Feeling a bit depressed re: my 3 year old sleeping.

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Really interested to hear from people who are keen on co sleeping, or are AP focused (even though I HATE labels in parenting) and not people who are going to advise I need to do a super nanny approach or cry it out, as I do not want to do this.

She was doing really well - chose to sleep alone in her own bed (with me staying with her until she fell asleep taking 5 minutes max) and sleeping 12 hours (8 to 8) for a long time, then recently, she has been demanding that I sleep with her (not her coming into the family bed, but me, alone, coming to her bed to sleep with her for the entire night). When I say demanding, she cries and calls out for me until I come to her.

This is fine in theory - I want her to feel secure and happy in her bed and when sleeping, but I am 25 weeks pregnant and really worried that she will want me to continue with this routine as I get bigger, heavier, and more uncomfortable, or even worse, when the new baby arrives. I really do not want to co sleep with 2 children as I do not feel any of us will be getting enough sleep and I would worry for the safety of the newborn. I also do not want to change the routine when the new baby is born, because I feel like my little girl will see this as a "mummy no longer wants to sleep with you because there is a new baby" which wont help with the jealousy!

She has no interest whatsoever in her daddy staying with her - I recently went away for a night, and as soon as he had finished telling stories and turned off the light, she asked him to leave and slept fine, all night, without anyone there. It is me or no one apparently!

I have tried settling her when she calls for me in the night and going back to my own bed, but it is like having a newborn again, with her calling for me every hour, or 2 hours, until I pass out next to her at about 5am.

Has anyone had this issue? Any advice or ideas, or just a message to "go with her needs for now" from anyone? I really don't know if I should be taking action to try to change the routine now, or wait a bit and do it after Christmas, or don't try to change things at all, and muddle though if I am still dealing with this in March when I become a mum of 2.

I wonder if the sudden need to be close to me is because she is aware of the impending arrival of a sibling (although she is only ever positive when she talks about it, I am sure there is worry in there somewhere).

I sympathise. I don't have a second child but DD was/is like this, and our approach AP type stuff. At 3.5 DD went to bed in her bed, woke and I got her into bed with me, DP slept downstairs so as not to be disturbed, all slept okay. Then at that age she got into wanting to sleep holding my arm, head on my shoulder, and I could not sleep like that.

So I moved her bed into our room, next to the big bed, and said she had to stay in bed, I would hug her then put my hand on her when she woke in the night. Is there a way you could fit a small bed (I have one you can have...) or mattress next to your bed for now? In some ways it seems like a step back towards cosleeping but I felt it was a step away as it moved us from sharing the same bed.

Other friends had DC go to bed in their bed and had the mattress/nest next to their bed in addition, when DC woke in the night they had to come in quietly and get into that. They worked on getting DC to come in without waking them up by doing some repeated goes of it for some nights but you could try it just having her next to you.

Also attitude to Daddy the same here, for a long time, but now at 4.5 she likes him at night at bloomin last and cosleeps with him occasionally, if I'm out late. Friends with new babies have DC cosleeping with Daddy so it may change for you next year.

I don't co-sleep, as it would be more like co-awake, so my experience might not be so helpful but here goes- With dd2, she slept much better in general once she was happy to go to sleep on her own. We did a gradual withdrawal type thing, it probably took months, so pretty gently, and after that she was much more likely to sleep through, be quicker to settle in the night etc. We just did whatever it took in the night, but sorting out the going to bed bit was crucial iyswim.

Thank you for the offer Zoidberg - we do have something we could use in our room for her to sleep on, but she loves having her own room and it is a big thing for her to be there (she sees herself as very grown up being in "DD's Room".

I shall keep going with how things are until the New Year (in case things change on their own - haha!) and then see about gentle ways to make changes.

I was going to work on gradual withdrawl Parliamo - but it seemed just moving from sitting next to her, to slightly further down the bed, led to bedtime taking twice as long, and I keep at it for a full month! All she said for about 30 minutes was "come on mummy, come here and lay down" and when I didn't she would crawl over to me and try to sleep the wrong way in the bed so she would be in contact with me as she fell asleep.

Something to go back to in the New Year I think. I totally agree that getting her to drop off alone would really help, as I doubt she would expect me to be there when she wakes if I am not there when she drops off. Argh. I thought it was just newborns that caused sleep depravation!

I wish! dd1 and dd2 are still causing me as much sleep deprivation as the baby! Gradual withdrawal took months to work, and definitely extended bedtime in the short term. You have more patience than me though, every now and then I lose the plot and stomp out shouting 'just go to sleep' and bark no I'm not holding your hand

Just a thought, is she still napping? Could you reduce the nap, or go to bed later in the short term so she's really tired at bedtime. That definitely makes settling quicker for us. Also my 4 yo loves the 'relax kids' meditation cd. I saw it recommended on here. Have you tried a grown up girls cd player plus stories? We like the debbi gliori ones. Does she have a nightlight? New toy to take to bed to look after her? She sounds like she needs a bit of reassurance.

No naps for almost a year... she sleeps from 8 to 8 generally, and I worry getting her to bed later will mean a later wake up time (and I would really struggle to get her ready for pre-school if she slept any later) I might try it on a weekend, or over the Christmas holidays though, when it does not matter as much, and then if we have broken some of the habits I might be able to bring bedtime back to a better time... a good idea, thank you!

I will be googling and Amazoning that CD for meditation. She does have stories on the CD player, but just gets up to fiddle with it when it ends rather than it helping her sleep! We have a nightlight, and she has a bear she likes but isn't very attached to any of her toys at bedtime. She does need a lot of reassurance at bedtime, which is odd, because she is incredibly independent and shows no fear of anything in the day. Preschool mentioned how confident and un-phased she is by change and new situations in her recent review. Maybe she has a lot of bad dreams or something.

Remind me why I thought it was sensible to have another... !? Can this one just stay inside my tummy until DD is about 18?

Having another will be wonderful ... Overall and in the long run!!!

Just a few other ideas in the gentle range I'm not wild about reward charts etc. but she might be old enough for a bit of bribery and corruption. Dd1 chooses chocolate for breakfast as a special treat when we need to break a night/ early waking habit. Would she respond to a these are special pyjamas/ pillow/ new teddy as you are a special big girl who goes to sleep on her own?

Ultimately though, ime, whatever we try they only do it when they're ready!

Hi there. We have a similar problem with ds (2.3) and also do AP type parenting. And I'm also 21wks pregnant with no.2! Ds was a brilliant sleeper until he went into a bed at 22mo (he was refusing the cot) and now we have to stay in the room until he's asleep. This can take anything from 15-45mins, or longer on a bad night.

Have you read the no cry sleep solution for toddlers? We got it from the library and there's some good tips in there. Sounds like you're pretty relaxed about it (revisiting it in new year etc) which is good IMO. We're trying gradual withdrawal - but his room is only about 3x2 metres and even getting away from the bed is proving difficult! Luckily, he doesn't need to be touching us to fall asleep - and he prefers dh to me, so I haven't got the pressure of worrying about getting bigger and having a newborn.

We're just going with it for now (and he often ends up in our bed halfway through the night...) but I just wanted you to know you're not alone!

Thanks Misty, I have to say it seems more common than I thought, which at least makes me feel more normal, if not less tired...

Every night DH or I lay beside DS for 'five minutes' have a wee chat about the day, what's happening tomorrow etc.

Then we say we've got boring job to do - washing up, tidying etc and will be back in 14 minutes (this is because I said 25 and he bartered me down!)

He's usually asleep by then!

I tried that one and she just tries to follow me to help! She even got out of bed to see if I was doing a wee or a poo when I told her I needed the toilet and tried to use that as a get out! I shall keep trying it though as I think it's a good strategy.

We have a teddy with a small bag on his back.
I fill teddy's bag with hugs and kisses just as he gets into bed. I remind him the teady has all the love he needs for the night, and he's to got some out if he needs Mummy cuddles, but that Mummy needs to sleep.

When DS2 arrived, DS1 had to make do with Daddy - I was looking after baby, like I looked after him when he was little, and now it was his turn to be big, and let DS2 grow into a big boy with lots of Mummy milk at night. That was reasonably well accepted, but I got mroe sleep with a newborn than DH got with the 2 year old.

We had this for ages with DD (3) and it was becoming a real problem as we had newborn DS who was being woken by her screaming. He's now 8 months.....

What seems to be working for us at the moment is checking in 5 minutes. She used to beg for me to lie down next to her and I just kept saying 'Ill come and check on you in 5 minutes - but only if you're quiet'.
9 times out of 10, she's quiet and settled when I go back in.
The other times I might need to do another 5 minute check, and then she's ok.

It's not an exact science, and took a while to implement, but being firm and consistent was the biggest step.