Hi I just wanted to share this with other people that may be having the same problems as i have been.
I posted a thread a few weeks ago regarding sleep problems with my little girl who is 3.5.
Right up until about four weeks ago my LO was an absolute dream sleeper.This was until she was woken up one night by our neighbour below us who was snoring extremely loudly. This created fear and ever since then we have had major problems.
Over the past few weeks we have tried quite a few things. I made a mistake of letting her sleep in my bed on the second night and it has just got worse from there.
Basically she had been napping on and off in afternoon ever since she was 2.5.( which was when she started preschool.) Recently she started again when the wheather got colder. She was falling asleep very late in the afternoon which was causing problems at bed time, so she wasn't going to bed until 9-9.30 (not ideal!) A few weeks ago she stopped napping in the day due to starting school again.
I started off by taking over the bedtime story again, (we stopped this when i was about 6 months pregnant with my second and let daddy take over so that i would be able to deal with the new baby's bedtime) By the way my new baby is 5.5 months now so she was well and truly used to Daddy doing bedtime.
I would then stroke her hair until she feel asleep. This was fine but she was still getting up in the night and refusing to go back to bed. I would then have to stroke hair until she would fall asleep again and this would go on all night.
I then tried to do it the Supper Nanny way- usually bedtime story,then saying night, night and leaving the room, then evertime she got up after that i would not say anything, just walk her back to bed. This was the worst thing eve,r sometimes i wouldn't even make it to the door. She was hysterical, this ended up going on for an hour of her screaming, trying to make herself sick and in the end smashing her head against the bed to stop me form leaving. I ended up doing the same as before because i could stand it.
We then started to let her fall asleep in the living room either on mummy or Daddy before carrying her off to bed, we also got new beds for her, bunk beds and made a massive deal out of it which seem to work at first, until bedtime.
Until tonight we have been letting her fall asleep in the living room before taking her off to bed, leaving the hall light on, her door and gate open so she can just get up and for the last week daddy has been sleeping in her room on the top bunk to prevent her from getting in my bed and waking my other lo. ( which still hasn't worked)
After reading different threads on here i decided that she really needs a bedtime routine and needs to fall asleep in her own bed and on her own.
This is what i have done today, had a lot of one to one time with her in the day i.e. made cookies together, played kitchens and Playdoo etc. Then near bedtime i had a bath with her got her dressed then took her into her room to draw picture with her while hubby did my other LO's bath. Then i told her i was gettin him ready for bed and that daddy would come and join her in the minute. She played for about 5Min's on her own in her room alone (major breakthrough) I then put my son to bed., came back to her to take over from Daddy. We read a few story's, i put her teddies all around her and told her they would keep her safe, i then put on a story telling CD, dimmed her light as she asked me to keep it on, left the door and gate open and told her that i was going to do the bottles and that i would check on her after. By the time i had done this she was completely gone.
So major, major break through got her to fall asleep in her own room in her own bed. Yippee!! Will have to see how tonight goes, but baby steps, at least we have managed this bit.
Not sure weather to turn off lights or shut door or gate yet? will probably leave it all the way it is a the mo and remove one at a time as she hopefully feels better about her own room.
