Aaaah not another night.....

Just keep putting him back, man I forget about that part of teaching a kid to sleep <sigh>

So basically do the big night night scene, put him to bed & walk out. If he follows you, pick him up & take him back to bed & say it's bed time, sleep time or something like that & then walk out. Again if he follows you, pick him up & put him back but from there on in, no speaking or eye contact. Don't give in as eventually they do twig & fall asleep. Try & keep the whole thing calm so they don't melt down otherwise you might end up doing the sitting in the room slowly inching away scenario.

I have no experience with toddlers but I've watched super nanny and she ALWAYS has the parents doing exactly what AandCsmum described - no talking, no negotiation - and no relenting!

You only really need to explain once that it's bed time, then just quietly lead him back to his big boys bed. I wouldn't explain every time, you're probably just wasting your time! It might do to have a chat with him tonight before you start, explain that big boys go to sleep in the big boys bed and they have to sleep all night in there.

Warning: on super nanny (which are granted, extreme cases) this process can sometimes take hours - but once they get it, they seem to get it really well and it was worth the hours on the first night.

Good luck - and keep persevering!

Oh poo...I'm crap at this....I tried the putting him back over and over again but he is quick and I can't even let go of him before he turns around to follow. Ended up doing the inching away slowly option, which has been working.

He has had a cold on and off for a couple of weeks so now I'm thinking he is being clingy coz he has been feeling off colour.

kebakat you have a point, maybe we should just bite the bullet and get a proper bed.

I tried the outting Jack back in bed repeatedly thing and it just made things worse, he got really insecure and it was horrible although that is really his personality I think. In the end we have decided to sit with him as it is the easiest for everyone, most days he doesn't have a nap and is asleep in 5mins, if he has a nap it is about 30mins. At first he could see the door from his bed so I would sit in the hall and fold the washing or read so I didn't feel like it was wasting my time. Now that I have moved the bed we sit by the door, or rather DH lies on the floor and goes to sleep!

You could try moving closer to the door over a few days or weeks (whatever works best) and then eventually out the door. Good luck

ETA: what we also found that helped was that Jack used to listen to stories on CD while going to sleep (Pooh, Cars, Nemo) and it gave him something to concentrate on and relaxed him

Edited by Linzy

The jack in the bed method is not working.

So we are now trying the sitting on the chair , not saying a word and he eventually goes to sleep.

Last night he got out of bed 4 times! So he gets trotted back and we sit.

I think we will keep trying that for a few nights and see what happens but if we put him in bed and then leave, put him back, it just is so much worse. Seemed to work well tonight.

Last night he was up 4 times. I woke up and he was standing beside me, gave me a heart attack!

Thinking of getting the Diane Levy book, Of course I love you, now go to your room.

Anyone read it?

The Diane Levy book is awesome. Well worth reading. It's one of the few children's behaviour books I read.

I'm having a the same problem with my DD getting out of her bed but for us its anytime from 2-4 in the morning, she just suddenly appears beside the bed!! I caved once and let her in our bed and it has been the worst thing, now she's trying to get into ours pretty much every night...

I did have trouble keeping her in her bed at bedtime too, but just kept putting her back in and speaking very sternly and that problem seems to have gone away...

The main issue in the middle of the night is that she thinks she's had enough sleep!!!! Any suggestions?? I've tried putting her back in, she's super determined though.. Was thinking maybe I could put her portacot back up and warn her before bedtime that she'll have to go into the 'baby bed' if she gets up????

Yep pikelets I have tried it - put the cot up and warned her when I put her into bed that if she comes through in the middle of the night thats where she'll end up... I had to put her in there one night and since then she has been waiting itl 6-6.30... This morning she woke at 3 am, like you, I think she was cold and I actually think the 6am thing may be cause she is a bit cold too (and her nappy also starts to get very wet by then which doesn't help)... My plan now is to get bigger nappies (cause she's not really ready to TT for the night yet) and heat her room up better and stick more blankets on her bed before I go to sleep at night... Hopefully that will work

How long does it take for him to go to sleep if you sit with him? If it's less than 30 minutes is there really a point to making a battle about it?

We've done the sitting thing, the yo-yo thing with DS2 (and just the yo-yo thing with DS1 for 3.5 years) and I'd rather sit for 20 minutes till he falls asleep than be putting him back to bed for hours. In fact when we do this, they stopped needing anyone to sit with them after a while and even if they woke in the night and came looking for us you could pop them back in bed, kiss them and head back to bed ourself.

For us it meant a calm, stress free way of dealing with bedtime for everyone involved.