Banshee part 2
Another night of howling and wailing. Fortunately this time she actually slept when she came into bed with us around 3.30am. But tonight we go cold turkey. After checking on her after the first outburst to make sure she isn’t feverish or tangled or genuinely distressed we are going to just let her cry and moan and shout out “Mumoo! Up UP UP!”. I know it will be hard and horrible to do but right now she is getting plenty of positive reinforcement for her half hourly outbreaks. She can be in a huge sobbing fit and when I finally say, in a moment of total despair, “Do you want to come in to Mummy and Daddy’s bed?” she stops immediately and cheerfully says “YES!” and to make it even worse, as she cuddles down between us she gives out an evil, victorious chuckle. So no more! We will see who will break first.
Hang in there. My son always slept in his crib and never knew otherwise. Once we moved him into a big boy bed, he would climb into bed with us every night. I didn’t mind it until he started thinking that it was playtime at 3 a.m. That’s when we started putting baby gates up in front of his room. We’ve been back to normal since. I’m not against children sleeping in bed with their parents..I say whatever works.
Stay strong! My daughter is almost three and she has her ways of trying to make me do what she wants. It’s hard, but you have to remember who is in charge and who is the parent.Good luck!
Good luck, Claire. It is heavy going when it gets to this. I’m quite hopeless listening to the carry on; I leap out of bed, wringing my hands, completely beside myself. Oscar is always the voice of calmness and reason. We’re going through it with Harry at the moment, so I’ll think of you at 3 am. 🙂
at some point (much sooner than you think), you children stop wanting to sleep with you. it is a unique luxury; don’t give it up too quickly.
You must not give in to the TODDLER! Fight it, Claire, fight her evil ways!!
Ugh, the evil victorious chuckle! Isn’t it amazing, the control children have over your heartstrings? Good luck with the programme, hope you sleep well.
Have you read/seen the book “The No Cry Sleep Solution”? We are now on night four of our daughter sleeping in her own crib all night (13 months). I didn’t think it would ever happen! Now if the dog would only stop snoring. Good luck.
Oo, good plan- my uncle and aunt have three kids and ALL THREE (the eldest is NINE) still sleep in their king sized bed because they never *trained* them out of the idea.
I’m not a fan of their parenting skills.
Claire, My kids are in their teens now, but I still remember going through similar situations with them. We never let them sleep in our bed on a regular basis, but they didn’t want to sleep through the night in their own beds without night-time visits from me. So, we did do the cold turkey route, finally. We would let them cry for 15 minutes, then go in and check on them…would say to them “You are okay, so go to sleep now.” and then leave. The next time it would be 25 minutes before a check-in, the next time 40 minutes…well, you get my gist. As long as you don’t fuss (“Oh honey, I am soooo sorry!!!” but were matter-of-fact in saying they were okay), they got the idea pretty fast that you weren’t going to break this time. This IS a fight for control, and your little girl is winning, and she knows it. This is NOT a precedent that you want to set with her. Good luck.
we did the controlled crying thing with max when he was about 9 months and never looked back. think – short-term pain for long-term gain!!
Stand firm, Claire! It’s such a hard thing to do, but you’ll be so very glad in the end. In the short term it’s torture, but in the long run it’s a true gift that you give to your child — good sleeping habits are so important for health and well being. Good luck, we’ll send good sleeping vibes your way!
My daughter has never slept with me – for some reason, she never would – but I recently went through a second round of not wanting to go to sleep, after months of thinking I had her trained. What worked for me was to put her little toy radio in the crib with her. When 8 p.m. rolls around, it’s time for bed. If she isn’t quite ready to sleep, she usually plays with her radio for a few minutes until she drifts off.
I’m not sure if this is the best method, but it seems to work.
I feel your pain, we just, and I do mean JUST got our almost three year old to give up the ghost and sleep (blissfully)in his own bed after much gnashing of teeth and banging of heads. For us it’s on to the seven month old who will scream for two hours straight. I am positive if my dear husband could resist the need for sleep, the boy would scream for four hours straight.
Believe me, I FEEL your pain!
Stay tough and harden your heart towards the banshee business at night. It’s worth it in the end for restful nights. And if you give in just once they’ll keep on trying.
Claire, We’re going through the same thing. Jacob will be a year old in a couple of weeks & we’re trying to “train” him to go to sleep on his own, in his own crib. It isn’t easy. But it’s reassuring to hear about others going through it. I’m fairly resolved, but keep worrying if I’m scarring the little guy for life. Anyhow…good luck. I’ll be thinking of you as I’m trying to be tough myself.
I never thought I would be a tough mom, but after seeing my friends struggle with their toddlers I will never do a thing different. I started at 6 months. It was SOOO worth it. Josiah sleeps 12 hours at night and 3 in the afternoon. Plenty of mom and dad time, and time to paint/blog/cook.