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Help re getting out of bed at night
For the past couple of days, Zach will wake up in the middle of the night, crawl out of his bed, and crawl into ours. We put him back in his bed, he comes back into our room. The cycle continues until we just let him stay, he flops around in our bed, and eventually falls asleep. Needless to say, this is getting old fast. Any ideas on how to deal with this? He previously slept fine in his bed, and I can't figure out what is triggering this.
I've been looking and it seems like the Super Nanny TV lady has a method for this, that involves stoically placing the kid back in bed until he finally gives in and stays there (what I have been doing with some tweaks). Do you think that will work if I just don't give in? Any other ideas?
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Re: Help re getting out of bed at night
I would try it as a first line of defense, but it didn't work for us. When DS#1 first climbed out of his crib we moved him to a bed and he immediately started coming out of the room. We tried the Supernanny thing at bedtime and it took about an hour and he went to sleep. I thought we were golden. Repeat for an hour at 10pm. And 2am. Some time later I finally gave up and literally slept in the hall with him. This went on for about 3 nights before I had a nervous breakdown because DH was going OOT for work the next night.
Since we were living in a corporate apt. at the time (just moved back to the US) and it wasn't well childproofed, I was convinced he was going to wander around at night and hurt himself or burn the place down. We put the mattress on the floor and took almost everything out of the room and turned the doorknob around so the lock was on the outside (we also have a video monitor). He yelled for 30 minutes, but then went to sleep. I have no idea if he tried it during the night, but he didn't cry at all. The next night it was 5 minutes of yelling. After a couple of nights I started unlocking it after he was asleep and putting up a gate in the hall. After that I didn't even lock it when I put him to bed. Two years later I am happy to report no problems staying in his room.
I think Zach is a lot older than DS#1 was at the time. How is his receptive language? Do you think you might be able to talk with him about staying in his room until mommy comes in? I would use what we did as a "last resort", but safety is obviously a huge issue. He's been coming straight to your room, but could he get to other parts of the house (bathroom, kitchen, etc.)?
Your experience with SN method is exactly what I am envisioning, esp. b/c the issue is getting up in the middle of the night right now (1 AM).
His receptive language is good in that he understands what we tell him, but he has that toddler thing of disobeying going on as well. Safety-wise, he can get into other bedrooms and the bathroom, but not downstairs, as we have a gate at the top of the stairs.
We have 1940's doors on the house, so we can't easily lock them (they have keyholes and I have no idea where the key is). We might be able to baby gate his room, though. We have a couple in other places in the house, and he cannot open them. Thanks for the idea!