Two-year old won't stay in bed

[RafflesMaidenSister]

So, our two year old has recently moved into a toddler bed. He did a couple of nights fine, then he kept getting up and we put up the travel cot (his former cot now being occupied by his sister) and would put him in there if he would not stay in bed after a few tries. Go back and then pop him in bed. This worked for a week or so, but now it's just turned into a game and any time he wakes up he gets up and cries.

I've just put him down in the cot (at 5 am), which he's really upset about but however upset he gets he can't get passed the idea that getting out of bed is a game. Any suggestions? We can't keep doing this!

Sorry! "Past" not "passed". Utterly knackered!

We put a stair gate on the door and left dd to it. She got bored when she realised we weren’t coming to play the “game” of putting her back. She also went through phase of taking all bedding and teddies off the bed and sleeping on the floor... again, we left her to it and she eventually got bored of it.

We’d do all the normal bed routine, tuck her in and then only go up if there was an actual problem. Any silly shenanigans we just ignored as responding seemed to fuel it more.

We have done this tonight and he's clearly not a stayer - into bed after 5 minutes and asleep in another 10.

Thanks for giving me the confidence to do it!

Glad it worked!