help me tweak - is this where I want to be headed?

[lunababy]

Hi. I posted Thurs about my DS (26 mos) getting out of big boy bed unless we lie on floor as he goes to sleep and new night waking.  Later that day at naptime we evolved into a new routine that has corrected some of the problems.  I finally feel like I am the one in control of how he goes to sleep.  This has been a 19 month battle as techniques like PU/PD, WI/WO truly didn't work for him.  FINALLY we saw a technique take hold so that he was learning how to do things on his own and not getting more wound up.  FINALLY I saw him getting tired and getting in line with the method I was using!

So basically I tuck him in with his lovies and tell him "nite nite, I'll see you when you wake up."  Then I walk out.  I wait at the door.  He'll come to the door and do one of 3 things...
*  fools around or asks for another lovie, etc - I tell him nonemotionally "OK then, nite nite on your own" and I send him in the direction of his bed with a light tap
*  tells me to leave - I tell him "nite nite, goodbye" and walk w/footsteps he can hear to my room
*  says "snuggle" - I wait for him to head to his bed and I'll help him w/lovies again quickly and walk out.  If he starts to fool around again I immediately go the first option again.

Day 1 was about getting him to say "snuggle"/head to bed and accept that there's no playing around.  This was huge!  Nap/bedtime/nite wake each took about 60-90 minutes but I could see him getting tired and more cooperative.  I realized that with other methods like PD and WI/WO he liked the negative attention which gave him the stamina to never wear out.  Also, the nonemotional "you're on your own" really upsets him because he sees it's the end of the line on what he actually perceived as fooling around time.  Day 2 we were down to about 15-40 minutes each time.  Today my husband tried and seems like he was about 30 min too (hopefully he's down now, at least it is quiet at the moment!).

So as I'm getting into this I realize I have set a few new problems in motion.  I think it is actually OK and this is one of these situations where I need to correct one thing at a time.  But wondering if I need to tweak things now to avoid a future problem or if we should continue how we are headed and correct the "less bad" bad habit that we've started next week or so...

Problem 1 - He's becoming dependent on us to arrange his lovies once he gets up.  I'm trying to get around this by doing it more quickly the closer he appears to be to sleep.  This seems to be working.  Also, I'll tell him "you're snuggled.  you're OK" as I walk to the door as he starts to get up.  This works sometimes but other times he gets up to follow me.  I think we'll work thru this before lovie adjustment becomes a prop but not sure. 

Problem 2 - Last night he started paying attention to me at the door.  So he was settled a couple minutes but popped up and cried when he heard my footsteps creak away (darn floorboards!).  I'm thinking I can gradually get further from his door, but again not sure if I should address this now or not.

Problem 3 - The routine actually encourages him to get out of bed.  I'm rewarding him by coming to me and opening the door and saying "snuggle".  I have been trying to coach him just to say it w/out getting out of bed.  It's such an improvement of what we had, but either way it involves me so long term I need a better option.

Thanks!

[Layla]

Sorry your post hasn't been answered.

Sounds like you're making lots of progress.

In regards to him becoming dependant on you to arrage his lovies... is that something that he asks over and over again? If it isn't then personally I would just do it once and leave. Isabella does something very similar... its like a ritual she has... as soon as I leave her room, she will ask me to blinds up and I "have" to respond "No Bella, if I put the blinds up, the sun will wake you up". Then the next thing is for her to ask me to put her heater on a little bit louder... to which I "have" to respond "Sure Bella, I'm going to put your heater on louder". I swear to you.. if I don't respond to those things and just leave her then she'll stand at the door and cry because I didn't answer her. But.... at the very begining when we were at the start of the transition, she was asking me to fix this and do that... so slowly over a few weeks what I used to do during the day is role play with her... and give her the chance to try and do things herself. One of the things she would always ask me was to cover her, to give her a drink (her water bottle is right by her side) and to wipe her nose (her tissue box is also by her bed). So during the day I would ask her to show me how to cover herself, show me how to drink from the bottle and show me how to wipe her nose. Then we'd talk about her being a big girl and being able to do these things on her own at night. And finally when she'd be tucked into bed and she would then ask me to tuck her in, etc.. I would stand at the door and say to her "show me Bella how you can do it yourself" and I would wait by the door. Then a little cheer and "hooray"... and that was enough to give her the confidence to be able to tuck herself in, etc.... Now... the phrases that I mentioned earlier in the post I don't think I'll ever be able to end... so I am happy to have her ask me the same thing every night and for me to answer her just so she can go to sleep.

With the cuddle... we get that too. She always wants a kiss just when I leave. Personally I just go in and kiss her and thats enough for her. Also I remember at the start when all these requests were coming.. I drew out a chart of our bedtime routine and I would draw a plate for dinner, a bathtub for bath, a toothbrush for brushing teeth, etc... and maybe you could try something like that and get him to tick things off as you are doing them???

Hth a little
Layla

[lunababy]

You were right.  This works so smooth for us now.  It's as if he needs to come to the door once to make sure we're still around.  We asks "Snuggle."  We say "bed" and he gets right in.  One more tucking in and on majority of nights he's usually good.  Thanks.