16 months and sleep is a mess!

[acnebride]

Sorry about this, I have searched but I'm too knackered to search very effectively. any links to useful threads?

DS is 16 months and it's not really a mess - pm nap is 2 hours and he goes to bed beautifully at 7. However, he is usually awake for 90 mins /2 hours in the night and it's killing me. We now routinely bring him into our bed, which is a problem as he loves it but as a playground - wild stampeding wriggling, scraping, scrambling, bouncing etc for up to 2 hours. However, it does mean that when he eventually sleeps, he sleeps through til almost 7 . On the odd night he doesn't wake up, he tends to wake in his own cot at 5.30.

I feel crap just typing this but you know what it's like. Please put a bit of steel in my spine? many thanks.

Commiserations, AB. Dr Richard Ferber's book, Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems, is pretty good stuff if you've decided something has to give. It's kindly and reassuring, yet also bolstering.

at a guess, he is waking up for about 2 hours because he knows that he will get into your bed they are smart little people I think!

what we did, in short, was we went in, never picked him up, settled him back down in the cot, stroked his head and left the room when he was calm, and when he cried again, went back in and repeated until he got the message - took two nights, third night and ever since was a dream

however, if you choose this route, don't do it for a bit and then give in, because all you are doing is sending the message that, eventually, he gets to come into your bed

good luck

Thanks - really helpful to get a consistent message!!
Will probably limp on to weekend, then give it a go. Cheers as ever.

blimey. thats crazy. have you tried just leaving him. my dd is same age. she does wake up in the night sometimes, I'd say about 3 times a week. I usually get away with just leaving her, ie she has a cry and winge for a bit then goes back to sleep or starts to play with some toys ( often hear her awake for up to an hour) but just leave her on her own.

If after about 10 mins she is still going crying and it has worked up into screaming I go and get her and go and make her a cup of milk. Give her the milk back in her room. which she guzzles, check her nappy. then just put her back in her bed. she usually snuggles back down or starts looking at her books. either way i go back to bed. sometimes she cries abit before dropping off again.

I don't bring her in our bed in the night anymore. because just like yours she seems to think it is a cue to play and she just wriggles around and disturbs us.

if she wakes up early. again i give her a drink of milk then put her back in her bed. get her up around half seven - eightish

Ds2 is 15 mths and was having a similar problem. We did much the same as KB except that if he does get very distressed, we would pick him up and give a quick but close cuddle and put him down again, leave the room and wait outside for a bit and if he cries again repeat the process and he also got the message.
Now if he wakes, we do the same, (if popping his dummy in isn't sufficient), only picking him up ifvery distressed though, and just gently stroking his head for a moment usually does the trick without the need for going in again. He mostly sleeps through though. (apart from now as he's riddled with chicen pox)!!

My dd2 is the same age. She has always been a pretty good sleeper, but we went cold turkey on the dummy recently. I was expecting a nightmare, but actually after a couple of nights of us consistently going in, giving a little pat and leaving again she threw in the towel and gave up crying in the night.

I had prepared the ground for about a week beforehand by always giving her the same rabbit to cuddle whenever we put her to bed, as a sort of alternative comfort object. Apparently this works particularly well if you first spend a couple of nights sleeping with the rabbit yourself.

Personally, I would rather be up and down all night for a couple of nights than take a baby of that age into bed with me, unless it was very ill.