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Pre-School and Daycare
mavs_girl07
member
3.5yr old and night wakings
mavs_girl07
member
DD is absolutely driving.me.nuts. She's always been an awesome sleeper, but the last 2 weeks she wakes up screaming multiple times, every single night. At first it seemed like she really was scared of something. She was screaming, there were tears, she told me she "heard something" and wanted to sleep in our bed. (I didn't let her) Ever since then she wakes up at least 2-3 times a night. The last week she screams and cries "Mommy!!" and when I go in there she seems really upset and crying. But when I ask what's wrong, it's something ridiculous like "I can't find my panda" or "I want my night-light brighter". One night I told her I was not coming in there anymore. 15mins later she began crying "Mommy, I need to tell you something!!!" After several minutes of this, I felt bad so I went in and she said "Mommy, see my stuffed animals are in my bed and they're keeping me company. I have my panda, and my rabbit, and my pony, and my..." I almost lost it. Are you kidding me? It's 3am! Go to sleep! I feel like her night wakings started out with her actually being scared, but now it's evolved into some sort of routine. She wakes up in the middle of the night and instead of rolling over and going back to sleep she comes up with some excuse to get me in there.
I make my visits as quick as possible. I don't even go in the room anymore, just peek my head in and ask what's wrong. No coddling, no back rubbing, nothing to make her want to do it more. I don't get why she keeps doing this, and I don't know what to do to make it stop. We've tried just letting her go and not responding, but then she gets extremely worked up and loud to the point of waking up DS. We've tried a reward system, and told her if she slept all night like a big girl without waking up and calling Mommy or Daddy in, then she'd get a surprise. She still woke up, but in the morning pitched a fit when she didn't get the surprise because "I slept all night! I didn't wake up!!" Um, yes you did...3 times actually. It's driving me up the wall, and I'm completely exhausted. Any ideas or tips?
ETA: We had an awful night last night. She was up from midnight until almost 4am. She came into our room multiple times crying, saying she was scared. I just don't know what to do anymore. I'm so tired, and I know she must be too! She missed out on 4hrs of sleep, and was still up at 6:30am! She has her loveys, she has TWO nightlights, a sound machine...
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Re: 3.5yr old and night wakings
Sorry that you are dealing with this! Maybe she got really scared one night and is now dealing with new fears? I know that at this age, since their imaginations are becoming so much more vivid, fears and bad dreams can increase.
I always refer to the book The Sleep Easy Solution. It has strategies for dealing with sleep issues at every age/stage of childhood. I would give it a try.
GL! I know it sucks but I am sure it is just a phase!
Ya know, I have this book on my kindle and totally forgot it had info on older kids! If I recall correctly, I think it even goes into how to deal with nighttime fears. Waiting on my kindle to charge up now, so I can go back and re-read that section. Thanks!