2.5 yr old waking at 4am and sleeping in out bed

[Vally]

Our 2.5 yr old has been a good sleeper but that changed about 6 months ago and he seems to need much more reassurance as he gets scared. We are happy to sit by his side until he is settled. What we are finding hard is that he has started waking at 4am and wants to come in our bed or for one of us to go in his bed. We try to keep in his but it just creates such problems and can take sn hour and then 9 month dd wakes so it's just easier to let him climb in with us. Is this a really bad habit? What can we do? Should we drop daytime nap? Usual routine
WaKe at 630am
Nap 130pm
Asleep 8ish although start windown at 730

[*Jo*]

is there a reason he is getting scared? My 2.5 year old can come into my bed throughout the night. I was doing the same thing and putting him back to bed but then I remembered when I was little my mum used to let me lay with her for 10mins and then put me back to my own bed. 10mins was all i needed to feel reassured and comforted from whatever was bothering me and i would go back to sleep in my own bed. So I tried it with Caleb and it worked. He jumps into bed with me and I say "only for a few mins" and sometimes I can accidentally fall asleep and its an hour later but usually after 10mins I say "ok, time to go back to your own bed now" and he will go back because he feels calmer. so far it hasnt created a habit, he doesnt come in every night, only when something is bothering him, so sometimes every night for a week or once every two or three weeks, nothing to suggest its a habit

Not sure if it would work on your LO but perhaps give it a try?

[Vally]

It seems to be his imagination as he talks about crocodiles and monsters!! He doesn't do it every night but we seem to have more nights where he wakes these days.

[*Jo*]

Have you talked to him during the day about these crocodiles and monsters? Is he seeing them on the TV or in books? It sounds like he's quite scared of them if it's a reigniting thing

[Vally]

We have talked to him. It's from a range of things like books, something said by another child at nursery about a monster. We reassure him but he just doesn't seem able to go off to sleep without us anymore

[*Jo*]

just looked at my above post, i have no idea what i meant to say here:

It sounds like he's quite scared of them if it's a reigniting thing

lol

have you googled tactics to approach this? like perhaps going on a "monster hunt" with Daddy and slaying the monster or not finding one cos he got so scared of Daddy that he ran away and promised never to come back? that kind of thing? I dont know if that would help or not as we dont have this issue. does he have a nightlite?

[lamchop]

We have the same type of problem here too --spiders.  DS is both fascinated and scared of them.

Two months ago, my SIL's family made a few not so smart comments to DS when I said that he doesn't have nightmares.  They asked him if he had monsters in his closet.  Gee thanks for planting ideas.  So then we had the start of our problems.

Got through the monsters in his closet.  I threw cookie monster, Sully and Mike (monsters inc), and elmo into his closet one morning.  That night when he asked if there were monsters in his closet I said," yes you do!".  He was a bit puzzled and so I opened the closet door and showed him.  He saw his 'buddies' and smiled. Gave them all a big hug and wanted them back into his closet because they like to sleep there.  No more monster problems since.

Spider problem.  This one is more on going thanks to Halloween.  He saw a rather large spider at my parents' house and got scared.  Tried to personify them a bit, saying they like their own house, that one got lost on his way home and ended up inside the house.  Worked for a few nights.  Recently, we made signs 'no!' with drawings of cute spiders that he helped with.  We put them on the front door and on his bedroom door.  Seems to be working so far.  The next thing I'm looking at doing is finding kids' story books on spiders.

Hope there are some ideas you can use.

[lamchop]

Haven't read this book but a friend's son loves this one --'There's a Nightmare in my Closet', by Mercer Mayer.  It's about a boy who's scared of a monster in his closet and one night he decides to get rid of it only that he ends up finding a scared monster in his closet and he eventually comforts the poor thing and lets it sleep in his bed so it won't be scared anymore.  Kind of a neat twist.