sleep 'training'

While we were in Queensland with family, Atti had to sleep in a single bed. Nana got a great bedrail, and we set him up in his own room, in a bed.

He wasn't very happy about it - he rather liked his cot. But didn't have much of a problem sleeping in there, and only fell out once. And of course, he could get out of bed whenever he wanted.

Thus began the bedtime dance. He would get up and come out of his room, some nights upwards of 20 times. And I would put him back in bed over and over. I know you aren't supposed to say anything to them, but this is not my forte, and so about every 5 times or so, I would growl 'get back to bed' or whatever.

It was pretty interesting seeing him do this. He clearly put a bit of thought into it. Sometimes he would open the door and rush out and cling to me, sometimes he would open the door and back into the room wriggling around on the floor escaping my clutches. Sometimes he would open the door and then run back to bed. Or have thought and prepared a 'line'. Need a drink, a wee, a teddy, sore finger, whatever.

Sometimes he would turn on the lights in his room. I would unplug the lamp before leaving the bedroom, and keep an eye out of him turning on the main overhead light.

He tended to fall asleep, (I think) while plotting his next reason for getting out of bed.

I got a bit sick of it at times, and one night I went and sat in the other lounge in the dark, and watched what he did if he got up and couldn't come and get me. I assumed he would go and open the door to his grandparents' room, as the tv was clearly on in there. But he actually roamed around in the dark, looking for me. He went and looked out the front and back doors, and wandered all over. I was beginning to think he might just go back to bed, when my Mum got up and came out to the kitchen to make a cup of tea, and just about had a heart attach when a little body walked up to her in the dark and said 'Nana, I can't find Mummy'.

He would get up after I had thought he was asleep sometimes, and because of the white noise we use in his room, you could hear him coming, which was a bit handy.

At the very end, I was totally sick of fighting about bedtime, and on one of the last nights I just didn't.  I was fed up with it, and put myself to bed and then I pretty much pretended I couldn't see him when he came into my room. Eventually he did actually put himself to bed, even if it was at like 10pm.

Now we are home, and while we were away the Wook sorted out a single bed (with trundle*) for him. He was a bit horrified that his cot was gone, but once he saw the trundle, and I said that he could jump on the bed (another post) he was happy enough. And we have a lot less hassle about staying in bed now either. We bumped his bedtime back to 8, because if he goes to bed at 7 we just spend an hour putting him back in there. If he seems tired we put him down earlier, but btw 7.30-8 works these days. Here the door handles are too high for him to let himself out, so he is always begging us to leave the door open when it is time to sleep. He gets one chance to have an open door, and if he gets up, the door is closed. About half the time he doesn't come out.

The biggest sad about the whole thing is that he still wakes up stupidly early, so we don't often get a sleep in. I think my neighbour starting his car outside our bedroom windows at 5.30am each morning might have something to do with that, but he is usually awake before 6am. Not every morning, we had a nearly 7am wake up the other day, it was brilliant!

So that is the deal with beds and sleep around here at the moment. And Atti put himself down for a nap last week, which was a bit of a bonus!

*We mostly chose a trundle because Atti is such a tosser and turner in bed. Rather than a bedrail, we just pull out the trundle at night, and if he rolls off the bed at night the lower bed catches him. So far he has mainly slept fine, not rolling off.