17 MO not now settling for sleep / naps - help Im confused!

[georgesmummy]

Hi
George is 17 months and has been a great sleeper and napper. He is still good when he gets to sleep but its now taking ages to settle him both at nap time and bedtime. I am hoping this is holiday excitment and travelling to grandparents so sleeping in strange cots. We are at home now for 2 nights before another 4 away! I think we need to go with it whilst we are in the holiday period but can't face this carrying on into the new year and am dreading it now. Re-reading the FAQs we had been doing toddler put down, this worked well and then I would put him in his cot say its sleep time now and leave and 99% of time he would settle. Now he is not. I have been trying to put him in and come out as before but he never seems to settle now. I then go in and he is standing up crying. I lie him down and he tends to stand straight away. I try not to make eye contact as he finds the standing a game and when I approach the cot to lie him back down he laughs and trys to run to other end, even through the crying. I have not been giving up though, but have been leaving periodically to see if he settles himself - this is probably confusing him. Im thinking we should go back to toddler pd until that works then try the walk out / walk in - I am 20 weeks pregnant so have a while until the new baby but sometimes is taking an hour to settle him and I won't be able to do that when new baby is here. I will need to be able to put him to bed as before and leave while he is awake but quiet without this unsettling him and then spending next hour trying to settle. Im lost as to what to do next.

Will not have internet access after tomorrow for a few days if I don't reply but any advice would be great. Thanks

[Erin M]

I think you're dfinitely right about the holiday excitement getting the best of him, my dd has`been having a rough time as well.  If it's been going on for a bit, probably some overtiredness as well.  Can you push his bedtime forward a bit until he catches up a bit?  Other than that, your plan sounds great.

[georgesmummy]

Thanks for the post. We are going to bed about 6.45pm to 7pm at the minute anyway so don't really want to go much earlier - tonight he took an hour of pd to settle and be asleep, but he did have a 2.5 hour nap in the day which is good as his naps had been short over christmas too. 2.5 hours is long (usually only about 1.5 hours) but he defintately needed a catch up.

In terms of toddler pd assume you stay until he is asleep as if not he will stand up if he realises you are not there. He is checking you are still there at the minute. Actually feel better now I have decided to continue to do just toddler pd as have new resolve! My back might be killing me though if we are still taking ages at 30 weeks pregnant 

[Erin M]

If you can get through this stretch of overtiredness, things should improve nicely.  My dd had quite a bad patch of sleep around the birth of my dd2 - things have improved (though they're still a bit off with the Christmas craziness) so just press on and keep doing what you're doing!