How to stop co-sleeping?

[Ktd88]

Hi! Our 2 year old starts the night in her own bed at about 7pm, but then at about 11pm finds her way into our bed and stays their the rest of the night. She was a terribly sleeper in the early days so we've never minded this new routine as it means that we all (finally) get a good nights sleep! But now we're thinking about trying for another baby and I'm worried about the practicalities of managing a newborn and toddler at night time. So we'd ideally like to try and encourage our toddler to stay in her bed all night. Does anyone have any tips for this?

Watching this with interest as we are in the same situation.

Don't panic. You are thinking about trying for another - you are not there yet, so have at least nine months and a day in hand. By that time your two year old will be nearly three, and her language so much more developed. You will be able to offer star charts/rewards for being a big girl and discuss things with her - eg shall we buy a new light for your big girl room, to help you stay there all night? A cd player/white noise etc.

I was in the same situation with my 3 year old. We started talking about the fact that when his brother arrived, he would be a big boy and that he could do things that the baby couldn't . . . It was so much easier than I hoped.

Enjoy your snuggles in the meantime.

Thanks @Notverygrownup that makes me feel better! That's the thing I really do love the nighttime snuggles and we all sleep so well at the moment I don't want to rock the boat. Star charts sound like a great idea I think in a few months she would respond quite well to something like that :-)

:-) We found a 3 year age gap so useful for this. They are close enough in age to play well together but the 'big boy' card really worked for us. It meant that much as we loved ds2, we were able to make sure there was very little jealousy, as we were able to remind ds1 that "he's 'only' a baby, so can't do big boy things like you yet. When he's older you can teach him."

(It also came in useful for getting ds1 to do things he didn't want to do as he was very proud of being big. "Poor baby can't tidy his room/eat meals at the table/go for a long walk/etc as he's not a big boy." He sometimes worked out what we were doing but was very keen to maintain his status, so more often than not, I had a rather willing helper . . . )