How to get a continuous routine - PLEASE HELP!

[alwaysawake]

Hope someone can give me some advice because I'm very slowly losing my mind! I keep having trouble getting my 3-year old daughter to sleep and I just don't know how to get into a good routine. For the past 2 years I've been swinging from one tactic to another, each one seems to work for a couple of months then doesn't anymore and I have to figure out something new to try and get her to sleep.

For the last couple of months I've been sitting with her as she goes to sleep which was working but then it took her longer and longer until she wasn't going to sleep until she'd been in bed for 2.5 hours. Now I'm settling her and then leaving her, going back every 15 mins and its still taking just as long but at least I get an evening! She cries for ages and eventually runs out of steam, which seems to be the only way to get her to sleep, getting her to cry herself to sleep which makes me feel so guilty.

When she was 18 months I had her in a good routine of a bath, then a story, then bed and I could leave her and she'd go to sleep. then bit by bit it fell apart when she wouldn't go to sleep, then wouldn't have a bath at night, only in the morning. It got so hard getting her to sleep that I'd just do whatever worked and have done ever since. But now its got to the stage where I've run out of things I can do and just want a set routine that she'll be happy with and will last for more than 3 months!!!

Please suggest something

Sorry, but if anything like me you read all the books try all the advise and go round in circles the give up then start all over again and then eventually they work it out for themselves! Sorry!

You're having EXACTLY the same problems as my sis had with her dd. She was sitting with her dd until she fell asleep too but eventually it was getting ridiculous, her dd was taking up to 2 hours to fall asleep, and would literally be climbing the walls and chucking things around her bedroom like a loony. She started going into their spare room and telling her dd she was just next door etc, and then started to tell her that a 'fairy' would leave her a present if she stayed in her bed and went to sleep!!! Eventually, she thought 'bugger this' she was getting no time to herself in the evenings, would put dd to bed and then go to bed herself, what kind of life is that!!? Then she did what you are doing, following the same routine before taking her upstairs and leaving her to cry for a bit. The crying didn't last long, and it's worked. If your daughter is a happy, secure child, it will not damage her to cry for a bit before going to sleep. Does she still nap during the day? Cutting out a day nap might mean she will be too tired at night to kick up too much of a fuss about bedtime. Or even just cutting the nap down a bit.

Thanks for the replies, at the moment I'm doing a very similar thing peggotty, telling her she'll get a special present in the morning if she goes to sleep on her own with 'no talking, no playing and no crying'. She's overjoyed in the morning when she gets her packet of smarties or whatever but has to cry herself to sleep at night. Did the same at about 18 months and it worked beautifully for about two weeks and then it just slipped like all of my efforts seem to!! She'd just cry longer and longer until she was crying until 10.30/11 at night and I had to go to bed so I just slept with her as it was easier which led to about 4 months of me going to bed at 7pm!!!!

She doesn't have a daytime nap, hasn't for about 9 months and I try to wear her out in the day, and she only eats rubbish first thing in the morning (when I'm busy waking up) so she shouldn't be hyper but she just seems to have endless energy.

She's generally happy and secure but what worries me is I think she got less secure after the first go at cc - that was the time when she stopped playing on her own and insisted I play with her all the time/go everywhere with her/never sit down when she's up and about. I know thats probably just coincidence with her development but deep down I just feel panicky that I'm making her feel lonely and that'll make her clingy. She says things in the morning like 'i was all alone' and 'you made me sad' which I know is toddler tactics but it doesn't half work well!!

I'm putting all my efforts into cc but there just doesn't seem a happy medium, I either have to be with her for hours until she drops off or get her exhausted from crying.