[Tessied]

My son is 2 in a fortnight and has always been a crappy sleeper. Until he was about 17 months he would self settle initially and I had no issues with him GOING to sleep, it was just the night wakings. Then he got sick and since then has refused to go to sleep by himself.

I initially tried camping out in his room and the first few nights he took about 1.5 hours of crying to calm down and sleep....which improved to no crying but it was still an hour or more for me to wait in there. I finally gave up after no improvement and let him sleep in a Queen bed we have, laid next to him, and he'd fall asleep quickly. I didn't mind because he was asleep in 30 minutes or under and wasn't mucking around.

Then this changed and he began taking one to two hours to fall asleep! This was seriously doing my head in as my whole evening was wasted, yet he would still wake up later anyway. However I would say night sleeping was better at this point, he'd often sleep until about 5.30am, have a feed and sleep more, so that was great.

So I cut his nap out, and he began falling asleep in 5-10 minutes at 7pm, it was great. He coped reasonably well without a nap, but he did seem pretty tired and it was a struggle to keep him awake if he got in the car. Even a 2 minute power nap would mean he was back to an hour to get him to sleep.

But the last few nights with no nap, he's back to taking 40 minutes or so to fall asleep and he hasn't done a sleep through the night for a while. He seems now fall asleep at 7.45ish, wake at 11.30/12 either for water or to see me but then falls back quite quickly, and then wakes again at 3.30ish for milk, and then back to 7, so it's still quite disruptive.

Do you think maybe he's NOT ready to drop the nap and the overtiredness is now catching up and that's why he's taking longer again? I just don't know what to do with his routine anymore and I'm so sick of the sleep hassles!

[LittleM]

hi!

my ds was 2 at the beginning of december and he has been a shocking sleeper. a disgrace as his sister was perfect (there is every chance ill hold it against him forever ;P lol) and its been a real challenge to work it out.

we have given up stressing about sleep. if he naps during the day, then he naps....and if he doesnt then i try not to worry about it and i make sure dinner and bath is done at a reasonable time so he will actually eat and not be cranky. i do find it hard sometimes as its a long day if he doesnt nap but i will often break the day up with a trip to the shops in the afternoon (for an iced coffee because i NEED it!) or somewhere to stop him getting antsy.

we still lay with him at night time and it can take from 5 mins to an hour or so. and i cant work out what it is that is making him take so long. he is in a bed now..partly because we were sick of getting numb arms whilst draping them over the side of the cot for so long!lol

im not a great lot of help im afraid but if its any comfort to u, im in a similar boat lol!

good luck

[Tessied]

lol, I moved mine to a bed as it was more comfortable than me sitting next to a cot!

He's back to only taking 5 minutes to sleep, but today he is having a nap so we'll see what happens at night!

[LittleM]

oh good stuff lol

ohhhh how did he go??