New problem with night wakings...

[vmcdonald28]

Hi,

Any suggestions would be welcome, as I am at work, barely able to keep my eyes open, and enough is enough!

For the past few weeks, ds - 30-ish months - has been waking during the night. It can be at any time between 2am and 5am. He doesnt cry - he sort of whines, and calls for Mummy or Daddy. He is verging on crying, but I sometimes wonder if he's just pretending, so we go to him. There seems to be no obvious pattern to why this is happening.
At bedtime, he takes anything from one hour to two hours to fall asleep, but doesnt usually get upset.

We have tried closing his bedroom door after he's asleep (in case he needs the room to be dark), weve tried leaving the door partially open and the hall light on (in case he needs some light). Weve tried no supper, lots of supper (in case it's to do with hunger). Last night, he woke at 2am, asking for a story!!! He then woke again at 4am and again at 5.30. I ended up losing my temper with him. Not good. He's just playing us for fools!!

Is he still needing an afternoon nap...? He stayed awake in his cot from 1pm till 3.30pm yesterday, and wasnt even close to sleeping, yet he still kept waking during the night. So i'm not sure he really needs his pm sleep to stop.

Is WI/WO an option...? I'm not really sure how this works, if anyone could give me some tips on how to start...?

Also, his cot is full of cuddly toys cos he always asks for them. Could they be distracting him from sleep? Should we limit him to 2 or 3 animals?
Also, in the afternoon, i sometimes give him a car to have in his cot. Should i stop doing this?


His routine is different depending on what day it is (some days at home, some at nursery), but it's roughly as follows -

At home -
between 7 and 8am - wakes up
8am - 1.5 Weetabix
Plays with his toys
10am - snack
Plays/I read a story/watches a little CBeebies
12.30 - lunch
1.30pm - bed
4pm - gets up (sometimes he has slept for the full duration, sometimes he doesnt sleep at all - just chats and sings)
5pm - dinner
Playtime
7pm - start getting ready for bed
8pm (at the latest) - in bed.

On the days he's at nursery, he sleeps for one hour after lunch. He goes to my mum's house from 5pm till 7.30pm, then we take him home to bed at 8pm.

Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks so much
Vicky x

[ryan's mum]

I would try and earlier nap time as he's not getting much A time beofre bed to be tired .Also try limiting his nap .At your DS's age Ryan was napping at 12.00/12.30 but no later than 2pm or we had the problem of taking over an hour to fall asleep at night .

[Layla]

Agree with pp - bring the nap up to 12.30 & don't let it go any longer than 1.5hs. Also if there is no nap put him down for the night at 7pm to allow for a 12hr night

You could try limiting the amount of toys if you think these are too stimulating & not letting him nap but at this age alot are skipping naps & start the transition to no naps...

Let us know how it goes

[vmcdonald28]

Thank you both for the info!

Last night went well at bedtime - although he seemed a bit confused as to why i KEPT telling him I loved him and that I'd be there if he needed me. 

Anyway, he actually slept right through last night. Just one little whimper at 5am, so in fact we didnt get to try any WI/WO or anything (thankfully!) I'll let you know how i get on tonight. Possibly just a coincidence, but possibly he got the message from my OTT comforting before leaving him to go to sleep!

Oh, two nights ago, we started saying night-night to all his toys, cars, etc. He kissed them all, and watched me put them all to bed, in their box. Well, last night, when we said it was time to say night-night to his toys, without any prompting, he took them one by one, and kissed them and put them back in the box. That was a huge turnaround - he actually seemed pleased to be going to bed!

[Layla]

Good to hear