Need sleep help!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-10-2004
Need sleep help!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
1
Fri, 08-10-2007 - 10:44pm

Tony, 27 mos, has been having trouble falling asleep for a while now.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 10-03-2004
Fri, 08-10-2007 - 11:19pm

Hi Ginny,

and I am so sorry to hear you are having these problems, it is so hard not to be getting enough sleep.

We co-slept with Malcolm from birth, but ours was a family bed on purpose and at the time we started we had no idea even what sensory issues were or that by age 3 we would know that he definitely had them. Sleeping together meant that he snuggled up to us and allowed our calmness to help him calm down and go right to sleep almost every night. I know there are schools of thoughts that this is bad for children somehow, but I don't myself buy them.

He moved to a mattress on the floor when he was almost 4 and just getting too big for our king-sized bed. Some nights he would come up awhile when he couldn't relax and then when he fell asleep, we would roll him back down!

By 6 and change he was in his own room and bed and he hasn't come back. And as he got bigger, we started giving him melatonin on the nights he had trouble dropping off, now that the stress is his life is REALLY low, he doesn't need that at all...

There are other good ways of helping relaxation, building a bedtime ritual repeated at same time and order every night -- such as warm bath every evening, walking around the house and turning off all the lights one by one while saying goodnight to each room, teeth, massage and rocking, read stories and snuggling, having favorite animal to sleep with, lullabies, blacking out the room so there is no light helps some kids, white noise machines.

This day with the long nap is just a little slip-up, you can't expect he will go down on time tonight. But go right back to what you were doing tomorrow and then tweak. The sleeping thing is always a work-in-progress, yes? But don't despair, you will figure this out and all learn together.

yours,

Sara