How did you stop cosleeping?

[emily]

DD has been cosleeping (not by choice) for over a year now. She is now 28 mos. We have tried everything to get her in her own bed but no success. We've done the switch to big girl bed, new bedding, even tried mattress in the master so that she could be in the same room but her own bed. NOTHING. If we even try to leave, she starts wailing. She insists on one of us lying with her in bed until she falls asleep (usually we fall asleep before her). We really need to her to sleep on her own especially since both DC will be at daycare full time soon and we both work FT.

Any BTDT advice?

[lil_acorn]

we have BTDT. When you lie down with her, is it in her bed or yours? Make sure you start in hers. I'd try baby steps. Lay down with her in her bed and then leave ( or better yet stop laying down and only sit in a chair next to the bed). She will likely get up in teh middle of the night. Then you can choose to take her back to her room and lie down with her or agree to sit in the room until she falls asleep again. Then slowly wean it down by sitting outside the room, etc. Warning: this is very time consuming and you will still be exhausted....

Another method is to find out what her dream wish is and try bribery. With my 3 year old, he is incentivized to sleep through the night by the promise of the mcdonald's playland.



Sorry there are so many options - you just need to figure out which one works and gets you sleep!!! Good luck.

[ZeeBaby]

We are going through this now with DD1. It is very, very frustrating. We have her fall asleep in our bed and then take her to her crib in her room. This worked for a very long time, but now she has figured out how to jump out of her crib. We are debating between a crib tent and just moving to the toddler bed. We are leaning towards the toddler bed and a gate. We really need to get her to stay in her own bed!

[frgsnlzrds]

We are in the same position. G slept with us until she was 2 1/2. We're now at the stage where she'll fall asleep fairly easily if I lay in her room. (Of course, there's that loooong bedtime ritual of pjs, books, potty, hands, teeth, hair, picking out the lovey, etc...)

We've been at that stage for 6 months. She goes into hysterics if I try to leave early. BUT, she will go back to sleep by herself if she wakes up to go potty in the middle of the night. Go figure.

Worse, G and E share a room, and now E is addicted to us staying in there, too. He says he's lonely if he has to go to sleep by himself. Sigh. Good luck to you. :-)

[Katigre]

This doesn't sound like a cosleeping (same bed as mom/dad) issue so much as a bedtime issue.

Honestly at her age I think it will take a gradual transition for her to fall asleep on her own. Start out with her in her own bed (probably her own room too) and lay with her until she falls asleep. Do that for 5 days consistently, staying until she's sound asleep, give her that security.

Then you can gradually back off of that in increments - use a timer and lay with her in bed for 2-3 minutes and then get up and sit in a chair next to her bed with a book and read until she's asleep. Then move to the doorway.

Next, lay with her/sit with her for a few minutes and then say "I need to go potty - I will be back in two minutes" and then follow through - go potty and come back (or go put away some laundry, whatever - just make it a short interval). The important thing is that she stay in bed while you're gone and that she trusts you'll come back.

You can eventually lengthen the interval you're gone and you'll find that she will be able to fall asleep on her own. But it takes time - I would make a goal of 3-4 weeks for this transition and I would still sit with her for at least a few minutes before leaving.

I have found with DS that the time I spend next to him before he falls asleep each night is a major time of bonding and open communication - it's quite a special time where he talks to me about things, tells me he loves me, cuddles a bit. I wouldn't trade it for anything (he is able to fall asleep without me there, we did the above to help him learn).

[Tanya]

Well, my girls were both 3 when we did the transition, so age may have had a lot to do with it.

For my oldest, I was pregnant with my second and we decided it was time. We bought a new mattress set for the "guest room" and added some siderails and new sheets. We just told her it was her new big girl bed and we didn't try to make her sleep alone there all of a sudden. I would lie down with her (I usually read and had pregnancy insomnia and sometimes even fell asleep there because her mattress was really nice!). When I did go back to our bed, she'd sometimes wake up in the middle of the night and we'd just let her back into our bed so that we'd all get some sleep. Eventually, I offered her a deal. If she could go 10 nights IN A ROW without calling out or getting up (unless it was an emergency like going pee), she could have a Barbie car she'd picked out at the store. I'd even already bought it and put it up high where she couldn't reach it, but could see it. She also was having a friend come over on a certain day for a playdate after preschool and she really wanted to have that car to play with then. Once she hit the 10 days, it was easy after that. I will say that she is 7 and still wants us to "lie down" with her. However, that is now about 2 minutes and I consider it part of her getting to share things about her day or get her hug/kiss, etc. We certainly don't stay until she goes to sleep anymore or anything.

For my younger daughter, we still had the crib and I didn't want to take it down since we were ttc. She had no interest in sleeping with her sister (very attached to me) in her full size bed. So, one day I just told her she wasn't allowed to sleep in our bed anymore. I made up a bed on the floor next to my side of the bed and she accepted it surprisingly easily. I thought someone switched kids on me because surely she wasn't MINE! She would occasionally wake up and want a hug and a kiss, but I wouldn't let her back in our bed, so she'd return to her bed on the floor. (Oh, as a side note, we went to bed at the same time so she didn't have to go to bed alone....but I have night owls for kids.) She was potty trained and wearing panties during the day, but still in a diaper at night. One night she really really wanted to wear panties to bed. I told her she couldn't UNLESS she slept in HER OWN BED in her room (which has a waterproof pad). We took the side of the crib to convert it into a toddler bed, added a pool noodle as a "rail" and a body pillow on the floor just in case. She learned to go to the bathroom at night even if she didn't think she had to. And success. Way easier than I thought it would be. She gets to pick out 3 books at night. We read one to her (taking turns between parents) and she "reads" the others after we leave. She quite easily goes to sleep by herself and then we turn down the dimmer on her overhead light (she gets upset if she does wake up and the light is all the way off). She has fallen out maybe a couple times and she has wet the bed a few times, but not in months (she'll be 4 this month). We recently got rid of the body pillow on the floor and the pool noodle without any issues.

DD2 was older than DD1 and they have completely different personalities. Both were very attached to me though. DD2 was easier than DD1 and is still easier since we don't "lie down" with her. We just read and give hug/kiss and leave. Both kids like their lights on until they fall asleep. DD1 seems more dependent on having someone with her still (she can sleep with the light off if someone is with her for example....like at sleepovers).
Anyway, after over 3 years of co-sleeping with each of them, I expected more trouble than we got. It really wasn't that bad and if I'd known it wasn't going to be so difficult, I wouldn't have worried about co-sleeping so much in the beginning.

Good luck. Every kid is different. I hope that this at least gave you some more ideas to try.

[Katigre]

I also second a small light one and the door open when she's in her room falling asleep.

[emily]

This doesn't sound like a cosleeping (same bed as mom/dad) issue so much as a bedtime issue.

Honestly at her age I think it will take a gradual transition for her to fall asleep on her own. Start out with her in her own bed (probably her own room too) and lay with her until she falls asleep. Do that for 5 days consistently, staying until she's sound asleep, give her that security.

Then you can gradually back off of that in increments - use a timer and lay with her in bed for 2-3 minutes and then get up and sit in a chair next to her bed with a book and read until she's asleep. Then move to the doorway.

Next, lay with her/sit with her for a few minutes and then say "I need to go potty - I will be back in two minutes" and then follow through - go potty and come back (or go put away some laundry, whatever - just make it a short interval). The important thing is that she stay in bed while you're gone and that she trusts you'll come back.

You can eventually lengthen the interval you're gone and you'll find that she will be able to fall asleep on her own. But it takes time - I would make a goal of 3-4 weeks for this transition and I would still sit with her for at least a few minutes before leaving.

I have found with DS that the time I spend next to him before he falls asleep each night is a major time of bonding and open communication - it's quite a special time where he talks to me about things, tells me he loves me, cuddles a bit. I wouldn't trade it for anything (he is able to fall asleep without me there, we did the above to help him learn).

We tried this maybe 6 months ago with no success. Maybe we'll try it again. We'll try the bribery too. She wakes up almost every night and if one of us isnt there, she comes looking for us. Other nights, she'll wake up and wail even when we're still in her bed with her. She cannot be comforted. It's like she's possessed, eyes still closed and screaming on the top of her lungs. The worst night it lasted for about 45 minutes. Is this normal for her age? Is it a nightmare?

[Sweetum]

DS is 18mo and doesn't understand bribery. He has been sleeping with us now for 2 months, and seems to like it better here! We have been successful in putting him back into his crib after he falls asleep, but awake, he wouldn't go there. After reading this thread, I've got an idea. Maybe it'll help you too. I'm thinking we'll still put DS to sleep in our bed (to later move him to his crib), but as opposed to lying down with him, DH/I will sit by his side and help him fall asleep. once he gets used to that, I'm thinking he'll be more open to doing the same in his crib.

[khalloc]

I have not BTDT, but this is the exact reason I stopped cosleeping at about 5 months. I did not want to have to deal with trying to get a 2+ year old to sleep in their own bed/room. It seems like it would be so much harder once they really get whats going on. Good luck!

[AnnieW625]

We tried this maybe 6 months ago with no success. Maybe we'll try it again. We'll try the bribery too. She wakes up almost every night and if one of us isnt there, she comes looking for us. Other nights, she'll wake up and wail even when we're still in her bed with her. She cannot be comforted. It's like she's possessed, eyes still closed and screaming on the top of her lungs. The worst night it lasted for about 45 minutes. Is this normal for her age? Is it a nightmare?

That sounds like night terrors. DD1 gets them every so often. I would get a rocking chair for her bedroom and rock her back to sleep. That's what we did with DD1 at that age. I agree this sounds more like a bed time thing, but I agree that you should put her to bed in her bed and then decide if you want to lay down with her also.

[Babymakes3]

DS co-slept with us (or me since hubby moved to the couch for a decent nights sleep) for almost 10 months. I tried everything trying to move him but it wasn't working. Then we had our master bathroom remodeled. My mom has a beanbag thing that folds flat on the floor for a bed so we borrowed that and that is where DS and I slept for about 2 weeks. Probably a shorter period would work too but after that it's like he was used to sleeping in his room and we didn't have any problems!

[MamaSnoo]

I do not have a solution for you, but wanted to say :hug: and BTDT. DD is about that age, and just this week, it was like a light went off. She suddenly likes her own bed, says "night night" to me, and I leave her in there awake. She does not cry, she falls asleep. This would have been unheard of, unfathomable, and downright insane to ponder a month ago. For her, it co-incided with wanting to do things "by the self." We also did a sticker chart, and this a.m. she earned a Schliech elephant. She is thrilled, and just beams when we talk to her grandparents about how well she is sleeping "all by the self."

We had major sleep problems before this. She always slept literally clinging to me or DH, usually with an arm up the sleeve of my shirt. DH or I was going to bed with her every night at 8 pm. It did not make for much personal or couple time. I did not post too much about it here because nothing worked for us.

I am sorry that you guys are going through this frustration, and I am hoping that your DC will just flip the switch like mine did (and soon!)....