22 m.o. previously great sleeper has started night wakings-help!

[Meredith123]

I meant to say "Am I right"!!!

[MDHmommy]

What time is a normal wake up under normal circumstances? He should be getting about 11 hours at night - I think (check that) - so I'd stick with the *plan* in the morning. You can keep saying, shhh sleep time if it's 5:30 especially since it's still dark at that hour.

Stupid cat!

Meanwhile, I'm about to write my own post about bad sleep with my own toddler. Sigh.

Keep us posted, it does sound like things are going quite well!

[Meredith123]

We need to get him up around 6:30am to have enough time to get ready in the morning, he's in bed by 7:30 each night. I'll try to convince my husband not to worry about the neighbours until they complain!

Good luck with your little guy!

[MDHmommy]

Remind DH that the crying sounds a lot worse to you guys than it does to the neighbors

[Meredith123]

Another update...

The last 2 nights have gone well. He's sleeping through, but waking up at 5:45am. I haven't had the energy to fight with him to lie down for 20-30 more minutes. If I do somehow find the energy, should I just let him cry (while I stay in the room, lying on the mattress) until it's time to get up? It seems like that would teach him that crying for long enough will make me get him out of bed. He's wide awake at that time, so I don't think there's much chance that he would go back to sleep anyway. Any ideas? I think I might try moving his bedtime to 7:00 rather than 7:30, to see if that makes any difference.

We're off to the grandparents' tonight...I hope we don't undo all that we've accomplished so far!

[MDHmommy]

Have you started to move the mattress away? If he's sleeping through (or even if he weren't) you should be close to out the door by now, I think?

I would just lie there and say sshhh, it's too early. You can say something like, lie down and find your teddy (or whatever) and just encourage him to be quiet. If he's really up - then turn on all the lights (painful as it might be) and start the day.

My experience has been that the extreme early wakes are pretty tough to get rid of while you're still in the room though. You might want to work first on getting all the way out of there and then see if the early wake doesn't take care of itself.

K

[Meredith123]

I haven't moved the mattress yet because the room is quite small, so we are pretty jammed in there as it is! I'll be moving it to half in and half out of the door tonight, to see how that goes. At the grandparents' house on the weekend I lay down with my LO as he fell asleep, but I didn't stay in the room through the night. He slept through until 5:30 and then my Mom got up with him (Gramma is awesome!!!!!). I did the same thing when we got home last night and he actually slept until 6:00 this morning. He even talked to himself for awhile in his crib, he didn't start crying right away like he would do when I was in his room with him. So hopefully moving the mattress will help with falling asleep and waking up later!

Any tips on the half-in/half-out nights? Should I stay there the whole night, or should I keep doing what I have been doing? He's never slept with the door open, so I have a feeling that that is going to be an exciting event for him!  Maybe I'll keep the rest of the house in darkness until he falls asleep!

[MDHmommy]

Yes, I'd keep it dark. You want it to be as much the same when he goes to sleep as it will be when he wakes up in the night. So if there's a hall light on or something when he goes to sleep and then that light is off if he wakes in the night - that's not ideal.

If he's been ok the past 2 nights with you not staying in there - I'd say sleep in your own bed and only go back to the mattress if he wakes up.

Woo Hoo!!

[Meredith123]

We've had a bit of a regression...

The first night of half-in/half-out of the door went well - no night wakings. But the second night...not so much. My LO woke at 12:30 crying "Mommy lie down" (I had gone back to my bed and closed his door when he fell asleep). He did that again at 5:20. I lay down on the mattress again until he drifted off, then went back to my bed but left his door open. He stayed in bed until 6:50. (Another thing that was different last night was that my husband was away for work, a very uncommon thing.)

So I guess my question is should I stay on the mattress all night? Put the mattress all the way in the hallway? I do not want to go back to night wakings!!!

[MDHmommy]

He might not be ready for you to leave quite yet. Once you came back, he went B2S right? Can you just get up and leave without pulling his door shut? The shut door might be more alarming to him than seeing that you're not on the mattress, KWIM?

I don't know why I'm giving advice when I spent 4 hours sleeping on the floor last night, no blanket, no air mattress, one sad pillow from the guest room 

But seriously - sounds like he might not be quite ready for you to go yet. Let us know how it goes tonight, if DH is home, he might feel better, you know?

K

[Meredith123]

Kate, I think you're right...it was the change in how the room was when he fell asleep compared to when he woke up (ie. door open to fall asleep, then closed when he woke up). Last night I lay down in his room with him again, with the door closed, until he fell asleep. Then I snuck out and didn't hear anything from him until 6:15 this morning.  Hooray!

Now I just have to figure out how to get the mattress out of his room! I think my next plan of attack will be that I do the same tonight as last night, then on the weekend try moving the mattress all the way into the hallway and keep his door closed as he's falling asleep, but be there to talk to him if he needs it. I'll keep my fingers crossed!

[MDHmommy]

Congrats!!

Try turning the monitor around so he can hear you talking through it - that might be a good way to reassure without being in the room. I think Kelly had a post about this sticky'ed. Brilliant idea!!

[Meredith123]

Well, moving the mattress all the way into the hallway didn't work so well. 
I showed my LO where I would be lying down, then put him into his crib and he freaked out when I tried to leave the room. He was doing a scared cry rather a mad one, so I caved and moved the mattress back into his room. I couldn't even calm him down after that though, he wanted Daddy to lie down with him then! So Daddy did, and LO went to sleep. We'll see if he sleeps through the night...
I hate that scared cry...it gets me every time. 
What do you think I should do?

[MDHmommy]

Is he showing signs of SA during the day as well?

Do you have a nightlight in his room?

Does he have a lovey?

I'm really surprised that he freaked like that....hmmm...

So, are you still lying down with him every night at bed time, and staying all night - or are you sleeping in your own bed coming back to the mattress only if/when necessary?

If you're sleeping in your own bed, and he's sleeping through the night just fine, you might just leave well enough alone for a while. Then, in a week or maybe longer...just pack up the air mattress one day when LO is not around to see you do it. If he asks, just tell him that it's put away. Then at night, stay with him till he falls asleep (or whatever you're doing) and more than likely, he'll sleep all night if he has been!

If you guys are still sleeping all night on the mattress, try ditching back to your own bed so that you can get yourself to the point where you're only going in if you have to.

Let me know!

[Meredith123]

I can't tell if he's showing signs of separation anxiety or just generally being whiny.    There are times when I think he's still worried about the smoke detector, but it's so hard to tell sometimes. He doesn't have a nightlight in his room, he does have a lovey.

The situation right now isn't all that bad. My husband or I lay down with him until he falls asleep, and then we are able to sneak out and spend the rest of the night in our own bed. There have been a few nights where he has woken up once through the night, but falls back to sleep pretty quickly after one of us goes back in to lie down on his floor (we can sneak out again after he falls asleep). He's been sleeping until 6:00. So overall, I know it could be much worse! We are getting good night sleeps. I think we will just stick with what we're doing right now, like you suggested, and then try to switch to sitting in his room, rather than lying down.

Baby steps....right?!?! 

Kate, how are things going with your LO?