Catapults out of cotbed, moving to bed not worked out, travel cots seems to do the trick....but

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how long can i really make him sleep in a travel cot without any damage to his back -- i.e. bearing in mind that the mattress is not as good as in his cotbed/now made into a bed?

My son is 2 next week and he started catapulting himself out of his cotbed so we changed it into a bed, put a stairgate outside his door, but the three nights we tried this has been a nightmare. We find him at odd times in the night, with his door open, head leanign on stairgate reading some book or playing with some toy in the semi-darkness. The next day is then a nightmare because his is so overtired. And whereas before he would nap for 2 hours in the afternoon, forget that with the bed, only sleep if he falls asleep in car during school runs - again a nightmare.

I was at the end of my tether and decided to set up the travel cot - he can't seem to get the leverage there to escape -- and he is back to napping for 2 hours and back to sleeping in the night with no escape tactics. My dilemma is, how bad is this for his back? I have put a thick sheet over it and a thin duvet to make a bit more of a mattress, but clearly not a mattress like his bed. He still doesn't talk well enough and i really hoped not to move him to a bed till another 6 months or so at least.

Failing to reassure me that it's ok, can anyone recommend a really good travel cot -- mine is a Baby Dan - which may have more of mattress?

thanks. sorry for going on and on and on!

I'm no expert, but I wouldn't think it would do him any harm at all. It sounds perfectly comfortable and ds seems to like it.

From what you said, he's probably a bit young for the move to a big boy bed. Maybe give the proper bed another go once his language skills pick up in 3-4m?

DS would have a story and a 'special' treat the next day if he was a good boy and slept in his bed all night - we're certainly not above bribery in our house. We'd also potter around upstairs when he went to bed, popping back in his doorway every 30 sec, 1 min, 1 min, 2 min, not making eye contact but just so he'd knew we were there.