My 22 month old son has been waking frequently in the night for the past 2 months. This is the first time he has had trouble with sleep. I do put him to bed awake and he falls asleep on his own very well. It usually occurs about 1 hour after he falls asleep and then several times around 4:00- until he wakes around 6:30. On a difficult night it has been every 20 minutes. He will wake up crying, but will stop when my husband or I walk in the room, pat his back and give a little "shh". We have gone through the regular options. He does share a room with his older brother and I know that brings him great comfort, but when he crys my 3 year old starts crying. It starts an endless cycle of tears I am wondering if there is something I am missing. Any ideas or suggestions to help our little one would be great.
Does he already have his 2 year molars? I know that those can be very painful, and can take a while to come in. Try giving him tylenol before bed if this could be the problem and see if it helps. Also, if something did happen initially to upset him 2 months ago he could be in a habit of waking up. That happened to my daughter. But try the tylenol, see if it works!
Read Night Time Parenting by Dr Sears or go to his Web site askdrsears.com, both are very helpful. Keeping him close would give everyone more sleep, which is the bottom line. Can you move his crib mattress to your room? We did well with our kids in our room and now that they are older have made easy transitions to their own beds. We do however have weekend slumber parties where they get to have sleeping bags in our room.
Hang in there! This will pass.
The day (or nights in this case) are long, but the years are short. It won't be long when you will be wondering where the time went.
Enjoy your kids!
Good luck,
J.
Maybe try some soothing music or white noise on repeat in their room? Maybe outside or inside sounds in the house are waking him up at those times. Our 2 year old still has a Fisher-price Aquarium, and it lights up and plays music or water sounds for about 20 minutes if she pushes the button on the front, so it is soothing and gives her a little bit of a nightlight. Usually when she wakes, I will hear that come on, and usually she will be back asleep before he music even stops....maybe try one of those for him, it won't be too loud or disturbing for the bigger brother, either. We are definitely buying another one for our next baby, so we don't have to take away the older girl's.
Good Luck!
Jessie
When my kids do this, they are usually in uncomfortable (ear infection, sore throat, growing pains, teething, in need of a potty run/diaper change, too cold or hot) or hungry.
Most nights, we give our 2-year-old a bedtime snack of oatmeal and that takes care of it.
If he wakes up around 4 am, a diaper change and a drink of milk usually does the trick and takes the edge off his hunger.
If in doubt, we give him Motrin.
Sara,
If you are putting him to bed already asleep, that could be part of the problem. They get scared when they realize they are in a different room and you aren't with them. My daughters are 4 and 2 1/2. They started sleeping in the same room almost a year ago and it was difficlut. I understand not letting the younger one cry it out because you are afraid to wake the older one. I went through it too for a little while with the younger one. One night I was just fed up and tired and just kept laying her back down, not saying a word. I would let her cry longer each time and to my surprise, the older one didn't budge!! That helped a lot knowing that she wasn't bothered by her sister's crying. It also helps that she already knew the routine. Once in bed, your in bed until good morning! Good luck.
Hi Sara,
I just answered another Mom on this same subject about ten minutes ago. Sounds like you put your little guy to bed asleep.? When children are put to bed asleep they tend to not sleep as well. Plus, if you put them to bed awake they learn to put themselves back to sleep if they do wake-up, which is wonderful.
C.
Is your son by any chance teething, or could he have an ear infection? Any "head" pain can get worse when you lay down.
If you think it's teething, try a dose of Tylenol before bed. My son also had great results with Hyland's Teething Tablets.
And Hyland's also makes Calmes Forte, which is a homeopathic remedy to help kids relax for bedtime. You can get it at Whole Foods, and most co-ops should carry it.
Consider running a fan in his room for white noise. (We run one in our son's room. It's just a little tabletop fan, and we have it turned so it's blowing against the wall).
Also, make sure the room isn't too hot, especially if your little guy is wearing "feetie pajamas".
Lastly, consider visiting a chiropractor. My babysitter's daughter was a restless sleeper until she had chiropractic care.
Good luck!
Maybe he is waking up cold. Try to give him another blanket to see if that helps. If my kids are cold they sleep horribly.
