Getting 2 year old to stay in own bed

[jb1305uk]

Hi, I’m looking for some advice for getting our 2 year old daughter to stay in her own bed, will give a bit of background first.

She moved into a toddler bed in August and slept well, about 8-7 although needed one of us to stay with her until she fell asleep.

A few weeks later she experienced illness coupled with bad night time coughing which often led to her being sick, so we put her in a travel cot in our room so we could get to her quickly. On really bad nights she slept next to us as it was the only way any of us got some sleep. Over winter we’d get a week or so of her being fine then another bug would hit and she’d be back in the travel cot or our bed.

She’s now on medication which has massively helped the night time coughing but we are having problems getting her to stay in her own bed, she’s wanting into our bed after a few hours. It never used to be an issue but she’s bigger and moves around a lot which means we are getting a poor sleep and are exhausted.

We don’t want to leave her to cry but we really need to break this habit. I’m aware we’ve made a rod for our own backs but we felt we were doing the right thing when she was ill or having problems with coughing.

Can anyone offer advice? Many thanks.

Shut the door. The world isn't going to implode because she cries.

As I stated in my post, I’m not leaving her to cry.

I think if you don’t want to leave her to cry then you’ll have to sit by her in her bed when she wakes up and comfort her there until she goes back to sleep. We’ve done this a few times as new baby means our toddler can’t really come in so we then sit by her bed or bring duvet and sleep on floor next to her and then go when she’s fallen back to sleep.

I know. And that's your problem. You're doing everybody a great disservice because you don't want to feel guilty for 10 minutes. That's a bad parenting habit to get into and you talk about building a rod for your back, oh boy, ain't that the understatement of the year. And it's only the 7th of January.

Gosh judgemental much knitted???

As elpheba states, going into her room and reassuring her that she is ok in her bed, she isn't poorly now and that you can hear her if she needs you. She might be missing you, she might be worried about being sick so you just need to make sure she is happy again in her own room.

At two, my dd could open her bedroom door, in our current house due to layers of pain the door doesn't stay shut. Oerhaps the previous PP is suggesting that locking children in rooms overnight is the way forward? Or perhaps they just don't want to be very helpful.

Layers of paint! No layers of pain here!

I came on here looking for advice, not judgement on my parenting.

Elpheba and Thishatisnotmine thank you.

We moved our 2 year old into a toddler bed earlier this year and it's generally been fine until she gets ill and then we've seen very similar behaviours about wanting to decamp into our bed. We've tried to persevere with a mix of sitting with her, explaining she needs her own bed and occasionally sleeping on her floor (not ideal but means at least one of you gets some sleep but we equally had to be careful that didn't become a habit!). It did pass after a couple of weeks - regressed over Christmas (think it was the lack of routine and general excitment) and now seems to be getting back on track. Not much else to suggest I'm afraid as very difficult to leave an ill child to cry.

Thanks gg96cgp that’s helpful, I think we’ll have to take a similar approach. We’ve had periods like this before which have settled, I’m hoping with a bit of consistency this one will settle too.

I feel your pain OP - our 3yo also does this. Hopefully will grow out of it before he's 12...

@knittedjest are you an 80 year old woman? 🤣 the outdated ‘advice’ you give is hilarious. Thanks for the laugh

Just to update. DD has been in her bed in her room for 4 nights now. She won’t go to sleep unless one of us is in the room with her, normally sitting on her bed or on the floor- I’m not worried about this for now, we can gradually withdraw. But, 3 out of 4 nights she has slept through without a peep which is great progress! One night she woke up and wanted in with us but we think this was due to a noise from outside waking her.

Very early days but we will keep trying.

I've had similar with all 7 of our children, I've now got the transition down to a week or so.

You just need to be totally consistent with routine. We have bed at 7:30 after a shower, even if I come straight from work and delay my dinner. She sits on the step and brushes her teeth while I choose a book. Into bed, book read, lights out. For the first week I lay on the floor till she was asleep, then progressively left it longer and longer putting the book away on the landing so she didn't expect me there immediately.

For the first week or two she woke frequently in the night, you've just got to go to bed early and be prepared to settle her, don't let them back in your room for any reason.