2yo CC not working?

[RetroHippy]

Any advice gratefully received. DS is 25 months and has never been a good sleeper, except one blissful 8 week window in the autumn when he would cheerily wave night night as we walked out of the room and sleep till morning.

We started sleep training on Monday, We are sticking to our bedtime routine, then DH is saying good night and leaving the room. He is returning at intervals, extending 5 minutes each time. The aim was to help him to go to sleep without us there, in the hope that he would stop waking in the night & coming in to our bed (where he continues to cry/kick unless he is lying on me, otherwise I'd happily co-sleep). So far the week has looked like this:

Mon & Tuesday - Cried 7-11. No wake-ups. Up at 5.

Wed - Cried 7-10. No wake-ups, up at 5.

Thurs - Asleep by 8:30. No wake-ups. Up at 5

Fri - Asleep 8:15. Woke 2:30. Cried till 4am when we caved and DH stayed in until he slept. Woke 7:30.

But every time he's gone to sleep, it's been when DH was in the room. Even if it's just for a minute while he calms him down, it seems like DS is exhausted enough that when he calms down, he falls asleep instantly. At no point has he actually fallen asleep unless DH was in the room.

So I think the earlier sleeps later in the week have just been because he's so bloody knackered, not because the training is working.

Any ideas? It's making bedtime an issue when it never was before. He's even clingier to me during the day (which I didn't think was possible!) and he is waking earlier than ever. I can't help thinking we've made an awful mistake.

I wouldn't continue, it doesn't seem to be working and there is lots of research how cc adversely affects an infants mental health (this is evidenced by your child clinging to you in the day).

I am not against cc, indeed I did it with both my children but it was never as you describe and even though my children are much, much older if they wake in the night, I will often snuggle / fall asleep in their beds !

Hi retro my 14 month old sleeps on me too when she's in our bed. It's so frustrating! I can't do controlled crying. Mainly because I'm lazy

If you are happy to co-sleep, maybe concentrate on making that work for you rather than cc?

What I have started doing is giving our daughter a long cuddle when she first comes in our bed, then peeling her off me and putting her down beside me, whilst patting her back and repeating 'it's ok, I'm right beside you' etc.

First night, it took three bloody hours, second night, an hour, third night half an hour with no thrashing or crying and no toddler slamming in to my stomach. It was lovely!

My nearly four year old still needs one of us to hold her hand to go to sleep. Most nights she will sleep through until about 6am. This is a recent thing, since about October, before that she was up usually about 2am and either had to come back in with us or one of us had to hold her hand again. Takes about 10 mins - fine at bedtime, not so much in the middle of the night.

Other child takes himself off to bed if tired, falls asleep no matter what's happening, have to go and wake him up 12 hours later.

What I am saying is, there is nothing much we can do to help DC1 sleep better. She likes us there, end of. And there's nothing we have done to make DC2 a good sleeper. They've both been treated the same. Once we accepted DC1 was just a bit pants at sleeping, everything got much easier. We solved it by one of us moving into the spare room so whenever DC1 decamped into bed with a grown up there was more room for her to wriggle and at least one parent got a half decent nights sleep.

VeryPunny we have tried that, whoever woke with him would stay in our room (bigger bed) and the other would move to the spare room. But DH drives for work and really struggles when he is tired, and DS's sleep is even worse in with me.

I'm thinking it might have to be mattress on DS's floor for a bit. It's doing wonders for the conception of number 2

I would stop the cc

What's the bedtime routine like and the last couple hours of the day - is there enough time to wind down at his own pace etc... How long has it been this bad and have there been any changes in his life that would cause distress, upset, insecurity? I see he's recently turned 2, is he able to verbalise at all anything that's bothering him?

There's a Millpond sleep book that might help with ideas as to how to help him sleep.

I hope it improves for him soon

knaffedoff My main concern about CC has always been that it would make him more clingy during the day. He's suffered badly with separation anxiety since he had an operation at 6mo and woke without me there. And he might just be a clingy child I guess.

We're just both so shattered it's affecting our relationship. We needed to do something and DH has a friend who has had success with CC with older toddlers, so he was keen to try it.

Wonder He is very verbal, but when we bring up bedtime just gets upset and says he wants mummy's bed.

The thing that broke his sleep pattern when we thought we had it cracked was DH going away with work for a week. He woke crying the first night and hadn't settled since. But DH is away two or three times a year, so it's something he needs to get used to.

He's started potty training over the past couple of months, but led by him and very gradual.

And Christmas totally messed up any routine we had, which is why we've left it a month to settle down.

His bedtime routine is dinner, bath, downstairs for quiet play in PJs, teeth brushed and up with DH for stories and sleep. We found bed straight after bath didn't work as he needed a bit of a wind-down after his bath.

Phone died... he's also started nursery two days a week, but previously was at a CM and with his grandma so it's not the first time he's been away from me, and he has settled really well.

Retrohappy, it sounds as though he has had to deal with a lot of change recently starting nursery, this will disturb his sleep pattern. Unfortunately sleep is never an easy one to fix!