textbook three year old now waking 2-3 times a night.

[sophiesmum]

Sam is just three and has always been a great sleeper (well, from about 3 months when I first started him on a routine). He has, however, had the odd night of waking up crying which we put down to a bad dream. We would go in and give him a kiss/cuddle and he'd go straight off again. BUT over the last nine months to a year these wakings have gradually become more and more frequent and now it's 2-3 times a night. He still settles quickly but it's exhausting all the same, especially as we have a new baby too (five months). Between the two of them we'll often be up five or six times a night.

I think his increased wakings may well be connected to the baby- maybe he sees her getting attention that way? My question is how can we stop his wakings? Recently she actually slept through for a week and I was still getting up for him!

Most advice for night wakings seems to be to go in briefly and be matter of fact- but this is what we already do. We've tried getting cross with him, we've tried talking to him about it (he just looks bemused), we've tried a night light (he didn't like it).

Any suggestions for a non traumatising but effective way of dealing with this?! help!

[jessica and emilys mummy]

Go for a star chart.Kids love it.It stops Jess straight away.
I will say we have to do it once evry 3/4 months or so whne she has a spate of coming into our bedroom and going straight off to sleep again when we put her back,about 4 times a night.

What I do is tell her the day before we are starting a star chart.If she stays in bed all night she gets a star and if she gets 5 stars in a row she can go to the toy shop and choose a small toy.If she gets out of bed she'll get a sad face on her chart.Then you'll have to start all over again with the 5 stars in a row.
(Make sense?)
When she gets a star I go really overboard with praise,if she gets a sad face,I just say never mind,maybe if you stay in bed tonight you'll get a star tomorrow.
You can do it with any stickers really.My friend has a ds and she uses tractor stickers instead of stars and barbie stickers instead of sad faces (he's so embarrassed)

we normally print one from http://www.dltk.com

[sophiesmum]

Thanks for the suggestion. Up until now we've been trying just keeping response very low key but it isn't working. We did actually potty train him using a star chart, so I don't know why I didn't think of it. Sleep deprivation?!