Please explain sleeping logistics

[ourbabygirl]

when you have a two year old and a new baby sleeping in rooms next to one another. :) We have a modified two-story house, so 3 bedrooms upstairs; ours, DD's (nursery which will become the room of the new baby), and DD's big girl room which she'll move to. At least they'll be in separate rooms, but I still worry about the new baby disrupting DD's sleep (afternoon nap and overnight). Is a fan and a white noise machine enough to drown out the crying? ;) It's not like we'll be letting DC2 cry for a long time, but even so, I worry it'll wake up DD every time. Should we do a fan and white noise machine in each kid's bedroom? And also a monitor for each room? What works for you?

Thanks!

[newg]

We are planning on doing a monitor in each room and for the first few months the new baby will probably be sleeping in the pnp in our room anyways (which is at the other end of the hallway), so I'm hoping that with fans on and Dd's sleeping music on.........they won't hear eachother.
When DD was a baby she stayed in our room for the first four months (and she took naps in our room or whatever arm, bouncer...she fell alseep in)

[codex57]

Different rooms has worked well enough, altho a decent number of nights have had each kid on different floors. You move em as needed.

Yes, white noise helps a lot too. Lots of closed doors separating the two of course.

[scrooks]

Our DS's room and DD's room share a common wall so it has been an issue on occasion. DS was in our room (further away) until he was 3 months old so it was a non issue. Now it is an issue mostly at naptime, not too much at night. At night when either child wakes up they tend to go back to sleep or I feed DS and then he goes back to sleep.

I think it will be a bigger night issue when I try to stop night feedings with DS. Our ped suggested a loud fan for DD's room. We run ceiling fans in both kids rooms but they aren't too loud. We may have to look into a regular loud box fan...

[Indianamom2]

Fans, noise machines (in both rooms) and closed doors.

This was a SERIOUS concern of mine, as DD#1 is not a good sleeper. What we've discovered is that she is a heavy sleeper, but not good at falling asleep. We've got them as far apart as we can and thankfully Ds#2 is a good sleeper.

It'll work, but you may have to experiment a bit.

[Leeannpk]

LOTS of white noise and you should be fine. I have always been amazed by what my kids can sleep through. My girls have shared a room since #2 was 6 months old. She slept through the night fairly consistently, but even when she didn't, my older DD seemed unbothered and didn't wake up (and vice versa). I wouldn't call any of my kids "heavy" sleepers, but they simply got used to sharing and being near each other (DS is across the hall) and adjust accordingly.

[WatchingThemGrow]

We have DD(almost 4) in one room, and 2 boys (2.5 and 10m) in another room right next door. We use Marpac sound machines (:heartbeat:) and a video monitor in each room. At the beginning, DS2 was in a bassinet in our room, but we've never had an issue. We've also got a crib aquarium in the baby's crib, so that may have helped to cut down some crying. We do the "put 'em down awake" thing, so they seem to figure it out pretty easily.

[smilequeen]

My 2nd slept with us for a long time, but he woke up at night until he was 18 months old. He had terrible EI's for about 6 months before he got tubes and would wake up screaming. I would go to him quickly, but he was loud! That never once woke DS1 up.

[belovedgandp]

I have three kids - 6, almost 3 and newborn. The 6 YO has slept through everything. I was worried about DC2 waking him as an infant and kept him in our room for almost 3 months, but no amount of noise has disturbed him. The older two are now in a room together. It shares a wall with the nursery. Neither boy have been up even with a newborn up several times a night next door.

We all sleep with our doors open. I do not use a monitor at night. Sometimes, I close the baby's door for the first bit of the night since the baby goes to sleep before the other two. There is a monitor in the nursery that I use for naptime or when I'm in the basement/outside.

[khalloc]

My DD was 2.5 when we brought DS home. Their bedrooms are right next to each other. DS started sleeping in his when he was about 6 months old.

Honestly, DD is a very light sleeper and has NEVER woken up in the middle of the night and DS cries LOUD AND HARD! The only time she wakes up is if its closer to the morning time, like 5am. Then if he cries she might wake up. I do have white noise machines (HEPA filters) in both of their bedrooms.

[maylips]

We didn't have much trouble until recently (DD was 2.5 when DS was born) but I have to say that I jump to get DS a lot quicker when DD is also sleeping, especially early in the morning and during naps. He has woken DD up a few times in the morning (like around 6:00, rather than her usual 7:00) and a sometimes during her nap (she takes pretty long ones, like 2-3 hours, and usually it's around 1.5 hours that he can wake her up, so I'm assuming it's a sleep cycle she's going through).

We do not have a white noise machine in her room, so that may help. I do think that fear of mine has contributed to DS taking longer to learn to sleep through the night - where I had let DD cry a little bit and fall back to sleep, I have a tendency to run and get him and not let him figure out how to soothe himself back to sleep. And now that he's 8 months and getting more active, she sometimes wakes him up if she's throwing a fit before bedtime and he's already been put to bed.

[daisymommy]

I would echo what the previous posters said, and add that unfortunately, in our house, my most common spoken phrase is "SHHH! The baby is sleeping!!!" My kids are so full of energy and noise that I'm always on alert at nap time, and sometimes the baby still wakes up :( Sometimes you just roll with it.

[maestramommy]

It really depends on how heavy of a sleeper your older DD is. Laurel is a shrieker, but she's also a light sleeper, so SHE gets the white noise. The older two could sleep through an air raid, seriously. In fact, they slept through an entire windstorm, in which two trees fell on the house. :shrug: Laurel of course, did not:p

I think if you use the white noise, it should be enough to at least diffuse the crying so it's not so apparent.

[crl]

Well, so far, DS woke up the first night when the baby was objecting seriously to a diaper change, but hasn't any other nights. Or at least he hasn't told us about it. He's just across the hall and refuses to have his door closed. He does have a vaporizer running all the time because it helps prevent nose bleeds for him, so there's some white noise.

Catherine