I am feeling really fed up.

[Pavlovthecat]

I am now getting sick of evenings. I am starting to dread them.

They are just a battle. I cant eat as DD is screaming the place down, I cant relax as she is screaming the place down.

She goes to sleep somewhere between 8:45pm and 11:30pm.

DH and I are arguing, we are both exhausted. I am just a perpetual mother and cannot make any plans as DDs sleep pattern has gone completely out of the window.

I am so f**ked off with it all. Nothing is working. I have had enough.

.

Pavlov,how old is she??

And to be honest. You know I dont even necesarily want advice. I think I just need to sound off without DH saying 'you need to calm down. Dont talk to me like that, dont be so angry'

Why cant I be angry? Why cant I sound off at him? I was not accusing him, or blaming him, I was telling how I felt. But no, I have to be frustrated and annoyed and fed up, and keep it all in.

So, there. Thats were I am at tonight. I want our routine back, I cant see it happening without being really really tough and I am just not really really tough.

Do you mean she falls asleep, or is put to bed, between those times?

Talk to us, Pavlov, offload...

wrinklytum 22 months, almost 23. Its been like this for abiout 3 weeks? Since the last bank holiday.

how old?

maybe she is overtired? does she nap in the day?

Sorry, cross-posts.

Men aren't always too good at recognising women's need to be heard and listened to. They often think that they have to find a solution, but that's usually not what we want at that moment. So they get stressed and start pushing back at us.

Of course you're frustrated by this. It's knackering and draining!

Does she nap during the day??

Could it be she is a bit overtired??I know it sounds daft but sometimes if they are "past themselves" they can get more crotchety.DD (2.5) was getting quite whiny when she stoopeed napping so much in the day and I wasn't putting her to bed until 8 same time as her big brother.She slept a lot better when we put her to bed between 7-7.30.9(bviously this may not be feasible if you both do jobs that mean you get home late)

The clocks changing don't help!!

Other thoughts,could it be her teeth.My first got his back teeth at about this age and was a nightmare for a few weeks re sleep.

Good luck,its horrid when they won't settle properly xx

prettycandles her routine used to be

2:00pm nap for hour

7pm bedtime routine, cuddles, stories, soft lights, rhymes, milk
8pm bed, lights out, asleep.
7:30-8am - awake.
Lovely.

Now.
Sometime in the afternoon she will nap. wont be put down for naps now. Sometimes she does not nap at all. Sometimes she is crabby, sometimes she is perfectly fine.

if she naps
7pm routine
8pm bed. screams, cries, sobs, wants mummy, daddy, milk to hot, too cold, more more, wants to get out. wants to get out etc etc.
If this is the routine she will go to sleep somewhere around 9-10pm, but wake often for another 2 hours.

if no nap
6pm-6:30pm routine
7:00pm - 7:30pm same as above, but possibly asleep at 8:45pm.

Wakes somewhere between 6am and 9am depending on how many days she has gone to sleep late and not napped.

We are clearly doing something wrong

It feels like the naps are the issue to be honest.

She has always gone hyper of an evening, and i posted a week or so ago about this, and we realised that she now wants to go to bed earlier and if she is dropping naps, 8pm is clearly too late.

She actually fell asleep on our bed at 6:30pm at the weekend, as she was a little under the weather, but woke up again at 8pm until 11pm.

We think she might be teething too. Oh gosh its just hard to know, teething, naps, our just realising she can be a pain in the ass?

I am obviously being given a run through the mill because she has been a dream until now!

And I agree, she is clearly overtired. She looks exhausted by bed time.

And to top it all off I am working harder and need some me time much much more than i used to. Maybe thats it. Maybe she misses me, can tell I am tired! But then she is like it at the weekend now too.

Is she in a cot or a bed?

My gut instinct (sorry, I know you said you didn't want advice, but it does sound from your last post that you would like some) is that you should try to get her into bed by 7.30 every day, whether or not she naps, and to wake her at around 7am - or whatever earlyish time is convenient for you - no matter what time she finally went to sleep.

At this age my first two were napping 2h-2h30m and sleeping roughly 7-7 every night. OTOH at 19m demon ds2 has only just got the hang of napping 1h30m (very occasionally 2h) and sleeping 7.30-5/5.30. Still, a major improvement on 2 months ago. (My credentials, )

Also, when she is fighting bedtime, you need to be boring and consistent. No more milk, no switching parent. Just repeated "Goodnight sweetie, time to sleep" or whatever your phrase is.

Might it help if you told your dh something along the lines of "I'm not angry with you, I'm just angry and frustrated and I need to get if off my chest. Please listen to me, I need you now."?

wrinklytum the clocks going back! Well, thats probably where it all started really, a month before. Went on holiday to
NY, USA (5 hours behind) for 3 days, then
California, USA (8 hours behind) for 10 days
Then the clocks went back in USA. But not in England so, (7 hours behind)
Back to NY (now 4 hours behind) for 14 days
Back to UK 2 days
Clocks go back in UK!

However, DD took this all in her stride and when we got back she was back in her routine the first night, then when the clocks went back, it took about 3 days to get it back to normal again.

Its been over a month before it went all wack. Even with jet leg she was easier to settle/understand.

Maybe it is her teeth tho. Her last set of molars are due. And she can communicate more now, started talking in proper sentences in the last 2-3 weeks.

I do sympathise,its hard and no 2 kids are the same.

I think maybe she is adjusting to dropping her nap as you say.I know ds sometimes finds it hard to settle with the light nights but now he is older he will stay in his room,and talk to his toy bat or cars!!!

DD we have to play it by ear as she is SN and pretty non verbal,APART FROM LOUD CRYING !!!and has never been a big daytime napper but will sleep OK once she settles.From 2- 2.5 it did used to take her a bit to settle her,about 20 mins of screeching which we had a rule,we would go up once and check nappy and give her a cuddle /drink and then put her back down and leave it half an hour before we went back.It sounds cruel but it did work.Then she suddenly started settling straight away so I think it was a phase.

Pretty - she has never napped for 2 hours unless she has been ill or growing! I wish! What age did your little ones drop their nap? Is this way to early, should we just keep giving her a nap?

I did say pretty much what you said to DH. He does understand, but he hates me being angry and well I guess he goes to shit with it. I did tell him it was not him, and that I just needed to sound off. I was not hungry, and he said it would make the perfect dinner. So he is ok, and I am feeling much less angry now that I have sounded off.

DD woke at 7:30am this morning, I got up for work, and DH said 7:30am was too early for her to be up ! We have bben spoilt with 8am mornings recently !

Its at times like this that I need my mum, to just call up and winge. Unfortunately she is not with us, and I miss her loads at times like this. DH is the only one I can tell how I feel at times like this, and he is not exactly finding it easy. And he is great at being a dad, so its not like he can really do a lot to make it easier.

And telling me not to be angry when I have no one else to be angry around.

Oh, and apart from just walking in without my chocolate tart

I did not say pretty - she is in a cot, which she can almost climb out of now, even tho she is slight.

I was spoilt with my first 2, particularly no1, but I certainly didn't appreciate it at the time! I'm a big believer in naps, and have never allowed my LOs to give up napping at their first attempt, IYSWIM. But it can be tricky to keep a nap going in fthe face of rebellion. Once they got through the 'nap-strike', though, they continued napping willingly. Ds1 was still napping when he started school, and continued napping on weekends throughout Reception. And then suddenly went from needing about 13h sleep to 9h. Dd stopped napping earlier, about 4 and a bit. Sorry .

I have to disagree with your dh - if she's slept badly in the night, then letting her lie in will simply perpetuate the lack of routine and bad sleeping because she will be less likely to nap well that day. I do think you should try to start the day at what you feel is the proper time to fit inthe rest of the sleeps.

Is she active enough? Being a 3rd child, ds2 spends at least 2h, sometimes 3h or more, in the buggy in one day (two school runs, plus any shopping or errands that have to be done) and it is clear that on days when he hasn't been able to run around enough he is harder to settle and less likely to nap well.

Sorry to hear about your mum. Tough for you, particularly now.

IIRC ds1 went through his first nap-strike at about the same age as your dd. I put a CD playre in his room, with some soothing classical music (I think it may have been something like Rachmaninov piano) and told him that he didn't have to sleep, but he needed to rest so he could just lie down and listen to the music. Worked every time.

I asked about cot or bed because moving to a bed too soon can result in this sort of thing.

ds stopped napping at about 4 but we have "quiet time" at about 2pm where we read books and have a big cuddle now.(hes 4.5)

dd is variable sometimes she will nap for an hour other times she won't,but she is not a neurologically typical child,and doesn't walk,(but she crawls) so I sometimes wonder isf she doesn't expend as much energy as a normal child,hence not requiring her nap all the time,or whether she has just had to fit in to our routine a bit more,having her elder brother around,as sometimes we do an afternoon activity i.e swimming to be fair to him.She is 2.5.

I am sure your dd will soon get back into a routine xxxIts really hard when they are not sleeping though xxxx

is she active enough? . ooooh yes. She is non-stop! She is kept very active. Or should I say we are?!!
Nursery 1.5 days, swimming lessons, nursery rhyme group with daddy, park on most days she does not do other things, sometimes as well as, we visit friends with kids at least once a week, out in our small garden/courtyard doing planting/playing with sandpit etc etc. She is a very energetic little girl and has to have a lot going on otherwise she can be a bit distructive!
Today she did half day nursery, 45 min nap and hour solidly running through water fountains and climbing frames with older kids! She went to sleep at 9pm. The closest so far with a nap, after screaming for ages and drinking a gallon of milk

It appears that on the days she is less busy, those are the days she does not nap at all.

Its a minefield isn't it? Now is the time we are actually having to parent for the first time, not just love, cuddle, feed, entertain and protect!

I like the quiet time idea. She is old enough to start understanding quiet time I think, seeing as she tells her dolls to be quiet often enough when its their bed time

thanks for the support/suggestions everyone.
I just feel so crap. Now i have gone from feeling angry/stressed to feeling guilty. My poor DD does not need me to crumble, to raise my voice at her when she is clearly upset, she needs calm soothing voice to help her feel comfortable enough to go to sleep, not an angsty mother who is selfish. I am a mother FFS, that means that from time to time its going to be hard, and its not her fault, and I have to get over missing the second bloody episode of Waking the Dead or Holby last night, and that I was annoyed I probably would not get time tonight either.

As it happens, I would have, if I was not still on MN

Clearly an energetic little lady!

Maybe this is just one of those times that you're going to have to tough out, repeating the parenting mantra to yourself "This, too, will pass."

With my first I thought that everything I did was set in stone, that I had to start the way I meant to conitnue, and then continue the way I started. But I've since learned that you can be flexible, you can go with the flow, as long as you keep an eye on the overall picture. Children need consistency as well as the freedom to find their own way.

Hopefully, as long as you remain consistent in that you always have a rest time, and you never let her run you around at bedtime, then eventually she will settle down again. Perhaps not in the same routine as before, but at least in a routine that you can work with.

And in the meantime send him back out to get the chocolate!