WTS for an almost 3 year old???

[maddies momma]

I'm pretty sure my soon to be 3 year old son has begun waking up out of habit.  He wakes up and cries/whimpers almost every night between 3 and 4 am rather than putting himself back to sleep like he used to.  I believe my DH has inadvertently reinforced this habit by laying down for an extended period of time (IMO) with him every time this occurs (I keep telling him to turn off the baby monitor since he's not a baby anymore).

DS has always been a good sleeper - slept through the night at 7 weeks.  Although we have had some issues with him getting out of bed and playing during the transition from crib to big boy bed, that was almost a year ago and we haven't had any major issues until now.  Our 9 month old daughter is actually sleeping better than him.  I would like to be able to sleep through the night again, and I'm sure my husband would too.

I'm assuming I should try WTS in order to get him back on track???  I am wondering if this is the correct action to take, and if so how do I go about doing it correctly so that it is effective???

[imsmum]

Sounds like what he needs is to have the Ap cut out. 

my older dd sounds a lot like your ds--great sleeper, slept through the night by week 6 but would love to have so sleep with her.  when we moved to our new house and tranistioned her to her big girl bed at 2.5 years my dhwould lay down with her at bedtime and low and behold--she would get up in the middle of the night and crawl into our bed.  It took lots of work and tears but we kept returning her to her bed and leaving and it eventually worked.  what really helped was for us to explain to her that we all needed our sleep and that mummy and daddy would not be nearly so grumpy if she stopped waking us up in the middle of the night and lots of positive reinforcement when she slept though!

[maddies momma]

We've tried the "reasoning" with him approach.  Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

I did try WTS last night at 2am.  He stirred a bit, went right back to sleep.  He didn't wake up again until almost 7am.  PERFECT!!  I will do it again for 2 more nights and see if it works.

Thanks for the advice 

[tjteems]

Glad to hear it worked!!  I'm actually going to try it tonight with my 3 1/2 yo.  He has been waking at 5:30am screaming and cranky, but not able to resettle himself to sleep.  I'm going to try WTS and hope it works!! 

[maddies momma]

Worked again last night!!!  Jostled him at 2am and he slept until ~6:45am.  One more night and hopefully problem is solved, and the whole family can get back to sleeping through the night.

[tjteems]

Glad to hear it!  I tried WTS @ 4am and he still woke at 5:30.   Last night, I tried it at 4:30 and he slept until 6:10, but still woke up cranky and screaming.  I'm going to try 4:45 tonight and see if it makes a difference.  I get a little nervous doing WTS so close to morning, but it is worth a shot!