4/5 year old won’t sleep FOMO

[adeleb362]

Our 4 (nearly 5 year old) old daughter will go through the bedtime routine and then "flip her power switch" to full on.

She gets silly, disruptful, disrespectful and then just out of control with her choices. . We have a quiet bedtime routine...but as soon as the lights go out it's as if she can't handle calming her mind and body long enough to fall asleep. She’ll jump on the bed, scream, shout, hit, kick, spit.

We've used charts, calming sounds, meditation, diffusers but nothing works.

im at my wits end :(

She's at school from 7:30-4:15 most days as she does breakfast club due to my work.

We try and keep as tight of a schedule as we can for food, bath, bed etc, but it's not always so easy. But 4/5 times it's generally the same time for everything.

If dad puts her to bed she is worse and just screams for me constantly. We have tried being persistent with him staying with her when she shouts me, but she gets so beside herself with upset, that she just can't calm down.

Undertired maybe? How much sleep does she get overnight and has she historically been a high or low sleep needs kid? Maybe her natural bedtime is more like 8pm or 9pm – crap if so as you’ll get less of an evening, but you might have more energy for your evening without the battle. Could you try moving the whole routine back a bit so she’s actually tired?

It sounds like she's scared or anxious but doesn't know how to express it. How do you deal with things when she's scared at other times?

Sounds hellish -
my advice is ramp up the punishments, kick the door, physically lash out then the next day you eat breakfast in your room, no tv, sorry but you have to be far harsher on physical violence.

Hi, I really feel for you as I went through the exact same thing, I had mine doing the jumping out of bed, playing, coming out of the room etc laughing the crosser we got!

My now five year old was like this and how we solved it was lying beside him in bed ad he falls asleep. After story time with his Dad, I come in and it’s lights off. Snuggles and chats about his day and what he is going to do tomorrow.
I rub his back for a minute or two and then I say my hand is sore now, it’s sleeping time and turn around with my back to him. He keeps trying to chat and I keep saying it’s night time now go asleep and 9 times out of 10
he is asleep within a few minutes.

He was a nightmare prior to this and it would take forever and lots of frustration which led to shouting and threats. I was adamant that he should just go asleep by himself like every other child and no way was I going to make a rod for my back by lying with him as he goes asleep but we were dreading night time. Then I read somewhere that behaviours are children showing what they need. And it just clicked He needed us and the company as he falls asleep so I gave in and it was the best thing. Bed time are so much quicker and positive now. 20 mins of what I swore I would never do as opposed to hour or more or dramatics!

But every child is different and this might not work but I really do feel your frustration. Big hug

I wouldn’t be bothered what DS does in his room once it’s door closed and lights out so long as he’s not coming out of his room. Is she coming out of her room even if you just leave her to it? Has she always been this way or has it just started? Seems something is bothering her about bedtime.

DS has some stars that he switches on at bedtime and also a gro clock - he doesn’t come out until the sun comes up. It comes with a book etc and has been v helpful for our DS. He also likes to listen to Yoto stories too.

I appreciate we’re quite lucky though and also he’s 4 so we might have all this to come yet!

You mention the iPad... No screen time in the evenings might help. Screens make it hard to switch off your mind. Sorry if you're already doing this.

Just get a dog gate at the door (worked very quickly for us.)

How much does she sleep at night? My 3yr old does this when she needs to shave some time off her sleep and she’s undertired. She’s dropped down to 8pm bedtime to 6:30 wake up. Perhaps she just doesn’t need as much sleep as she used to?