Toddler Sleep Issues -- Crying Crying Crying!

[rgors]

Our 2.5yo DD has, until recently, been a "pretty good" sleeper, but now her sleep sucks. I'm hoping some of you BTDT mamas can provide some advice!

By "pretty good" I mean a simple bedtime routine under 30 minutes, and then she would go to bed and sleep straight through for 10-11 hours. Of course we had blips sometimes but mostly, pretty easy. We did Weissbluth CIO with her when she was 6mo and since then it's been clear sailing.

Four months ago I had DS, and two months ago we moved DD to a big girl bed. She slept fine for the first month in that bed and shows no jealousy/other issues with DS. She LOVES her bed because of the cat sheets we purchased for her (Company Kids). For this reason I would like to believe either her brother or the bed are unrelated to her sleep problems. but who knows?

Right now, when we put her down into bed, she dissolves into sobs and it breaks my heart. The routine that used to take 30 minutes now takes 60 minutes because she continually stalls. When we give her a final tuck into bed and leave the room with a kiss... it's cry, cry, cry. We believe in CIO, but her ability to cry intensely and long is a wholly new level now than when she was a baby. Occasionally she gets out of bed, to which we go in the room, don't speak to her or look at her, just pick her up and put her back in the bed and re-tuck her in, per a Weissbluth case study suggestion -- that one seems to actually work. The main problem for us is when she STAYS in bed and just cries -- mommy! daddy! mommy! daddy! -- which can last at least 1h15min (I haven't pushed beyond that point yet). How do you correct that?? At least when she gets out of bed, I can correct it by putting her back in bed. I am at a loss for how to correct her when her offense is crying and working herself up.

Once she IS asleep -- she is then waking up 1x, 2x, 3x per night. Our 4mo sleeps in the next room and we are reluctant to let DD CIO in the middle of the night for fear of waking up DS. We also can't stand the crying at 3am when we just really need to SLEEP after months of newborn sleep deprivation. The easiest solution for midnight DD wakeups is just to sleep in her room. We knew that sleeping with her was only reinforcing the wrong solution, but man, we're just so TIRED! Sticking to your guns and listening to 1h of crying at 3am is just really really hard. Especially when we're really not sure if CIO is the right antidote at this point? We had a moderately hard time with CIO when she was 6mo but were encouraged by clear improvement over time and clear success stories. Now, the problem has been going on 3 weeks and no improvement, and it's harder to find people who successfully CIOed with a 2yo.

I did read the toddler sleep thread posted a couple months ago and was intrigued by perhaps a sticker reward chart. Has this actually worked for any of you? Any other things that worked for you?

[ha98ed14]

We are in much the same position. I think it is the age. My DD is 2 yrs 5 mo. She has had no disruptions to her life (same room, same crib, no other children, etc.) and she has been crying and having full on tantrums when we say it is time to go to bed and waking up between 1-3 times a night screaming. We did CIO too. Sometimes we go in in the middle of the night. (DD has vomited in her bed in the middle of the night before, so we are just checking for that, not interacting.) But we always let her CIO when she is going to bed.

Two ideas: 1) Check her naps. Maybe she is still taking one and therefore is not tired when you put her down. OR Maybe she isn't taking one, so by bedtime she is so overtired that going to sleep is such drama.

2) Can you put her back in the crib? I think it wouldn't be a bad idea. I think a lot of the reason DD does go to sleep is because she can't get out. Since her options are limited, she gives up faster.

Anyway. You're not alone. I really think it is a stage. Our DD was a great sleeper too until about 2 months ago.

[hillview]

I find this seems to happen in short phases. Like a week or so. I found a nightlight helped us. We got the twilight lady bug.
/hillary

[rgors]

our "short phase" has been about three weeks already. :(

We did get a nightlight -- first night it helped, since then, no luck.

naps -- she perhaps could have too early of a bedtime? She still naps up to 2h a day, which is part of her preschool daily schedule, so we can't really drop it (plus I do think she needs it). But maybe we do need to push back her bedtime a bit and try that out. Her typical schedule is wake at 6:30a, nap 12:30p-2p, bedtime starts at 7:30p (in bed at 8p).

back in crib - can't do, because DS now sleeps in that crib. I guess we could get a new crib so they each have a crib but I don't really want to go that route if I can help it (DS is too big for the bassinet now).

Thanks for the answers so far! I am just really stumped so was hoping to get some fresh new ideas. I guess I will try pushing back the bedtime and/or the sticker reward chart.

[Katigre]

Have you asked her what is going on and if there's a reason she is crying for you at night? Are you closing her bedroom door or could you leave it open? A closed door seems to freak out a lot of toddlers for some reason even if they were fine with it as babies.

I believe that if she is crying that loud and long then she genuinely needs you for emotional security - being a 2.5 year old and falling asleep alone in the dark can be very very scary b/c childhood fears are starting to emerge, and she may be feeling insecure and just wanting reassurance. I don't see anything wrong with meeting that need for her right now - it won't be like this forever.

Is there a reason you need her to fall asleep alone in the dark without you there? In your shoes I'd experiment with laying down with her until she falls asleep and see what happens (I'd also try a nightlight and 'scare spray' and a security object).

Sleeping alone is not one of my parenting presuppositions, so I tend to look for solutions that help DS to sleep and also help the rest of us get enough sleep. When DS goes through nighttime fears he can come into our room to sleep (as a young child - 3-4 years old - I remember waking up at night scared and going to sleep in my parents' room on the floor, and it was very comforting and I needed it at that time to feel safe - I want to make that available to DS as well, and as a bonus DH and I don't have our sleep disturbed by him waking up crying at night).

I don't think that CIO is the best option for this situation - if she is waking up so often at night after CIO to fall asleep and this has been going on for several weeks that tells me that it isn't a simple matter of a habit to break but an expression of some emotional needs that should be responded to.

ETA: Is it possible for her to share a room with the baby? I think that kids tend to sleep better if they know they're not alone, I know DS sleeps better and doesn't get upset if his sister is in the room with him vs. him sleeping solitary in the room.

[Piglet]

Dd is the same age. Her sleep has been a bit off the past little while too but I think she is teething. Does your dd have her molars yet? Ours sleeps better if we give her some motrin on really bad nights. Otherwise I think CIO stops working when the kids are older. We did it with all our kids but never at this age. At this age I think you have to stick with the same rewards and punishmens that work during waking hours. In our case dd is all about her blankie. I tell her that if she doesn't stop screaming she will lose her blankie. She quiets down immediately!

[hillview]

I went back and re-read your post. She sounds stressed -- waking up a lot etc. For DS #1 we did spend a time when I slept in his room in his bed for a few nights. Seemed to get things settled down. DS #2 is 2 yrs a a couple of months and is in a crib. I do sometimes have to rock him to sleep when he is showing that kind of stress behavior.
/hillary

[dragop21]

I thought too, when I read your post, that it sounds like an emotional need as well. she has had a major upheaval, adding a sibling always rocks the boat for quite a while. I did CIO with my first, and she is my five year old who has more issues than my 3 year old who I didn't. I *personally* felt like I had to "reparent" her to sleep soundly as she aged. it didn't really get easier.

so if I were in your shoes, I would do as Katiegre suggested and keep it as an option for letting her come into your room. the baby is all ready there right? in her mind she might feel like the baby is replacing her, knowing she is shut away in a different room away from her family. I bet, even if you set up a bed beside your bed for a few weeks, confirm your responsiveness to her emotional needs, basically baby her a bit, she will outgrown this crying in the middle of the night thing pretty quickly. I think any child under 5 has moments where they do need to be thought of as babies, and treated as such, especially in moments of stress and anxiety.

in cases like this, I feel like I need to do what is counterintuitive and not my first choice, connect with my child and draw on my reserves and love for them to meet their need. it has never failed to re attach and reconnect at a time when we both need it.

this is my experience. no judgment here about what you do or decide not to do. :hug:

[rgors]

Definitely some good food for thought here; I really appreciate the thoughtful responses.

I have asked her what is wrong, but she has difficulty articulating her feelings so that I can understand them, especially when she is upset.

I had no idea that kids got their molars at this age. I will have to check that!

DS (4mo) is sleeping in his own room, not our room, and has been sleeping there for two months now. His room was previously a guest room, so DD has stayed consistently in her room and we have stayed consistently in ours. I do not want DD and DS to share a room as I think DD will wake up DS (either with her crying at night, or if she woke up before him in the AM then I can see her climbing up on the crib rails and shouting "BABY BROTHER!!!! WAKE UP!!!" so she can play with him, lol)

We did think of "punishing" her (re: piglet) however, it seemed like it would only add stress to the bedtime when it's already stressful.

There is no real "need" for her to fall asleep without us there (not in the dark -- we let her keep the light on dim if she wants, which she wants about half the time; and if it's on then we go in later when she is asleep to turn it off) other than this is what she has always done, and what we are used to, and what we like. It gives my husband and I some time to spend together and we feel like it's a good sleep skill for her to be able to fall asleep on her own.

One thing I did not make clear in my initial post is that we have not been CIOing her regularly (yes, my post does sound like we have). We have tried it about half the time but we have not been consistent as I was going nuts listening to her cry for me. So some nights we try to CIO and then I "cave" after about 30 minutes (once I went to 1h15m but that was just once). Some nights we just lay down with her right off the bat as I just don't have the emotional reserve for the crying (did I mention newborn sleep deprivation?? :) )

We haven't been consistent because we thought logically CIO was the right approach, but we've been too tired and emotionally spent to enforce it every night. (Yes, I realize the lack of consistency is an issue. ugh. I didn't realize how inconsistent we've been until just now as I have thought back over it.)

Regardless of if we let her cry for some time or not, in the end we have had to eventually lay down with her every night for her to fall asleep.

For the middle of the night wakeups, we haven't let her CIO once because I am afraid she will wake the baby -- so middle of the night, DH or I have always laid down in her room, or brought her into our room. We haven't attempted CIO middle of the night but I was wondering if we should be.

The problem is that as we have been giving up on CIO and laying down with her, her sleeping has only gotten worse. Now she needs us to lay down to fall asleep with her EVERY night; when this all started, it was only 3x-4x per week. When this started, she was waking up middle of the night 1x, sometimes 2x per night. As the weeks have passed that we have been laying down with her to get her back to sleep, she is now waking at least 2x, often 3x per night.

So, it feels like we are making the problem worse, not better, kwim? So I was thinking, ok maybe we need to be braver about this CIO thing -- I will post and see if that's what has worked for other people, or maybe other people can give me ideas of what did work for them.

Also, we don't really know how to get out of the laying-with-her-pattern once she is ready for it. It seems like that pattern could go on for months, and we don't want it to be this way for months. The parent that is "sleeping" with her always gets terrible sleep on that night.

[catpagmo]

Something that worked well for my DD at that age (and still works) was distraction. We bought her a CD player for her room, and some stories on CD to listen to at night. It works like a charm! She sleeps very well, and we still have her listen to a story every night. This is after the bedtime routine of brush teeth, potty, 2-3 books, and then her CD. The stories on CD that she listens to are about 1.5 hours long, so she has a long time to listen, and then fall asleep on her own.

Someone on this board suggested a CD called The Sleep Fairy for young kiddos who were having a hard time sleeping. I bought it for DD, and it works great, too. It's like a guided meditation for kids. When my DS was about 2 months old, DD started having sleep issues, too, which is why I bought The Sleep Fairy. It was very helpful.

Good luck! I know how difficult it is when your older kiddo suddenly stops sleeping well, along with a newborn in the house.

[fauve01]

1) Check her naps. Maybe she is still taking one and therefore is not tired when you put her down. OR Maybe she isn't taking one, so by bedtime she is so overtired that going to sleep is such drama.



:yeahthat: This was the first thing I thought when i read the OP's post too. what is the napping situation? the nap is one of the first things to check when there are disturbances in night sleep. At 2.5 some kids don't need a nap anymore.

Good luck!
Anne

[mominmarch]

My DD was 2.5 in September, so we might be just past "your phase". We are also believers in Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child. We moved into a twin bed at 2.5. There are no other siblings in our household.

But... like you, we went through a really tough sleep schedule about 2 months ago, and here are some things that worked, in no real order:

1- we did the "Sleep Chart" that Weissbluth suggests for preschool age kids. My DD LOVED this chart. We decorated it, hung it, made a big deal of reading it, she memorized it, we made the 5th rule "5. Always remember that Mommy and Daddy love you very much." and it is our own little game that she gets to read them all over again, and she lights up at number 5. The chart has been GREAT for us and worth its weight in gold.

2- my DD doesn't fall asleep for her nap (if she takes one) until 2... but we make sure that she is woken up at 3:30. She could really sleep, like until 4:30 in the afternoon, if we let her, but bedtime routine was horrid b/c she really just wasn't tired. So we had to limit naps.

3- we don't let her come in our bed, but I will go and sleep in her bed sometimes. This way we both sleep (in our bed, she wants to play, not sleep).

4- we step up the fun in our bedtime routine, but also we limit it to 30 minutes. The Weissbluth timer suggestion worked here. We make it a rule... the person not doing the routine (the other parent) sets the kitchen timer and then calls up when it goes off. My DD really likes the enforcement of rules... she is rules oriented and it makes her feel older and more responsible with this task.

Good luck!

[Piglet]

Just to clarify, I didn't mean punishment in the true sense, just more of a consequence. DD is very strong willed and we get into weird spells with her. For example, she will often have this insatiable need for a very specific stuffed animal (in addition to the 17 that are already in her crib at any point) and we can nopt find it in the middle of the night, nor do we want to make a habit of getting her somethign every night. It usually starts very benign - she asks for a stuffy that is on her dresser before bed and we give it to her. The next night she wakes up in the middle of the night asking for a different stuffy. We search the house and find it and give ti to her. The following night it happens again and again until we no longer want to give her the stuffy/wake up in the middle of the night/ or we simply don't understand WHICH stuffy she wants. We are all tired and cranky... I usually am the one t put my foot down at that point and tell her that I can not get her any more stuffies and that she has to sleep with the ones she has. She has a good tantrum while I stand by and then I resort to "punishment" - e.g. the threat of removing a stuffy from her bed or taking her blankie. She gets that this is not working and I tell her that if she quiets down she can have the stuffy/blankie back. I am not suggesting a real punishment, just sometimes yuo have to stop what isn't working and get back on track. I have no plans to actually take away the blankie (since she for sure won't sleep in that case), but I need to snap her out of the tantrum and from past expereince I know that the blankie gets her attention. I should point out htat if she is in pain, sick, sad, etc. then obviously I wouldn't resort to this technique, but when it is simply a case of escalation (wake up once the first night, 2x the next, 3x, etc.) then you do sometimes have to do something to stop it. I am not a co-sleeper and never was. I have no problem with a kid that comes to me if they have a ngihtmare or I come to them when they are crying but I refuse to have my kids sleep in my bed (for the simple fact that I don't get a minute's sleep in our queen sized bed if my toddler is kicking me all night which sort of defeats the prupose). If co-sleeping is right for you, then by all means, but I don't see it as a magic bullet either, ykwim?

[rgors]

mominmarch - for this chart, did you write out the words? or did you draw pictures or something? Since DD can't read yet I have difficulty understanding how written rules will really hit home for her. I mean, I can read them to her and point to the words, but it seems like pictures might be more effective?

Thanks again piglet for the clarification -- yes, I knew you didn't mean real punishment but didn't make the effort to correctly requote you. Our problem is that to snap DD out of an escalation or tantrum, we usually put her in a timeout -- which seems to work against the bedtime routine. I think the stuffy removal empty threat might work, though.

And the story on CD idea is brilliant -- especially because we already have a peter rabbit story on cd. :)

I am very very appreciative of the responses to this thread. It helps me to clarify my own thinking. Thank you so much!

[mominmarch]

We wrote out the words. My DD can't read, but she has an amazing ability to memorize. She had those sleep rules memorized in just a few days. And she loved them, just loved them. The last one is written in purple and she will say "read the purple one again please". She has memorized them, and she "reads" them now. We didn't do pictures (I am not that artistic).

I thought of one other thing a few minutes ago that I was going to post -- we noticed that whenever we had a babysitter, my DD would sleep through the night. But if it was me putting her to bed, she would be up at 11:30 and again like around 2. If the babysitter came, no issues. So we really do believe that my DD was waking up from habit because she enjoyed the time with me (I, on the other hand, was not enjoying it). So we started to enforce my DH putting her to bed without me. The first couple times, she screamed/threw a fit. I left to walk the dog. DH had his own silly routine (and matchbox cars went to bed when Daddy was there, in a gladware container), and now she really likes when he does it. It really did break the habit.

Another bad thing which we had been doing for months, I am embarassed to say, is letting her have milk when she would wake up at night (a small sippy cup). So we also broke that habit (in fact, that is written on our sleep rules poster "Milk before bedtime and when we wake up in the morning"). One night we did this elaborate thing where we had the doctor call (not really) and tell us that DD was a big girl now and no milk in the middle of the night, yada yada. All about the rule. She hasn't gotten it since. It is shocking to me how easy all of this was once we found that her thing is "rules following" and how proud this makes her. We did all of this at the same time we potty trained her too, and she is very good with rules/rewards, so the first week or so of no wake ups, I shamelessly let her have M&M's with her breakfast!

[goldenpig]

We also have a 2 year old daughter who still wakes up at night. She can cry for over an hour straight and I usually cave before then. So instead of letting her CIO we typically go to her right away if she cries, and she'll try to ask for things like "Mommy read a book? Mommy stay in my room?" etc. but I remind her that we'll read a book in the morning and I'm going to tuck her in and go back to my bed. I'll change her diaper if she's wet. Then she'll ask for a hug and a kiss and a tuck and then she'll go back to sleep. I've also taught her that everyone sleeps in their own bed and she likes to say "Mommy sleeps in Mommy's bed, Daddy sleeps in Daddy's bed, I sleep in my bed" when I tuck her in. I really try to limit the time I spend in her room to a minute or two. My husband is more of a pushover and will read her books, spend up to half an hour soothing her etc. I haven't gotten the solution to preventing her from waking up and crying for me in the first place. She often does this at 4 am, 5 am etc. and she'll ask "Is it morning time?" So I just ordered a toddler clock online and am hoping this will help. It's called My Tot Clock and it glows blue when it's night time and yellow when it's OK to wake up. It has a bunch of other features, like a timer that you can set (maybe that would help with limiting bedtime routine). I haven't received it yet, so I don't know if it will help but you can check it out:
http://www.mytotclock.com

Another great suggestion I've heard (but haven't had the time to try yet) is to make a picture book with her bedtime routine, and either draw or use actual pictures of her putting on her pajamas, brushing her teeth, reading a book, etc. You can read it with her so she knows exactly what steps come in what order and that may help her. Maybe the last few pages could be a picture of her sleeping in her bed, a picture of you two sleeping in your bed, and then a picture of her waking up in the morning. You could even have a page that talks about "I sometimes wake up at night but I know mommy and daddy are right next door so I'm not scared and I just go back to sleep."

Anyways, I don't have any magic solutions since we're dealing with the same issue, but you are not alone...if that helps at all. Good luck!

[hillview]

I am agreeing with other posters about the nap thing. DS 2 still takes a nap and we make sure he is up by 3 pm even if he is crashed out or went down later than usual. He was sleeping til 4:30 and that was causing issues on the bedtime.

His routine is to his crib at night btwn 6:30 and 7. Some nights he falls asleep straight away other nights he can be up for an hour. Most of the time he is asleep within 10 mins. He wakes btwn 5:30 and 7 am. He typically sleeps through the night. Once a week or so he will wake up in the middle of the night for a couple of minutes but we don't go into get him unless he gets very upset over 20-30 mins. He naps from about 1-3 pm. Sometimes he goes down closer to 12:30 or 1:30. Usually he will nap but sometimes he does not (maybe 2 x a week he won't nap).

I figure he is on average getting 12-13 hour of sleep. I think that is on the higher end of average for Wiesbleuth (sp?) last time I looked.
/hillary

[rgors]

We can't eliminate naps entirely because they still nap at DD's preschool from 12p to 2p. Her daily notes usually show her falling asleep for the nap about 12:15 or 12:30 and then usually waking up at 2p. We keep the same schedule at home so we are consistent with school. The only thing is we don't wake her up at home, but she also typically wakes up earlier at home (1:30p or 1:45p often).

That in addition to her waking up about 6:30a and in bed by 8p (her bedtime routine starting at 7:30p) gives her about 12 hours of sleep per day (when she sleeps through, like she used to).

[mominmarch]

The photo book sounds like a great idea, we might try that for the next "bump in the road".

[arivecchi]

I have been going thorugh the exact same thing with DS1 for months now. We just gave up because we were exhausted and he now sleeps in our bed. We all get more sleep that way. It's not the ideal solution, but it works for now. DS1's room is right accross from DS2's room and I also did not want to deal with a toddler and a baby awake in the middle of the night, so we could not do CIO with him. That, plus he puked the couple of times he did it and got so hysterical we could not in good conscience let him cry. I figured he will only be this age once and I'd rather have him happy and well rested in our bed than keep fighting with him and have him miserable and cranky. He does nap from 2-4 every day still in his bed. He seems to be afraid of the dark, so that might be the issue. A nightlight did not work for us either. Just go with your gut and do what is necessary for all of your family to get rest.