3 year old can't sleep by herself
eir...@ibisnet.net
Ok, so I put my 3 year old girl to bed in her own bed and around 1 or 2 in the
morning I wake to find her either in bed with me or walking through my bedroom
door to get in bed with me. Fortunately for her I'm a single mommy, but
unfortunately for me I don't get as much sleep as I used to because she talks
in her sleep - and talks loudly. What should I do? I can't imagine locking my
door. Wouldn't that frighten her?
Help...
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T
Dear Ann,
I'm a singleparentdad (sole custody) and have been raising my daughter myself
since she was 2. She's 5 now and still on occasion show's up at 1am ect..,
I've learned that hey, its my job to see that she's happy and gets good sleep.
And I'm a much happyer person when I've had my own 8hrs also. I can
autopilot pat her on the back till were both in slumberland and that's life.
Tom
Kirsten
My son, 3, only started sleeping through the night at about 3 years.
We would find him coming through our bedroom door and climbing into
bed with us every night until then, and even now sometimes. When our
second son was born, we wanted to put an end to it, so we put a baby
gate up at his doorway (the kind that swings open and close). So when
we put him to bed at night, we close the baby gate. This way if he
wakes up at night, it's not as scary as a closed door might be, and we
can hear and respond to him from our bedroom.
Mml
i am also a single parent , and for now have basically given up and let him
sleep with me, he is 1 1/2 now.. and just started this about 2 months ago..
if you guys figure it out, please let me know!!
Mml
janelaw
Before I even open my mouth, I know I am going to get a lot of
abuse for this. I let my daughter sleep with us until she was
three. When we needed some privacy, her father just carried her
sleeping into her room.
After that, she fell asleep watching The Wizard of Oz every
night for two straight years. I worried sometimes that as an
adult she would be unable to fall asleep WITHOUT the movie.
Eventually she just got tired of it, though. She started
reading herself to sleep sometime in the first grade. She is
ten now. She just goes into her room at 8:00 and reads until
she falls asleep.
I know the current conventional wisdom is that you have to be
firm and make them sleep in their rooms and all that. My
experience is that kids go through different phases and you have
to be flexible not rigid. Maybe your son just realized that you
don't automatically fall asleep when he does and that he is
missing out on some of your time. You probably desperately need
a little time without him at the end of the day.
Maybe if you compromise. Let him fall asleep in your bed while
you are in the living room. Or let him leave the door open as
long as he stays in the room. Or let him have a radio. Or do
what I did and just put a vcr in his room and let barney sing
him to sleep.