2-year old won't sleep

pickarooney

Our son has never been a good sleeper. He just doesn't ever seem to get tired and has always functioned fine on a short night's sleep and with a short nap. In the past we have had issues at various times getting him to sleep (teething, illness, moving house, changing bed) but these have generally resolved themselves with a bit of patience and resistance.

When my girlfriend was pregnant, we made the mistake of spending too much time with him at bedtime. We knew these were the last moments we would have with just the three of us and we indulged his wishes to have Mammy and Daddy put him to bed instead of just one. He also got into the habit of falling asleep with at least one of us there.

Since his sister was born two months ago, he hasn't slept a single night. He's put to bed at more or less the same time each night (8.30ish) after a bath/shower, is read a story, talked to calmly and otherwise reassured. He will not fall sleep before 10, but usually later, and then only if one of us is in the room with him, holding his hand or at least next to him. He wakes up and starts shouting as soon as we leave the room. When we put him back in bed, he gets out and leaves the room, over and over until we eventually give in and accompany him to sleep. Once he finally does drop off, he wakes up again about midnight/1am and needs to be coaxed back to sleep, the same again at around 4am and 6am. I almost always end up just falling asleep on a mattress in his room with him so that we can get a bit of sleep (not a whole lot, as his sister wakes up several times a night to feed).

I'm kind of at my wit's end as to how to break the cycle. Any advice I've read on line has been pointless and always along the lines of leaving him to cry himself to sleep, ignoring the fact that he will just get up and leave the room. It's hard going on 4 hours sleep a night, but if I could come up with a plan that takes a couple of weeks to carry out I'm happy to forego sleep altogether in the short term in order to get him back into some sort of pattern.

I think the problem stems from jealousy or abandonment issues related to the new baby (who sleeps in our room), but find it hard to reassure him that nothing has changed and that we're still there for him. I hate to admit that I've lost my temper on a few occastions out of sheer frustration and sleep deprivation and that can surely have no positive effect on him.

So, I know I'm not alone in this and appreciate that we're blessed in that the new baby does sleep a lot and cries very little so it could be so much worse, but if anyone has any really practical advice or ideas, please share!

Nevyn

It does seem like you spoiled him a little and is going to be hard to break but you can't keep on wiht the way things are.

We had to put a child gate on our eldest's door when he would wake up and wander and leave his room, it's a hard thing to do but it is for his own safety.

It sounds like he doesn't know to go to sleep with out you there and you are going to have to let him figure it out, once his room is safe and he can come to no harm in it then let him figure it out.

Oddly enough having the same battle with my eldest again atm but he's 11 now and having to talk about removing his bedside lamp and just cos he can hear me in my room doesn't mean he can come in and try start conversations at 11pm on a school night.

pickarooney

What kind of a child gate did you use? Is it something that goes across the outside of the door so that when he opens it he can't get any further but is not completely locked in?
I've never thought of that - I really didn't want to go as far as locking himin to his room for safety and psychological reasons but I could see that this might be a compromise. It would have to have a fairly complicated mechanism though, or he'd just open it or climb over it!

How long did it take before he realised he wasn't going to be able to escape and resign himself to going to bed? I have to think of the baby and the neighbours' sleep

littlebug

This might sound stupid but what about just leaving his door open? My youngest always felt more reassured that he was not being left alone when he could hear what was going on downstairs (and we just going about our usual business... no effort to be extra quiet or anything). We also let him look at his books/ colouring or something for a little while by himself as long as he stays in his room. We would give a set amount of time to himself and then say we were coming up for tucking in, song, lights out etc. sometimes he'd already have fallen asleep or sometimes he would have gotten out of bed and turned off his light by himself and gone back to bed. I find that giving a little responsibility (with limits of course!) can work better than constant battle which can just drive us all mad.

I should add that the above would work better with a child at the older end of 2 than the younger... you don't specify.

Nevyn

Standard moveable stair gate was what was used and it was fixed in the door way with the door open and only put in place at night time.

Did it with both of them and neither of them remember.
If took about two weeks of putting him to bed and leaving the room and being on the landing and telling him to go back to bed until he eventually went to sleep.
There were a few times we found him alseep on the floor of his room near the gate
rather then in his bed and we'd lift him asleep back into bed.

We left the gate in place until he was sleeping through the night, we never ignored him or abandoned him or failed to check on him but we could not have him wandering around the house on his own at night.

pickarooney

littlebug wrote: »

This might sound stupid but what about just leaving his door open?

He gets up and leaves the room. When I put him back in bed, he gets up and leaves the room again. My record is 37 times before I had to give up.
We've tried leaving the small light on, the big light, giving him his books, his teddy bears, letting him go into his tent (in his room), play with his train... the end result is that he just doesn't want to go to sleep.

I should add that the above would work better with a child at the older end of 2 than the younger... you don't specify.

He's 2 and 2 months.

littlebug

pickarooney wrote: »

He's 2 and 2 months.

ah right... he's still very little I have to say my eldest was similar when the second was born but she was older so easier to work/ reason with. Have you tried some kind of reward system? star charts etc. You must be at the end of your tether.

tomcollins97

pickarooney wrote: »

He gets up and leaves the room. When I put him back in bed, he gets up and leaves the room again. My record is 37 times before I had to give up.
We've tried leaving the small light on, the big light, giving him his books, his teddy bears, letting him go into his tent (in his room), play with his train... the end result is that he just doesn't want to go to sleep.

He's 2 and 2 months.

Ok - don't all attack me here, but have you tried a gentle smack on the behind? I do not me a thump, beating or hard slap, but a gentle smack may just be enough to make him realise you are serious about him going to bed?

I did have this problem before, albeit not for a prolonged period. What worked for me is that I locked all doors upstairs, except his bedroom, and put the stair gate at the top of the stairs. I made it very clear that he could leave his room, but would not be coming downstairs, and his parents would not be coming upstairs. He soon got bored when he had no reaction and no one 'putting him back to bed'. A few nights he even fell asleep on the landing floor!

pickarooney

Unfortunately we don't have stairs
He knows we're serious about him going to bed, he just doesn't seem to understand why we don't want to stay with him.
I'd like to try a reward system but am not sure how to go about it. The star chart thing - do I put up a thing on the wall and add a star whenever he sleeps through the night or what? I'm afraid I'd have an empty chart and a bag of unused stars for quite some time.

I'm warming to the idea of the gate, as long as it's something he can't open or climb over.

Khannie

pickarooney wrote: »

Since his sister was born two months ago, he hasn't slept a single night.

I'm guessing, but I'd say the change to having the newborn around is probably a tough one. It took our eldest (who was 9 at the time iirc) a few months to adjust to not being the only child around and you could reason with him.

I like both the star chart and stair gate ideas. My best man used the stair gate and it worked well for him. I saw a supernanny on this before and her solution was to just silently put the child back in the bed over, and over, and over without saying a word. At 37 times I'm sure that could be quite tiring (especially when you're bottoming out from lack of sleep) but the silent treatment might be worth a bash too. If you do it, you'd need to stick with it though, or it becomes a kind of victory for the child where they know they'll wear you down in future.

Good luck anyway.

Wantobe

Have you thought about co-sleeping for a while? It's not something that ever worked for me as I could never get a good nights sleep if one of mine were in the bed with me but plenty of people do. I guess it could work if you had a really massive bed! Short term solution obviously but you know, whatever works- I wouldnt worry too much about future problems, children change so much in the space of a few months at that age.

Sounds like you've already tried the gentle night routine, have you tried doing up his room, new bed linen, maybe some wall stickers that he likes, a night light and so on? When we were moving our eldest into a cot we laid the groundwork by doing up her new bedroom over a period of a few weeks, saying that when she was a big girl she could sleep there, making it seem like it was a big treat to sleep in the new, fabulous bed ( an old bed we bought at a second hand shop but painted, new mattress, new bed linen from Penneys etc). She'd never been good to sleep at night but from the minute she moved into her big girls bed she immediately improved.

pickarooney

I tried a few more things tonight but just as I thought I was getting somewhere there was a disruption and I'd wasted an hour and a half. I ended up just holding his hand until he dropped off. He woke up an hour later and his mother put him down, stayed a minute and did the slow retreat out of the room. He grumbled a bit but eventually fell asleep again after she left - a minor victory. In two minds about whether to try get some sleep myself now, one eye open knowing he'll inevitably get up again and go into our bedroom and wake the house up or just sit it out until he does and put him back down again.

As regards decorations, he has a new bed that he 'built himself' (that move involved about 10 days of readjustment as it was no longer an effort to escape from his cot) and a new calendar of his favourite cartoon character which we're changing each night, the ceiling is covered with phosphorescent stars which he used to love but is getting bored of (previously I told him stories about all the stars and the adventures of the creatures that lived there, but he kind of stopped listening).

Tomorrow night it's going to be the silent treatment. I'm just going to stand in the room, not talking to him until he gets bored and nods off (bit creepy-clowny, but sure...) That's the foolproof plan at least.

Khannie

pickarooney wrote: »

Tomorrow night it's going to be the silent treatment. I'm just going to stand in the room, not talking to him until he gets bored and nods off

The supernanny approach involved leaving the room iirc. Just putting it out there. I'm not saying your way wont work....but she IS supernanny.

pickarooney

But he just gets up and follows me out if I leave the room...
Anyway, he slept for 5 hours last night and only got up at 5.30 which felt a little like a victory. It took until 6.30 to get him back to sleep though, and then only by capitulating, so that's another night wasted really.

Nevyn

You'll get there, just keep it up it will be worth it in the end, he needs to know that Mammy and Daddy mean what they say and will follow true, if you can impress that on him at this stage and keep it up it makes life a lot easier for you all.

I know it's hard then you are sleep deprived, but you'll get there.

kizzyr

Does he have any pictures of you in his bedroom? My sister had a similar problem with her oldest when her second baby came along and she got photos of her and her husband and both sets of grandparetns onto transfers and ironed them onto a small quilt.
This quilt then went on top of the covers and my niece was told that all these people who loved her lots, would watch over her during the night and keep her warm and cosy in her bed. This way my niece never felt like she was falling asleep alone and she'd chat away to the pictures when alone.

pickarooney

kizzyr wrote: »

Does he have any pictures of you in his bedroom? My sister had a similar problem with her oldest when her second baby came along and she got photos of her and her husband and both sets of grandparetns onto transfers and ironed them onto a small quilt.
This quilt then went on top of the covers and my niece was told that all these people who loved her lots, would watch over her during the night and keep her warm and cosy in her bed. This way my niece never felt like she was falling asleep alone and she'd chat away to the pictures when alone.

I might just try that. Another thing I didn't mention before was the problem with how to dress him for bed at the moment. When he's going to bed it can be up to 30 degrees so a quilt or even a blanket can be suffocatingly hot. On the other hand, by 4AM it's cooled down considerably so if he's not covered up he's likely to wake up cold.

kizzyr

pickarooney wrote: »

I might just try that. Another thing I didn't mention before was the problem with how to dress him for bed at the moment. When he's going to bed it can be up to 30 degrees so a quilt or even a blanket can be suffocatingly hot. On the other hand, by 4AM it's cooled down considerably so if he's not covered up he's likely to wake up cold.

If he is going to bed in PJs and is hot enough why not just put a sheet over him and then when you are checking on him later before you go to bed put another layer over him then?
The quilt idea worked a treat for my sister and like you, her kids tend to be roasting when they go to bed, so the quilt isn't a warm one that you'd use in place of a duvet.
I was thinking about my post afterward and how you will have your hands full with two kids anyway so sitting down to make a quilt may not be the easiest thing to find time for. If this is the case you could get a big picture frame and put all of your photos into that and hang it on the wall beside his bed. That way the people he loves are still close to him at night, it helps towards the heat issue and will take 10 minutes where as sewing a quilt would take longer.
Good luck with it either way

Nevyn

Even now with mine being 11 and 9 with the change in the weather I go in and make sure they are covered before I go to bed myself and when winter comes in properly they willl have an extra blanket on the bottom of thier bed which I will cover them with when I check on them so they are not waking up cold when thier body functions bottom out in and around 4am which happens to all of us.

pickarooney

I put a 'new' blanket and pillow on his bed tonight and tucked his teddy in. He found it a grand idea and followed suit. He even stayed in there for his second bedtime story. Afterwards I turned out the light and stayed in the room without talking to him while he got accustomed to the change. I left the room bit by bit and he watched me go out with only the mildest of protests. As soon as I actually stepped away from the door he was out after me of course. There followed a series of I-get-up-you-put-me-backs with no discussion and, to his credit, no complaints. He eventually fell asleep, although not in his bed (on the mattress beside it) at 11. I consider it as a progression in that there was no cuddling up and no hand-holding and only the slightest of protestations. If I can gradually reduce the overall time it takes and have him actually sleep in the bed...

Now I have to go in there at some stage and try put a blanket on him without waking him up or it'll be another hour gone...

smoochie06

We were in a similar situation with our son a few months ago. He is 2 and 10 months and my daughter is 10 months. We tried everything and what worked for us was what your doing now. Bring him to bed, read him a story tuck him in then walk away slowly out of the room. Then we used to wait in the landing and when he got up put him back to bed with as little eye contact as possible and the silent treatment. It worked in the end for us. Now he goes off no problem thankfully. Hope it works out for you i know how you feel with no sleep and its not nice.

littlebug

How'd it go last night pickarooney? Your post has brought back the most godawful memories of when my eldest was that age.. She was 2 1/2 by the time her brother was born and thankfully we had sorted out the "going to bed" bit but she still woke numerous times in the night as did her brother. I was trying to remember how we sorted it out but actually we didn't The easiest thing to do was to just let her into our bed. For about 6 months we dealt with one child each at night and rarely spent a whole night together (read never). We used to occasionally meet on the landing in the wee hours and smile grunt at each other. The good news is that by the time the baby was about 7 months and she was 3 they both started magically sleeping all night for no particular reason

there that was helpful wasn't it

pickarooney

Extremely I guess there was little chance of you having a third at that rate!

So, at 4am this morning I heard the pitter-patter of tiny footsteps. I went to meet him and put him back in his bed (I had completely forgotten to put the blanket on him earlier).
There was a few back and forths but no verbal communication and he went to sleep at about 5.15, in his own bed. It took me about 10 minutes to walk back to my own room and slip back into bed and I was just about to fall unconscious when my daughter woke up. Then sonny boy was awake and fresh as a daisy at 7, however he manages it.

Apparently some busybody paediatricain at the creche-type-place expressed concern that he might not be getting enough sleep, judging by how white he was. I don't think she really believed that Irish genes really do that to you (and he's actually tanned compared to normal at the moment).

kizzyr

pickarooney wrote: »

Extremely I guess there was little chance of you having a third at that rate!

So, at 4am this morning I heard the pitter-patter of tiny footsteps. I went to meet him and put him back in his bed (I had completely forgotten to put the blanket on him earlier).
There was a few back and forths but no verbal communication and he went to sleep at about 5.15, in his own bed. It took me about 10 minutes to walk back to my own room and slip back into bed and I was just about to fall unconscious when my daughter woke up. Then sonny boy was awake and fresh as a daisy at 7, however he manages it.

Apparently some busybody paediatricain at the creche-type-place expressed concern that he might not be getting enough sleep, judging by how white he was. I don't think she really believed that Irish genes really do that to you (and he's actually tanned compared to normal at the moment).

LOL, she should see me. Some people have commented in the past that I'm the whitest alive person they've ever seen..............I do have that faintly blue super pale thing going on.

delly

Sounds like you have really tried a number of different options pickarooney, fair play for giving them all ago.

My daughter is 2 years and 4 months and we have had tonnes of different ways of sleeping since she was about 10 months. We eventually found a compromise which isn't the best, but works with a minimum of disruption.

She would generally go to bed about 8:30 to 9 on our double bed. I would line up a rake of pillows on one side and after bedtime stories etc. I would turn out the light and she would hopefully go asleep while I pretended to do the same (I have actually fallen asleep on a few occasions leaving an irate wife downstairs waiting on me, having cooked the dinner ). If all goes according to plan she is asleep within 20 to 40 minutes. Longer if she has had a long nap during the day, shorter if she's been doing a lot of activities during the day.

From there I would bring her into her cot and lay her down with as little movement as possible and make my escape. From this point she would sleep soundly until maybe 1 to 3 in the morning at which point she would stand up and call me. From here I would then bring her into our bed and she'd be back asleep in minutes with me following soon afterwards. She generally doesn't wake up until after 8, which is something.

Its not the best situation, but works well as we've gotton used to it. Still being in the cot helps as she's doesn't roam the house, or fall out of bed, and the nap during the day takes an effect on when she drops off at night. On occassion she doesn't have a nap which means she is asleep in minutes, but I don't think she is old enough to fully cut it out at the moment as she gets very ratty by about 5 in the afternoon if she hasn't had one.

Having said all that however, if I had a newborn to attend too at the same time, I don't know how feasible my routine would be.

pickarooney

Similar enough story last night. I was a bit late putting him to bed for various reasons and he got into the bed for the second story, then out, then in... I said goodnight and stood by the door. He tried to get out past me and kept calling for his Mama to come and sleep with him for about 5 minutes (seemed longer, but probably wasn't). I eventually picked him up, gave him a kiss and calmly explained that it wasn't going to to happen that he and his two teddies were going to have a good night's sleep. Amazingly he accepted it and lay down in his bed with the two lads. He didn't go to sleep though, and when I sidled out of the room 20 minutes later he followed me, peeking through the crack to see if I was there. I got the feeling he was going to make a 'Mr. Wolf' game out of it, so put him back down and waited it out this time until I heard the deep breathing of toddler sleep. He slept all the way through to 6.30 and given that I was getting up in an hour I just put him down and nodded off on the mattress beside his bed, hoping that wouldn't scupper the progress from earlier. He slept again until 8.30 when he got up and walked into the living room, teddy in hand, beaming "I'm awake!"

Nevyn

Have you tried sitting outside his room and when you hear his feet hit the floor telling him firmly to go back to bed? I did that with mine used to sit on the landing and read.

pickarooney

I have tried it; he gets a kick out of sneaking up to the door and running back to bed. I will try reintroduce this next week once I have the current routing down and shortened, as long as I can avoid him thinking he can make a game out of getting up.

pickarooney

The last few nights have been a complete disaster. I'd been fooling myself that I was making progress, when in fact bedtime is just getting longer and longer and he still has no inclination whatsoever to go to sleep on his own, in his bed, or at a reasonable hour. I've given up for now, as I just can't deal with spending two hours, then another hour, then another half hour between 9pm and 6am trying to best him to sleep. Luckily, he was knackered after a picnic and a swim in the park today so was ready to conk out when we got back, but from tomorrow it's back to square one.

DaisyBabe

pickarooney wrote: »

. Luckily, he was knackered after a picnic and a swim in the park today so was ready to conk out when we got back, but from tomorrow it's back to square one.

Funnily enough you have just answered your own conundrum there…
The child isn’t simply tired enough at bedtime – make an effort to have more activity during the day and you’ll reap the rewards at night…
All this other bedtime routine in nonsense IMHO – the more fuss you make about gong to bet the worse it will get – from what I have read your nighttime routine has developed into a game for the toddler and I’m afraid this will be self-perpetuating.

delly

DaisyBabe wrote: »

Funnily enough you have just answered your own conundrum there…
The child isn’t simply tired enough at bedtime – make an effort to have more activity during the day and you’ll reap the rewards at night…

In fairness, thats an oversimplified view of matters. I am all for having a very busy day for my wee one, knowing that bedtime will be easier, but having to tire your child out everyday in order to fall over with tiredness isn't always possible. I think the OP is looking for a routine that that pickarooney jr. accepts and goes along with rather than sleeping by default as a reslt of a busy day.

DaisyBabe

delly wrote: »

In fairness, thats an oversimplified view of matters. I am all for having a very busy day for my wee one, knowing that bedtime will be easier, but having to tire your child out everyday in order to fall over with tiredness isn't always possible. I think the OP is looking for a routine that that pickarooney jr. accepts and goes along with rather than sleeping by default as a reslt of a busy day.

Agreed, I'm all for routine but I like to keep it simple. We put our 18 month old to bed anywhere between 7.30pm & 8.30 pm but we take our signals from the wee one. When she looks tired up she pops - on occasion it could be 7pm or 9pm depending on activity level during the day. If the child isn't tired, routine & routine alone will not work.

pickarooney

I'm really not sure how we can get him doing more activities, but he's starting in the creche on the 17th so that might help a little bit. Other than that he spends a few hours every day in the park or at the pool with his mother and his group of friends.

I don't know if this kind of thing is really inherited but my mother told me I used only sleep about 7 or 8 hours at the same age. I used to just lie in bed awake though, so less hassle for everyone.

luckat

Two is a really difficult age for sleep. It's when kids suddenly start thinking there are monsters in the room, etc.

Have you tried Pzizz? It's a sleep program available for computer and iPhone. It uses music, sounds like sea, chimes, rain, etc, and soothing speech to bring on sleepiness - I think the musical tones are designed to invoke sleepiness.

It's originally designed for adults, but a lot of people use it successfully with babies and children. It's great for giving not just sleep but a good, deep quality of sleep. http://www.pzizz.com

littlebug

that's really tough pickarooney:(

At the end of the day you can try all the different techniques in the book/ on the internet and you might hit on one that works with your child and you might not. With my eldest nothing worked until she got to an age where you could reason with her to an extent (3-ish). and believe me we tried absolutely everything. It just became a matter of doing whatever enabled us to survive (and dying the grey hairs). Once the youngest hit 7-8 months I never had any sleep problems with him. I didn't do anything different with them- they were just very different little people.

Creche might well help. I always thought it was going to playschool and learning a lot of new stuff that helped my girl.... tiring out her mind rather than her body.

By the way my terrible sleeper is now 7 and sleeps like a log
Best of luck.

pickarooney

littlebug wrote: »

Creche might well help. I always thought it was going to playschool and learning a lot of new stuff that helped my girl.... tiring out her mind rather than her body.

I was wondering if it wasn't the opposite - he's learning so much new stuff this past few months he's not able to switch off. I might stop reading him calculus books.

luckat

pickarooney wrote: »

I was wondering if it wasn't the opposite - he's learning so much new stuff this past few months he's not able to switch off. I might stop reading him calculus books.

Hmm. Spock recommends quantum physics.