Help. 10 year old won't sleep alone

[Weekesy123]

Hi
I have a ten year old who has not slept properly for the last 18 months. She suffers anxiety and will not be left alone to go upstairs, sit downstairs or go to sleep alone. She often wakes in the middle of the night and we are always getting broken sleep.

I wanted to know if there were some good news stories out there that could be shared.

We have tried everything from yoga to melatonin to homeopathy to reward charts etc.

From a stressed and tried mummy x

Could you co-sleep? Or at least let DD sleep in the same room? Would that be enough to calm her?

I had an horrendous time as a child with fear/anxiety at night, it never really stopped and I still have issues now (ie at age 5 it was monsters, now it's burglars etc). I was made to sleep in my own room despite being absolutely petrified and I do believe that it only exacerbated the problem rather than cured it in any way.

Currently playing on my phone in bed with my 10 year old. He started sleeping with me when we went into Covid lockdown and hasn’t moved back to his room.
Hoping it won’t last forever but enjoying the snuggles while they last.

This 100%! I've always been anxious of the dark, even as a 30 year old woman. When my DH is away I absolutely hate sleeping alone.
My kids both hate sleeping on their own (3&5) so when they need it they just sleep in mine and DH's bed, on the nights when they both don't want to stay in their own bed we just put their mattresses in our room and have a cosy sleepover in one room. My babies can have snuggles at night for as long as they need it if it makes them feel safe!

My DS has similar nighttime anxieties and is the same age. We have brought his mattress into our room and made one corner his own cosy space. He has a bath at 8:30 and then bed at 9pm. One of us will usually stay in the room while he falls asleep. He will now happily stay in the room on his own but won't fall asleep. It feels natural to us now to all sleep in the same room. I would recommend trying this with your DD.

OP I can't requote you but yes, letting DD sleep with us entirely fixed the problem. In the short term because we didn't have broken nights. In the long term because it broke the cycle of fear she associated with nighttime. Within months she stopped needing us at night and now sleeps happily on an entirely different floor.

Fwiw I was never a Co sleeper when she was tiny. But she needed it at the age of 11. What we did was just put a mat and blanket on the floor and told her anytime she felt afraid she could just bring her pillow and sleep on our floor but please don't wake us up unless really needed. She would slip in at night. At first every night and then it just tapered off over the months.

She's obviously got completely unnerved at being alone. She sounds like she has developed a pathological fear of something bad happening to her when she's alone. This could be a deep-seated response to the shock and fear of Covid. It could have become ingrained, and has been made worse by hormonal changes.

To me, there is only one answer. I would go back to a routine that worked when she was younger. And keep doing that for as long as it takes, until she naturally relaxes and gains confidence again on her own.

I would not stress her about it or make any kind of fuss about it. I would try to play it down completely and say aw don't worry, sure you won't be wanting to sleep with us when you're 16 : )

The options I'd see are:

1. Remove the pressure entirely. Keep her with you at all time. Don't ever ask her to go upstairs on her own, or go to sleep on her own.

2. Agree a bedtime routine with her. Take her up for a bath and do something in your own room so you're around. Then say hey it's nice anyhow to read you a story or whatever at bedtime. Lie with her. Maybe read or tell a story, or she reads and you read your own book, but have that wind-down time. Then when she's fallen asleep, leave her.

3. If/when she wakes in the night, tell her rather than calling out, just to come and sleep in with you.

I KNOW this is big commitment. And might feel like an alarming regression at her age. But she clearly needs this reassurance at the moment. I don't see how else this will get sorted.

If there's no pressure, and she can feel 100% secure and sure that it's ok to be with you, she will at some point relax. And then she will probably at first wake less in the night. And over time, she will end up just staying in her room.

If you literally put her to bed, then at least you can plan around that evening commitment.

And if she just slips in next to you in the night, you shouldn't have a broken night.

It doesn't matter if she needs this now, and she sleeps next to you. She's frightened. She needs you. It's ok, and good, to be doing the right thing for her. The only way to help her is to be with her, and not make her feel bad or anxious about her anxiety itself.

I personally think that if you change your mindset and do as above, it will be the quickest way to sorting it.

I know it's a shift in terms of your own relationship with her father, but both of you need to face this solution and just do it. The sooner the better.

Honestly she won't be in with you when she's 16. But she needs this now. She's fallen off the bike. Needs picking up and putting back on, but she needs to get her confidence back.

We bought some tiny worry dolls from Amazon that my 10 year old dd kept under her pillow. She would tell them her worries each night and keep them under her pillow. It worked a treat.

@Weekesy123 She’s just turned 10. She chose to co-sleep until she was 7 and then one day, a switch flipped and she just wanted the bed to herself. Well, with the dog! We chat at night and then she goes to sleep on her own but knows she can come down for anything if she needs us. I’d be happy to cosleep but she just can’t do it now.

Incidentally, on nights when we have tried the gentle guilt-tripping (ie; it’s really late/ we all need sleep etc) she gets so upset. There’s just no point because it isn’t coming from a place of malice and the last thing we want is to know she’s up there upset and feeling she can’t come and speak to us about it.

@Weekesy123 · 06/10/2022 07:16
MrsElijahMikaelson1 · 06/10/2022 07:13
We had exactly the same with DD at that age; we gave up as we were all so tired. DD and DH swapped beds and she came in with me. It’s not a perfect solution, but we had tried everything else and needed the sleep. .

How are things now for you?

I would like to say it was a quick fix but it took years! She was 15/16 before she started managing by herself. But on the flip side of that, we are super close, she knows I am her safety net and always there for her. Also-because she went to bed in my bed and knew that I would always be joining her, I got my evenings back as she was happy to go to bed and go to sleep by herself. Sometimes you’ve just gotta do what works.

Year 6 is a tricky one with lots of different pressures-school/SATS/friendships/high school/puberty etc etc. it’s understandable that children struggle and we should be there for them whilst being able to have some self care time. 🌸

I was like this and DD was like this and like a lot of things in parenting I think sometimes you just need to give it time - it wont last forever and one day she will be an adult for whom coming home for a cuddle, dinner and the safety of her room will be enough.

DD moved at 12 - it occured at the time we all moved rooms so she designed it and created a very safe space for her. She still likes me to give her a cuddle and we watch a 5 minute video together and then she goes to sleep.

Your DD will get there

I'm not going to repeat some of the excellent advice you've already had but add a suggestion of a weighted blanket.

They're really good for anxious sleepers and I found I stopped waking up in the night.

Yeah we've tried these thanks. She gets to hot under them unfortunately and consequently wakes up.

Tried these as well. And a worry monster.

Did you try the bedtime meditations I suggested upthread?

Yes. Honestly we have tried everything you can think of.

In which case, do you think a traditionally made bed would help?

If you choose a real wool blanket it's temperature regulating, so she won't overheat, especially combined with cotton sheet. The weight of the wool and the act of tucking her in will have the same effect as a weighted blanket - it's how I came to try weighted blankets, I slept so well in a traditionally made bed.
A cellular wool blanket can be used until the summer gets hot without making her too warm.

I would let her sleep in with you. In other cultures, people would think nothing of doing this. It's very british that everyone has to be in their own room.

Ah man, she's been brilliant for a couple of other people and their kids at helping to overcome bedtime issues.

Have you tried letting her fall asleep to Audi books?

Any luck op? Going through similar but strongly feel having her in our room is the wrong way to go. Sleep spray and herbal teas help but really it's the not feeding the anxiety, so talking to her about it as much as she likes the next day but not engaging in the drama at night, just saying we will talk about it in the morning seems to be slowly working.

Just a little tip, by no means the whole answer but magnesium cream massaged into legs and arms also seems to help.

We had this issue with our youngest DD. We just let her carry on co-sleeping with us but it went on until she was about 12. In the end she moved permanently into her own room and is now fine as long as she has a night-light (which she still has despite being 16).

Our 10yr old DS is the same. He has always been a terrible sleeper since being a baby. It was only 2 years ago we got him to go to sleep on his own. He goes to bed by himself now but a couple of times a week he will wander in to our room. I don't mind as I get up and honks his bed which means I get a good sleep too. It's becoming less frequent. His sister was the same but grew out of it at around the same age. Sleep is a big deal and it's important that everyone is well rested IMO.

*honks - go to

Hi All. Just wondered how you and your children are now doing with sleep progress. My daughter has been cosleeping with us now for 6 months. Her anxiety is much better in the day and we are still trying to talk her into sleeping on her own but this is still the hardest part. Since deciding to do this me and my partner have not been intimate and I miss this selfishly.