AuDHD child and ending cosleeping.

[CoffeeCakeAndALattePlease]

Hi all.

DS is 6 and we are very keen to reduce and stop cosleeping.

As a baby he coslept then as a toddler he slept fine by himself in his room. Then at 4 he started massively struggling with sleep of any shape or form.

We were at the point of spending literally hours trying to get him to sleep, leading to us all being exhausted and poor mental health. So we caved, bought a bigger bed and let him sleep with us….. his sleep was still poor but at least we got enough to function.

Eventually we were prescribed melatonin which helps and he now goes to sleep in his room. But after 1.5 hours he wakes and when we try to resettle him in his room he gets absolutely beside himself. If we are persistent (and we were for weeks and weeks) then it’s back to having no sleep. If we let him in our bed then he’ll go straight back to sleep until morning. So of course due to exhaustion we let him.

But it’s getting really difficult. He’s getting big, he wriggles as kids do and wakes DH up constantly. Obviously it impacts on intimacy too for me and DH.

I just don’t know how to successfully get him to stay in his room. It’s completely down to separation anxiety from me, I think. He has things that smell of me, a picture of me, a comfy bed and teddies to cuddle etc etc.

Has anyone overcome this? Any tips? Nothing works even with total consistency for weeks. We just end up even more exhausted 😩

Girl, following as I'm in the same boat with dd

It would take at least 2 hours for her to go down every night, and I'd have to sit next to her and restrain her. For 2 hours

😄😄 after I began simply losing my sanity, I gave up and let her fall asleep with me

6 months on and welp, we're still bed sharing. Luckily I'm manless but she hogs most of the bed and every morning I wake up on the edge of it! And it's a king.

Solidarity and help needed 😄🥰

Edit - one time, I'd done my 2 hours, and she seemed asleep. I went to the toilet and as i'm mid no.1, just saw her walk past me and climb into my bed 😭😭😭, i had to laugh otherwise I would've cried

Can DS explain what he finds difficult?

Would DS stay in his bed if you or DH slept with him in his room?

Have you relooked at medication?

DS1 is a lot older than your DS. He used to sleep in our bed all the time. Now he at least starts the night in his room and spends longer in his (specialist) bed than he previously did. Really it has been time and medication that has allowed us to make progress. Over the years we tried various lighting, dream pad pillow, ear plugs, a 2 way monitor, brushing, worry book, tents, doodle book/pillowcase, music, white noise, various apps, weighted blanket, audiobooks, teddy, relaxation. Going against all sleep hygiene advice as a last resort I tried letting him watch the Lego Movie in bed, but it didn't work. We tried an adapted version of gradual retreat and also the elastic band method. We tried several medications. Melatonin on its own made little difference.

Thanks for the replies.

He just says he needs to be with me and is scared to be by himself (he never likes being in any room alone). He goes to sleep quite fast initially and knows I leave his room when he’s asleep but doesn’t get upset about this.

once he wakes though he doesn’t want to be alone any more. He might sleep in his room with us but he’s in a box room in a high sleeper and not even room for a camp bed in there.

If he could stay asleep once he nodded off then he’d be fine but he’s wakes every 1.5 hours if he’s alone and needs me there to (very very slowly) fall back to sleep.

I’ll look into other medication but maybe it’s just time that’s needed.

Is DS receiving support for his anxiety?

So sorry to hear this. Both our sons co-slept with us for ages. Always starting off in their own bed. Our eldest stopped at 10 and our youngest mostly stopped at about 9. Still comes in occasionally but I can live with that. We tried everything and eventually gave up trying get him to stay in his bed. And so when he came in, I would move to his bed. I figured he would not do it forever. And he doesn’t.

Not yet, no.
Everything feels like a maze or jigsaw…. only managing to figure out a bit at a time. We’ve made huge steps forward in reducing violence which was my primary focus as it was awful. Now I’m seeing what was underneath which is the anxiety, so considering how to support that next.

Speak to the SENCO at school. They can support anxiety. Does DS have an EHCP? Is he under any health care professionals?

The SENDCO is very involved, his EHCP is being drafted at the moment. He’s in a Sen hub in mainstream and since being in there has made huge progress after a disastrous reception year.
We have another meeting scheduled so we can explore his anxiety then.

he’s under the child development centre for adhd and ASD, and speech & language.

The EHCP can include therapeutic input for DS’s anxiety. When you get the draft check therapies are in there. Unfortunately, you may have to appeal to get therapies detailed, specified and quantified. Keep an eye on the EHCP timescales, LAs like to breach them and think they can get away with it.

I think there is so much pressure on us to parent “normally” and I felt judged when I would admit that my son would come into our bed every night (mostly by my parents) but in the end - I just had to do something to get through the day - and that meant getting sleep. They will stop - do what you have to do. It’s v hard parenting a ND child.

DD is 7 and we have likewise accepted she needs to co-sleep still, as separating causes her great distress.

However two thoughts that could help slightly -

We have bought a junior bed and attached it to the side of our bed. We’ve added an extra mattress to raise it up so it’s the same height as our mattress. We’ve recently had success with insisting that DD has to sleep in this junior bed rather than in the middle of DH and I. She still gets v close presence and can hold my hand. But there’s a modicum of psychological “separation” through being in her bed, not ours. We hope in time she could extend this separation by having the bed further away from
ours etc.

Secondly - a high sleeper adds extra layers of separation from you, because it’s up a ladder. Could you do away with the high sleeper and replace it with a junior bed, door open, to increase the sense of being connected to you still?