over and over - god know what the neighbours are thinking!

Dh is a sahd at the mo, and i work 4 very long shifts a week, 2 of them over night. dh brings ds downstairs when he wakes! I say it
is a bad idea but he wont listen. I suppose it is easier to get some sleep that way though. dh then sleeps all day when i am
here.

We are all so tired and stressed out, and the house is very shouty at the moment and dh and i are too tired to do anything but the very basic stuff with the kids (Brownies etc - no extras at all ).
Dh and i argue a lot as we are tired (fine when we are not).

ds does not really want to eat either and on top of that work is excruciating for me (50 hours crammed into 4 days). I hate to leave my family in this mess and go to work - equally I am glad to be out! - I have even been smoking again (v. bad - dh would kill me if he knew!)

Any advice appreciated.

We have already cut daytime sleeps and sugary food.

any advice at all?

Do you think he may not be sleeping well because he isn't eating, could they be linked?

Could you try and do a reward chart for him staying in bed, (without him screaming) make it really visual and use stars/stickers of something that he really likes.

Can you put something in his cot e.g books, or near to his cot so he can be occupied in the morning?

Is he a fussy eater, or just completly refuse to eat anything?

Something that worked for me was to cut out carbs at dinner time - only offer protein and veg. The idea is that carbs give off a sugar rush in the early hours and wakes the child up. I cut out carbs for a few weeks (started sleeping through immediately!) then gradually re-introduced them. Worth a try?

Hi
Thanks!
He wakes at 1 in the morning so he cant see his books - I always have a couple in there though, and a couple of cars.
Picante - I will try that tonight, thanks - chances are he will only have a mouthful of whatever we put on front of him though.

cookie - he eats bits and pieces, a mouthful here and there. We have stopped snacks in the last week or so, but still no joy. He does tend to eat more in the morning, than lunch or supper though.

I dont know how to make him eat more, although could be linked - i would certainly wake up starving if i ate hardly anything all day!
He just wants a 4 hour play in the middle of the night .

Didn't realise how lucky I was with the other three dc's. i thought 'terrible two's' were a myth!

Is there any particular food he does enjoy, a certain amount you can rotate,

e.g give him what you know he will eat, and then add the the plate a small selection of new foods that you want him to try, so say he eats pasta really well so you give him mainly that, but not so much that it looks to him like a mountain of food, and then add a small amount of peas or carrots, or whatever it is that he doesn't eat or you want him to eat.

Or you could try fun food, like soup with pasta letters in, making food into different shapes, and such

although this is not really going to help with the sleeping.

Thanks
Unfortunately it is not really anything in particular that he does not like, he will eat anything, bu it will be one mouthful, maybe two and no more (but would eat a ton of biscuits if we let him!)

We try and keep him at the table whilst we eat, but it does not seem to encourage him.
He often sits on the work top with me and helps chop mushrooms/stir pots etc, but even when he takes an active role in making the food it doesnt work!

I even tried copying 'I Can Cook' exactly (he loves cooking) and had him with the little bowls copying me making the supper, making his own little one. He only had two mouthfuls of that too!

Maybe if he ate he would sleep more!

god that is a tough one, how hard it must be for you.

Could you make up a very small plate of food, so say he eats 3 mouthfuls of dinner, make it 5 mouthfuls, use a sticker chart if he finishes everything on his plate he gets a sticker, if he does this for a week for lunch and dinner then he gets a treat, then the next week make it a bit larger, and so on and so forth?

"He just wants a 4 hour play in the middle of the night." It could be the lack of food, but I wonder whether it is also that he wants your attention. Your story struck a chord - years ago, a friend who worked long hours in investment banking found that her younger daughter woke every night - and wanted nothing more than to play with her mother! It is a long time ago and I can't remember what my friend did so cannot give you helpful advice - except maybe try and give him as much attention as possible before he goes to bed. Not easy given your work schedule though.
Hope things get better soon!