Hello, my ds is 3 yo and for the past 3 weeks has been skipping naps here and there (we suspected he has been trying to drop them for awhile...he only naps like 3-4 days of 7 and some days he doesn't nap he falls asleep at 4:30 or 5p.m. and is horrendous to wake up after any cat nap). That is not the whole problem....I realize he may be trying to get rid of that last nap. The real issue is that now he will no longer go to sleep without me in the room, wakes repeatedly at night saying he's scared and crying for me so I have had to sleep in his room on the floor (At first I would go in and stay with him until he fell asleep each time and leave but now he is wise to this so I am better off staying in the room for the rest of the night. He still wakes up and calls out to make sure I'm there but I respond right away and he is back to sleep). Last night he woke up 4 times. (He did skip his nap yesterday so probably was OT). He's also very clingy to me and acts afraid that I will leave. He doesn't even like me to be in another room behind a closed door at home when he is with a sitter or his dad. He clings and says Mommy, mommy! But after I leave he does recover after about 5 minutes.
As far as recent changes, I admit there have been many. He did just start preschool for the first time 4 weeks ago. He is in K-2 (bday after the school cut off so there are a few other early 3's in there too). He does the same thing when I leave him there but the teacher says he is fine after 5 minutes and he seems to really like school. He only goes 2 days a week for 3 hours each time. Also, he has had 2-3 illnesses since...nothing to serious..first a stomach thing then some colds, the congestion which I can still hear at night. We have also had alot of work done around our house lately by various contractors (nothing big, just carpet cleaning, gen. maint, etc) so there have been alot of new people in and out, but Ryan loves them and seems to really enjoy anyone who comes over. He has even hugged a few of them who he has seen a few times or who paid attention to him. We are also under a bit of stress b/c he is being evaluated right now for a dev. delay (mostly expressive language) and some anxiety. Of course they are also assessing him for ASD or any other dev. thing since that is the thing everyone does nowadays. The problem wtih that is that all kids have some quirky behaviors and fears, but if you put that with any language delay, occasional hyperactive behavior and the low frustration tolerance and tantrums of the terrible twos and threes, you almost have an ASD diagnosis right there. So the jury is still out on that one. We are in process of evals for language, etc. so hopefully that will help.
I guess this sounds silly but is this enough to cause this kinds of anxiety/nigght waking? He was an independent sleeper until school started. Actually he was even a good sleeper the first week, then it all fell apart. Any input would be great! I don't really now how to remedy except to wait til a weekend and then walk him back into his room ever time he gets up ad nauseaum until he finally gives up and sleeps in his bed alone. I have a feeling the gradual w/d method is not going to work. Used it in the past but for some reason I think he will act out if I do that.
