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Sleep

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Original poster

Anyone co-sleep with their toddler?

25 replies

Tinks15 · 14/07/2017 22:42

How do you find? Do your DC sleep better once they are in with you?
What time do they usually get into your bed?

We bedshare with our DD who is 2 tomorrow - we want our bed back but just don't know how.
Don't think it helps she is super clingy with me either .

OP posts:

Waddlelikeapenguin · 14/07/2017 22:44

Mine starts off in my bed (with big brother) & I join them later.

FoxesSitOnBoxes · 14/07/2017 22:47

I do. My husband is in the army and has been away a lot and I like the cuddles! DS sleeps like a log. I carry him through from his own bed when I come up. If I leave him in his bed he wakes at about midnight and comes through himself or has a bit of a cry. He isn't clingy with me during the day.
I have no idea how we would start to teach him to stay in his bed all night... I didn't plan on him still being in with us/me but here we are! Sorry this isn't much help really, is it!?

NSEA · 14/07/2017 22:47

Ours goes in her own bed. She joins us at some point in the night and we all sleep better for it. She is 3 now. For the first 2 years I refused to cosleep and I was a zombie waking wvery couple of hours to resettle. I am actually starting to feel normal again.

She won't be here forever so I can live with it. I certainly couldn't live with things the way they were.

Original poster

Tinks15 · 14/07/2017 22:47

Mine is opposite she starts off in her cot but within 2/3 hours she wakes & wants to get in our bed & won't settle unless I'm in bed also.

OP posts:

debbs77 · 14/07/2017 22:50

I am a single parent and co sleep with my 3 and 4 year old daughter's. We love it!

Tootsiepops · 14/07/2017 22:51

My 20 month old is in her own double bed. She gets really annoyed if I try to get in beside her

NoWhereToGoo · 14/07/2017 22:51

I co slept with all of mine. They all moved into their own beds really easily at 2/3. They would go to sleep in their cots or my arms and then would wake in the night and get in with me. We all slept so much better

Tortycat · 14/07/2017 22:53

We coslept with dc1 until he was 2 and dc2 arrived. Now i cosleep with the baby and dh is generally in with dc1. Dc1 will go to sleep in his room but if he wakes in the night and dh isnt there he'll come into my room which wakes dc2 up. Not ideal but we all get more sleep this way. Hoping it doesnt last forever!

Tw1nsetAndPearls · 14/07/2017 22:56

We do with our -8 month old , not planned but it just worked out that way. We are probably not great parents to be honest - he does to bed about nine most nights.

Sometimes he starts in his cot but rarely stays there. My husband is probably a bit keener to have him in bed with us than I am but I do like waking up to him

Batteriesallgone · 14/07/2017 22:56

We caved and constructed a family bed from multiple bed frames / mattresses. We have all three kids in with us sometimes although DS (5) now sleeps in his own bed in his own room all night most of the time.

Definitely he slept much better in with us until one day he was 'ready' to sleep alone. Nothing we did it was just like a switch flipped. I think around 3.5. Bit hazy. He also had a sensible bedtime for a child once he dropped his day naps.

DD (nearly 3) can sleep on her own for 2-4 hours but usually goes to bed with us about 9 (still napping in the day) and then sleeps all night.

We also have a newborn in the bed (kept away from DD and DH obviously). He's our last and we keep saying hey in 5 years time we'll have our bed / bedroom back part of me can't wait but I'm sure I'll miss our monster bed when it's gone!

Caramelbutthorn · 14/07/2017 22:58

I'm a lone parent and co-sleep with my 4.5 year old. He refuses to sleep in his own bed - he says he'll sleep in it when he's 6!

MissSmiley · 14/07/2017 23:02

I would really like our bed back too but at the moment I have a ten year old DS and a seven year old DD in with me! Luckily our other three children are in their own beds.
Some children need the reassurance of co sleeping and some don't. Oddly the twin who is in tonight is the one who normally sleeps on his own.

isittheholidaysyet · 14/07/2017 23:07

I also co-slept with all of mine, they all moved easily to going to bed in their own beds when I stopped breastfeeding. (Around 12-18months), except the youngest who needed a bit more effort(no new baby to kick her out for!)

BUT, they rarely stayed in their beds.
Youngest aged 6 still often appears at somepoint in the night. We used to be strictly at putting her back, nowadays we only realise she's there when the alarm goes off.

The 8 year old was in the other night.
On the rare occasions the 12 year old appears, he gets a cuddle and sent back to bed.

They sleep far far more easily with us. (And so we sleep better too) Hotel rooms are a dream, as are tents!

There are nights when DH or I give up and go and climb into the child's bed or the sofa.

trilbydoll · 14/07/2017 23:09

Our 4yo starts in her bed and comes in with us probably 2 nights out of 7. She slept through for the first time at 15mo and it's been a very slow and steady improvement since then. Depends how desperate you are for your bed back, I think they all get there eventually.

Dd is happier in a bed with no gate on the door because she knows she can come in whenever. Might be worth a try?

Having said that dd2 is a total nightmare in a bed and is staying in a cot until she physically doesn't fit!

daisydalrymple · 14/07/2017 23:23

Dc3 is 2.8 now and comes in our bed when he wakes after I go to bed. He can wake anytime from 11pm onwards. He's slept through in his cot 3 times.

We've put his toddler bed up now in ds1's room, he went to sleep in it the first night, then came running through in tears when he woke and has asked for the cot since. Maybe he'll take to the bed more over the summer holidays, we'll see.

Also co-slept with ds1 and dd, but with ds2 it's been more or less from the beginning from the point at which he woke after I went to bed. I needed to sleep with getting up for the school run with ds1 and dd, so it's been all he's known really. Luckily he's always slept and not played about or woke up properly, just had fairly disruptive first few months as he's dairy intolerant but not diagnosed till 9 months.

Waddlelikeapenguin · 15/07/2017 02:24

Batteriesallgone description makes me think of the picture book "The biggest bed in the world" :) which is a favourite here.

www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/0007711190/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1500081815&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=the+biggest+bed+in+the+world&dpPl=1&dpID=61tFTKDd3pL&ref=plSrch&tag=mumsnetforum-21

CobsAhoy · 15/07/2017 13:03

22month old DD goes down in her own bed, wakes ever two hours or so, she can be resettled in her bed pretty quickly but I just take her into our bed when we go to bed as that way she sleeps through (unless she's teething/ill etc)

Original poster

Tinks15 · 15/07/2017 22:45

So pleased to hear this, seems more people co-sleep than I thought.

Maybe now she's 2 she will start sleeping through in her bed . Hahahaha

OP posts:

Crumbs1 · 15/07/2017 22:49

I did if they were poorly or unsettled for some reason. Could occasionally be a huge game of musical beds during thunderstorms etc I remember six little ones (three of mine and three of a friends) in with me, husband leaping out into one of the children's beds and older three swapping around and climbing in first with their father and then with me as storm increased in intensity. They slept, we didn't.

WanderingTrolley1 · 15/07/2017 22:51

We're still cosleeping with 2 toddlers.

ToneDeafHamster · 15/07/2017 23:03

DD has been in our bed since she was born, she is now 3 and showing no signs of wanting to sleep in her own bed. She is a bit of a bed hog, but I would miss her terribly if she did sleep on her own!

elQuintoConyo · 15/07/2017 23:11

DS was in with us until 3.8yo.

He had got his own bed at Christmas but still slept with us. We'd play in his room and put teddies on the bed etc - he was having none of it!

Then one super sticky clammy humid rotten August night (we're in Spain) he declared it impossible to sleep with us and took himself off to his own room and own bed. And that was it.

He has been back a handful of times when ill, but 99.9% his room and sleeps really well.

We co-slept because he was a shockingly bad sleeper alone, but a deep sleeper with us.

I miss him and he is now exactly 2 years older!

Crabbo · 15/07/2017 23:18

Mine is 2.3, she sleeps in her cot until somewhere between 11 and 2 usually then comes in with us when she wakes up. She then sleeps through till 8ish no problem. Second baby due in December so not sure what we'll do, maybe baby in a side sleeper cot and just put dd in our bed from the start? My dh is Chinese and it's totally normal there, everyone does it. We're both happy to have them in with us as long as they like.

Crabbo · 15/07/2017 23:20

Also on the rare occasion she sleeps in her cot for longer (like till 3 or 4...) I can't sleep at all, just lie there wide awake. Which is ridiculous as her cot is right up against our bed anyway

StinkyMcgrinky · 15/07/2017 23:24

We co-sleep (co-kicked-in-the-face) with 1 year old DS2. DS1 (2) is a great sleeper and does 12hours in his own bed no problems, but DS2 is the polar opposite. He's never slept through (We've done exactly the same things, he just isn't a sleeper) and we've spent the past year surviving on broken sleep and settling DS every 2 hours in the night as I was determined to teach him to sleep on his own all night.

We went on holiday to France and stayed in a mobile home which wasn't sound proof, we started bringing him in with us when he woke so he wouldn't disturb his brother. I realised he would still wake up but as soon as he recognised our bodies next to him he went back to sleep. So I gave up and decided sleep was more important than "the rules" and I am now a co-sleeping convert

DS2 tends to sleep 7.30-2.30 in his cot and then come in with us until around 7am. Best sleep we've had in months!

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