21 mo NWings and early wakings

[babyre33]

DD has an ear infection and since has been difficult to get to bed, wakes often throughout the night, and takes forever to get back to sleep, and is up by 6:30 anyway.  Or she'll sleep through, but wake early (5:40 the other day).  On a good day she'll get a 2hr + nap, usually shorter though.

This started with the ear infection, and grown to OT.
Our main problem is this: she is waking in the middle of the night, and coming to our room, and will be up anywhere from 2-4 hrs.  We use to lay with her, but that still could take an hr for her to go to sleep, and makes bedtime a nightmare because she wants some one to lay down with her.  Do we close the door and let her cry, even throw a fit until she learns to stay in her bed?  She knows what she is suppose to do and not do.  In fact she'll get out of bed, go to our door, open it, and then close it standing silently in the hallway because she knows she's suppose to be in her room.  Letting her cry will increase drainage, laying with her causes further sleep problems, and isn't all that effective anyway.

Any thoughts, or successes in this area?

[Layla]

Dd1 has been in her big bed for about 3 weeks now & this is what I have been doing:

Firstly, she has a gate by her door. If you're not comfortable with the idea of the gate, I understand... but it might help with her coming out of her room.

Isabella still hops out of her bed as soon as I leave and will stand by the gate crying asking me to come back. I come back if she's getting distressed. If she just calls out for me then I let her be. If the crying is getting worse, I go to her & put her back to bed. I stay with her until she is calm & then I leave. She will either accept that its bedtime & will fall asleep or she'll come to the gate again & we repeat the process. The first week or so we had bedtime delayed as much as 1.5hrs but now its been around 30mins on an average.

Another thing I did was to introduce a nightlight & put it on a timer. Before this she had her light on a dimmer, which I would switch off as soon as she was asleep. The dimmer is still on & so is the night light when she goes to sleep. I tell her that if/when she wakes at night, she needs to hug teddy & try to get back to sleep without calling mummy. Most of the time thats what she will do... although we still have days where she wakes as early as 5.30am (actually about 4 days ago it was a record 4.30am), she opens her door and will wait by the gate until her night light will come on. We still have night wakings where she will call for me but all I have to do is remind her that its night time & her night light is not on yet so she needs to get back to bed. Do you think your DD would respond well to that idea? It all depends on how much she understands....

I realise though that you are probably far away from doing this cause she is used to having you by her side when she's falling asleep so I would try a more gradual withdrawal method, where you stay with her but also move yourself towards the door. If she wakes at night, again either stay on the chair or lay down on the mattress. Over a couple of weeks you want to be out of her room (by the door), sitting on a chair & her falling asleep that way. Then you could try sitting on a chair but before she is fast asleep try leaving. If she starts crying you could say "mummy's going to the toilet & will be right back" and then come back... and then slowly increase the time it takes you to come back until she is falling asleep on her own.

I personally wouldn't lay in her bed... i did that for 10mins one morning when we were waiting for the light to come on together & then I got "mummy sleep with me"  that night & the night after. So rather than sleep in her bed, set yourself something on the floor (I am sorry I know you are pregnant & it might not be very comfortable...).

I wouldn't close the door & let her cry cause that will probably bring on more problems like SA, etc...

hth & let me know how you go

There is also a sticky at the top of the page,... success stories for big bed transitions. Have a read if you have the chance
Layla

[babyre33]

Thank you for the advice.  The gradual withdrawl is what dh and I spoke of doing, but I dont' know why he didn't do it this morning when she woke at 5:30.  I think we'll try it for bedtime and NW.

She understands TOO much.  Sheh k nows exactly what she's doing and how to manipulate, unfortunately.

FYI, this isn't a big bed transition.  She's been in her bed for over 3 months now.  I don't remember exactly when we started.  This is just a new occurance since the ear infection, and bad sleep carrying over to naps, etc.  So we'll go with the gradual withdrawl, and allow it to take a few weeks.  By that time we'll have gone to her specialist appointment for her ears (7 ear infections in one year) and maybe we can get the ear thing fixed and part of the problem will be gone.

Thanks again!

[Layla]

Ok, I thought it was "the" big bed transition... but still GW will work regardless....

For early morning wake ups... she might just be overtired as well. How is her routine these days? I know with my dd... all the days she delayed bedtime by 1.5hrs, or even 30mins, the ot would build up & so one morning she decided to start the day at 4.30am. So what I am doing now is in her room with books at 5pm and taking a very long time to wind her down. If your lo is overtired you'll probably have to work on longer windown routines as well and she might not fight you as much come bedtime.

Something else I am going to do from today onward is draw up a chart of our bedtime routine. I've been wanting to do this for a while & all this time i've been talking to her about the steps of the routine but we've come back to the stage where she wants "one more.... one more..." so I am going to draw up a chart starting from bath, then supper, book, book, song, song, final potty & then bed". I am hoping it will reduce the crying at bedtime & might work for you too

Good luck & keep me posted

[babyre33]

Layla,

It started with an ear infection and has grown into OT.  The ear infection is still haning on too.  But maybe a longer wind down will help.  Yesterday's bedtime went pretty well.  I stayed by her bed at her feet, nealing low.  This is also next to the door.  She went to sleep right away, but did protest getting into her bed.  However, she had an EARLY waking at 4:20.  Dad was able to get her to sleep in a record 45 min!   But 30 min later a big truck went by and woke her.  Then for the next hour she was laying pretty still, getting up every so often, but I do th ink she drifted off once.

She is SO tired that at lunch time she is falling asleep in her highchair today.  Her old routine was up at 7ish, nap at 12-2ish, and bed at 8.  Now she's up anywhere from 4:20 like today, to 6:30, but it all depends on howthe night goes.  She's been averaging about 9 hrs of sleep straight through, or with NW and still a relatively EW.  Nap has been moved up to 11:30, and is usually 1 hr 45 min.  We'll get 2 hrs + a bit more on a good day.  Then bed by 7.  We can't seem to get her to sleep before 7, but we haven't really tried that much either.  My mother and father are staying with us (have been for 2 months now), and coordinating dinner doesn't leave much time for bed stuff.

Do you think we should go to a super early bed time of 6?  I've done this enough in the past, and has often worked, but she outgrows so much, I'm affraid she'll be up at 3 for the day.  Something will work well, so I try it again and it back fires on me.  She has diarreah from the antibiotic too.  We see a specialist on Tuesday.  Let's hope they can cure her and she'll magically start sleeping 11-12hrs at night ...yeah right!

is 13 hrs daily the average about this age?

[Layla]

Sorry I haven't replied sooner ..

13hrs is about right for her age.

What I would try and do is 15-20mins earlier rather than the full hour at once. You might find she won't fall asleep at 6pm... some do but some have a hard time if their usual bedtime is 7 & then its shifted to 6 in one day. So try 6:45 for a few days & then maybe 6.30pm

I do think she is overtired too as she's waking 9-10hrs later... the early wakings are a good indication that she is overtired too... so if you can try to have her in bed earlier

Let me know how everything goes 

[babyre33]

the past 2 nights have been pretty good.  11 hrs straight one night, and last night was about the same, but she woke sometime before 2 am and fell asleep outside our bedroom door.

Naps are still crappy.  She wakes and looks at the floor where I have laid once or twice.  when I'm not there she gets up and there is no getting her back down.  THis is after 1.25 hrs sleep or 1 hr twenty the most (the past few days).  So I pretended I had to leave for an errand and had my mom do lunch and nap time to see if she'd go down easier, and sleep longer knowing I wasn't here.

we'll see!

[babyre33]

The brilliant idea of tricking her with grandma didn't help.  In fact she only slept an hr.  She almost went back to sleep, but not close enough.

Now that she's had 2 okay nights of sleep, is it possible she doesn't need to go down for a nap as early as she use to?  How long are other almost 2 year olds staying up before their first nap?

[Layla]

Yeah its possible she needs more A time. Jasmine is waking up around 6-6.30am and I put her down for a nap at 12pm. She's pretty good at staying up more before nap than before bed... same as Dd1. So maybe try longer A times... like 5-5.5hrs and she might sleep longer.

Great to hear her nights are improving

[babyre33]

Well, that's where we are now, since she's waking between 6 and 6:30 and nap at noon.  Before she was up at 7, and nap at noon.  Who knows.  Lets see what the dr says tomorrow
Thanks for your advice.  Let me know i fyou get any pearls of wisdom in the middle of hte night.  I need as much as I can get!

[Lissybits]

Hi Andrea,
How are the NWS and EWs going? Any improvement?
What did the Doc say? I'm interested as my DS has had 3 ear infections in the last 2 months and we have only just got back on track , although he is still waking once every night
but, at least he's back in HIS bed and only waking once - I can cope with that. I'm hoping being consistent this stubborn, last NW will vanish completely
Lis
x

[babyre33]

I've been off for a while due to the crazziness of sleep and being pg, and now the new one has arrrived. 

The ear infections have been fixed with tubes and sleep has improved.  BUT...now with dd#2, things are crazy again.  DD#1 is waking more than ever!  up and down for the Entire NIght!!  WE're lucky if she gets11 hrs of sleep totalfor the 24 hr period.

We're very tired here!

[Layla]

Its all new to her... having the baby in the house and it will pass. Try to include her when you change the baby or when you're feeding the baby, you can also try reading her a book at the same time. Almost everyone goes through a rough patch in sleep when a sibling arrives

{{{HUGS}}}