18 month old wanting skin to skin all night

[jasmin27]

DD 18 months was bf till 14 months and co slept till about 15 months. She up until recently went to sleep in her own bed in our room but would come in to our bed at around 4am or sometimes later. However the last couple of weeks she is not settling in her own bed from around 11 and is wanting to stroke my arm to fall asleep and cuddles my arm like a teddy. As soon as I move away she wakes up. So has been coming into our bed from usually around 11 as I'm 25 weeks pregnant and too tired to sit next to her bed all night. Once in our bed she will cuddle up with dh or stroke his back and put her self to sleep. We don't mind co sleeping but she has starting kicking us in the night and end up lying across the bed. I've read about 18 month sleep regression not sure if this it or some sort of separation anxiety. Just want some advice as to what to do? Do we just give in to her or keep putting her back in her own bed. We have never left her to cry so don't want to start now.

It's hard to say if it's just a phase until it passes but as she has always slept until early morning previously, it could easily be an anxiety thing/teething etc.

Another thing to consider is whether she is genuinely not sleepy enough to settle well all night - does she now need less sleep in the day? We've had this problem quite a lot and it often gets interpreted as something else.

What are your plans for when the baby comes - will you have them both in your room? If so, I would imagine this will disrupt her sleep quite a lot? There are gentle ways of changing sleeping habits and if you want to get her in her own room before the baby comes, now is the time to do it. I know a lot of people have had success with gradual withdrawal, a technique that a lot of the baby books discuss. There's also a thread started by Nectarina which is really popular and helpful.

Thanks I will search for that thread. With regards to plans for when the baby comes I think we will move her into her own room and probably put a mattress down for DH until she is use to it. She only sleeps for about 1hour and half around lunchtime and I take her out for a walk early evening which usually helps to get her to sleep pretty quickly at bedtime. I did think she might not be sleepy enough but she falls asleep straight away once she gets into our bed.

Yes, it might be wiser to do the move to her own room in two stages as it will be a major step for her. So have your DH in for a week sleeping with her and then start the process of gradual withdrawal.

My DD was on an hour at lunchtime by 18 months and my friend's son had dropped it altogether (we call him the Duracell kid!). It's probably not a daytime sleep issue but I know this can often be the cause of sudden night wakings for no other apparent reason. :)

My son had had a similar regression, and I am 30 weeks pregnant. I feel torn as we love having him in our bed, but he really does love his cuddles and are worrying about putting him in his own bedroom as it's down some steep stairs and don't want him trying to come back up to us in the middle of the night. Also he's turned two recently and is a huge boy. We were thinking matress on the floor in our room so he doesn't feel reected by us when new baby comes? BUT THAT WILL probably save more problems for future.

I think it's a developmental stage. A lot of children latch on to a transitional object at this age, so you could encourage that if she hasn't chosen one for herself. At about 15 months my son went from sleeping happily in his cot alone to only settling with me in bed. He could only settle cuddling my arm so I took to putting him in his cot but sitting with my arm through the bar in the cot so he could kind of lie on top of it and drift of cuddling it, then I'd gradually move it out and replaced it with Monkey (same size and shape). After a while he would start out with Monkey and me sat close by and he'd open his eyes every so often to check I was there, but would be asleep within 15 mins max, then I would put him in bed and go and sit a bit further away from the cot. Each night I'd sit nearer the door, until now he just goes to bed with Monkey and his perfectly happy for me to leave while he's still awake. The whole process only took a few weeks.