How do you get 15 month olds to sleep if they share a room?

[Rosebud05]

As above, really. My 15 month old ds hasn't been a great sleeper for a while. He actually doesn't seem to need that much sleep - 15 mins of an afternoon and he's still chirpy until bedtime, when he doesn't want to go to sleep. Due to illness, camping and staying in other peoples' houses over the past few months, we've got into the habit of walking him around to get him to sleep, though can only put him down when he's actually asleep as even 'extremely tired but awake' results in him waking up and screaming the place down. He occasionally goes through until 3-4am when we've got him off, but mostly wakes before that and is awake on and off during the night. We do a combination of bf and walking him around during the night - sometimes he is really awake.

I'd be up for sleep training, but he shares a room with his 3 year old sister. We've only got 2 bedrooms, so no choice.

I've been trying to get him to sleep for well over an hour now and he's screaming as I type this. He's been at nursery all day - had a short nap - but is obviously tired. His sister is currently asleep in our bed, and I'll decant her later.

I know we got into bad habits when he had croup etc, but what the bloody hell do we do now?

Can you move your 3 year old into your room? I would be inclined to do a good bedtime routine (bath, bit of a play, book then into bed), and just leave him. Really hope things improve for you soon.

He sounds overtired to me - can you get your nursery to put him down for a nap after lunch to encourage a longer sleep in the day? Also go for an early bedtime of half 6 ish.

I'd also get a bedtime routine sorted - one that you can do even when not at home? We do this for our DS (11 months) and he goes down well as he knows it's bedtime.

As previous poster says, can you sleep train while having your DD in your room for a week?

I'm no expert on night wakings as DS wakes up once (more if ill etc). But they dropped dramatically with self settling.

To get your DS to self settle, try putting down drowsy after a feed and early bedtime. It may not work but if you keep trying, the bedtime routine and proper day nap will mean he'll relax enough to fall asleep faster. You could try a crying method - I'm not a fan but I know people have had success quickly with controlled crying. I would suggest, if you were going to do it, do it after a week of having the early bedtime and routine so he knows what's next (ie sleep).

Sorry I meant it might not work straight away!

Also I've found as DS gets older he settles better if I leave him to it and he's not overtired.

Thanks for your replies - I agree that he is often overtired. We do do a bedtime routine, which works sometimes but sometimes he takes a long time to get to the 'drowsy but awake' stage!

Dd does often go to sleep in our room as she's ready to snuggle down whilst he's still crying, but we may have to think about having her in with us all night for a bit.

Last night he was actually awake and talking to himself for quite a long time around 3am without screaming, which is progress. When I went in, he was sitting up but hasn't yet learnt how to lay back down.......