I’ve joked about this but it’s now actually breaking me

[fruityb]

My son is two years and two months. Since turning two he has been what I can only describe as a fucking nightmare at bedtime. Since he was 8 months old he’s gone to bed awake and slept all night without any problems. And would sleep anywhere - so sleepovers with or without us were fine.

Since he turned two he’s been horrendous. He was in a cot still and started waking in the night, which was unheard of. We made the switch to a bed and things got better for a time. This last week it’s been absolutely awful and my anxiety at bedtime is escalating. I’m actually sitting here crying while DH deals with him. In the day time DS is a normal toddler - he plays, he chats, he has a nap, he’s a little bugger at times but generally good company. When he goes to bed it changes. You put him in bed and he starts making noises that lead up to full on wailing. He goes “uh uh uh”
Louder and louder and as soon as you leave the room the shrieking begins. He comes out onto the landing and stands at his stair gate screaming blue murder like something awful has happened. Got him a night light and that helped for one night but we’re now back to this. I dread bedtime massively because this is driving me insane. He will not lay down, he gets back in when you go up only to get right back out again seconds later. We tried putting the stair gate on his bedroom door but he shook it and slammed his door shut which took his door off its hinges!!!

He is screaming like his world is ending. We’ve both taken it in turns to sit upstairs till he goes off but we can’t keep doing that - i was there for over an hour the other night and he didn’t talk to me or bother with me other than to start the uh uh noises if I tried to move.

I feel like my toddler is manipulating us and I know that’s not true - he’s still small I know but I just don’t know why his personality has done a 180! He’s also been really clingy and crying when being taken to CM yet I then have to fight to bring him home at night!! I cannot cope with the shrieking when he’s going to bed. When he’s asleep he doesn’t wake up till morning but it’s getting him to sleep that’s hard. He’s going to his aunties for the night on Friday and I’m seriously considering cancelling it as she has a 6 and 2 year old herself and I cant even think of him behaving this way somewhere else.

My husband is much calmer so he is dealing with it most of the time but this needs to stop. How the hell are we supposed to go anywhere or leave him anywhere when he acts like this?? Part of me wants to put him back in the cot so at least he can’t run out but then knowing him he’d just climb out now!!

We haven’t changed routine, his nap is only an hour which he still needs as he’s worn out by lunch, NOTHING has changed! Why is it like he’s broken in the last month! If you try and leave the room when he’s in bed he just starts wailing if he’s not ready for that. I feel like I’ve tried everything - rapid return, slowly moving myself away, shushing, being calm, winding down before bed... you even mention bed and he just grins and then makes it hard to take him up as he won’t walk but fights if you carry him.

Any advice would be appreciated!!

You've heard of the terrible twos, right?
I'm sure lots of people would disagree with me, but I would be a lot firmer than it sounds like you have been so far.
Tell him it's time to go to sleep and he mustn't get up again until morning, tuck him in read him a story, make sure he has his teddy/blanket, give him a kiss and say good night.
Go downstairs, ignore all small noises uh uh or whatever he does. Ignore it if he gets out of bed and looks for you. (Assuming he is safe obv.)
If he is screaming the place down, go and put him back to bed with minimum fuss telling him in the most boring manner that it's time for bed.

Repeat as necessary, I really would not sit with him or engage with him at all. Now you may well spend a few nights holding your breath listening to every cream, but he shouldn't know that and he will learn that you are not up for this game every night and he might as well go to sleep.

Creak! Not cream! That sounds so weird.

There's a huge sleep regression and another peak in separation anxiety at 2 or so. Could be either or both?
My almost 2yo has been going through this on and off for weeks now. I've found managing expectations around bed time to be the best tactic for us. So I tell her clearly when she has 10 mins left before bed in units she understands (so one more bing ep, three more crazy dancing to whatever the song du jour is, two more stories etc) I also find getting her ready away from her room helps, I take all of her toys/teddies/dolls/oxo cubes yes I'm raising a tiny oddball don't worry they're low salt up to her room and bring her pyjamas and toothbrush down.
We do the last nappy change, toothbrushing and getting pjs on in our living room, then when we go up her room is dark (and I've taken to digging out her old white noise machine and having that on). Give her a cuddle then get her into bed and tell her one story, when that's done I tell her I'm going downstairs and tell her goodnight, then I go and that's that. No sneaking out or she'd lose her shit. It's getting better each night. Unfortunately I can't help re drop off as she clings to me and we've not yet cracked it. It's just a phase, it'll pass, they're only small for such a short time blah blah blah...it sucks, wine helps!

I’ve been upstairs forty minutes and he’s started treating getting out like a game. I put him back in without speaking to him and when he just started laughing at me I came downstairs. He’s now shouting mummy at the top of the stairs but he’s staying there for ten minutes before I lose my shit - and that’s not a way I want to feel.

Sitting with him isn’t working - I’m not doing it. I’m just going to go with putting him back and leaving.

He is given ten minute warning before bed - he has his pyjamas on half an hour before. The routine is the same and he takes a toy/notebook/empty box with him (it’s been all three lately) and gets tucked in. He has Ewan on and has done since he was four months old - he even switches that on himself in the night!

I’m downstairs and I’m leaving him till 25 past. I’m not being controlled like this!!

DS1 was a freaking nightmare when we moved him to a bed at 2.3. Unfortunately he'd worked out how to fling himself out of the cot so we had no choice. He'd been a great sleeper up til then, but when we moved him to a bed it all went to chaos for a while. He kept running out of bed, crying, middle of the night waking. I tried things like rapid return and that thing where you night by night inch your chair further out of the room but no success. What actually worked was a period of just sitting in his room as he fell asleep. He used to like to cuddle one of our arms as he went to sleep. Then one night I told him I was just popping out to do some trivial task like emptying the tumble dryer and I'd be back in two minutes to check on him. For some reason that seemed to convince him that it was actually OK to lie in bed on his own, and from then on he's been great at bedtime (he's now 4). It was probably a month or so of sitting in his room, which felt like torture at the time and I was desperate to solve it, but actually it all worked out OK of its own accord.

I'd stop the nap honestly
All three of my kids messing about at bedtime around this age is because they needed to drop the nap

How's it going?

I used to tell mine I leave the room if they get up and piss about. (Not those actual words out loud 🙈🙈🤣). I felt bad but it actually worked better than trying to stay or trying to leave.

I’m just left feeling tired, stressed, angry, fed up, miserable.... I feel like I’m being controlled by a fucking dictator!! I need an outlet so sorry if I get sweary. I just feel like I’ve failed somewhere and done something wrong which is why he’s behaving like a little shit at bedtime.

I’ve just had to bring him downstairs and practically flung him at DH. I actually don’t want to look at him right now.

I was sitting in his room. He won’t listen or won’t understand me when I say I’ll be back in a minute of that he needs to go to bed as it’s sleep time. He just whinges. I tried leaving him upstairs but it was incessant mummy mummy mummy then daddy daddy daddy and it was driving us both to distraction. DH can deal with it since he won’t let me leave him up there longer.

I am a teacher - I often have work to do in the evenings and I just can’t do any of it right now. I’m so angry and frustrated and I don’t want to feel like this. When he started laughing at me I almost lost my shit.

Drop the nap!

The Super Nanny back to bed technique works- first time they come out, say 'it's bedtime, darling, back to bed' and calmly put them back in; 2nd time just say 'bedtime' and put them back; all subsequent times say nothing but put them back in bed. No discussion. The videos show parents putting toddlers back into bed hundreds of times the first night but by the third night the child stays in bed. Good luck.

Do I ask CM to cut it short? Like half it slowly? Will it stop this fucking around at bedtime? The little terrorist is laid there with his dad right now - I just want to go to bed and think about my life choices for a while...

Ah feel free to vent. He knows exactly how to push your buttons.
I know he won't listen to you and you can't reason with him. I just used to say the same boring things to my dc each night as part of the routine.

Just cut it out completely

People have said that many times

Ok I’ll drop the nap.

I’m also going to do the super nanny thing. I have tried but my husband just keeps shouting to bring him downstairs as he’s obviously not going to bed etc. I’ll speak to him later about how we both need to be on the same page here otherwise it’ll be even harder to stop this.

DS is 20 months. I go in and lie him straight back down when he dicks around, or screams. A breezy “good night”, and off I go again. The worst night, it took 27 goes to get him down and I almost ran away myself, but now it’s max twice usually, and mostly none at all. We don’t do any screens or toys after bathtime - just books and quiet songs - and I don’t have any bright lights on. That all seems to help.

We had this with DD for a short time.....I went all super nanny on her ass and it did the trick! Took about a week all in all though but got shorter and shorter each night.

What worked for mine was to say that this was the time of year when Santa sends his elves out to check on which children were asleep in bed at the right time. It worked for me!

Our toddler started to do this as well after being great at self settling for ages. We have difficult neighbours so any noise is a no no so I read a book to him on our bed, turn the lights out and he falls asleep after 5-10 minutes and then I transfer him. Probably isn't the best thing to do but he is a very anxious boy at the moment and this is the only calm way of going to bed we have found. He also dropped his nap and now will usually fall asleep within a few minutes of turning he light out.

I wouldn't drop the nap they still need it til closer to three and it'll be worse if he's overtired, just make sure it's no longer than an hour and ends by 2pm for a 7pm bedtime.
Stick with the super nanny approach first and see how that goes then drop the nap as a last resort

Agree, two year sleep regression. Mine screams some nights, but always has done intermittently. How long is the nap? I limited to 1 hour from before 2. My dd1 gave it up about 2.5 so I'm expecting it won't be much longer. If mine plays up more next week nap is getting cut to 30 mins.

Drop the nap! He clearly isn't tired enough come bedtime. And yes he is controlling you as he is downstairs now....this was the worst phase with my 2nd, sound very similar and I just went back to basics, took a week of not talking just putting back but we got there. I do remember that fury of wanting to yell obscenities....good luck x

Some kids don't need to nap until age three

Sorry forgot to say when we did this, we regressed back to "witching hour" where she was a nightmare between 5-7pm after dropping the nap..... your child minder needs to be on board, yes he prob will be a little shit before you pick him up but guess what, that's what your paying her to do.... don't let her fob you off saying oh he just fell asleep etc, I always knew the days she had napped....

And beware of the full moons!! Even now my youngest is horrendous on full moons and she's 6!

Ye drop the nap he might not be properly tired and that's why he's messing about