Toddler Sleep

I’ve got a couple problems I’m hoping for some advice on. 1. My 3y/o son has been going to sleep later and later (think 9:30/9:45) and still waking up at 6. I am starting to spiral into despair as night time was my time and now I’m getting 30 min of that before it’s time for me to go to sleep. He does nap from 2-3:30 ish which I’d rather not drop because otherwise he’s feral by 4:00. We start bedtime routine at 7:30 so he’s in bed by 8/8:15. He needs me to stay in his room til he falls asleep otherwise he will bang on the door and yell and wake up my daughter. It takes over an hour for him to get to sleep now. So drop nap? Move up bedtime? Move up nap? I tried to convince my SAHD husband he needed to move his nap up but he basically said it was impossible. Suck it up? Thoughts on how to have him not need me in his room? (It’s 9:41 and he’s still awake and I’m close to tears because now my time with my husband is down to 15 min if I want to get enough sleep.) 2. My 22 month old daughter is also going to bed at 9:30??? She will barely nap so I’m thinking she’s overtired? But she only naps for like 45 min to an hour most days. She’s been on one nap for a few months I think. My husband puts her to bed while I put the 3 year old to bed. I imagined more family time before bed with reading to both kids and I’m upset with this unideal situation. So same questions other than dropping the nap since she’s so young. 3. Same daughter wakes up and needs me to then cosleep with her the remainder of the night. She starts off in her crib which is open and up against a queen bed in her own bedroom. When she wakes up she cries and calls for me. If I leave too soon she wakes up and if I try to wait I end up falling asleep myself. We want to break this habit but I’m not sure how. Just looking for some thoughts on that. Thank you and please be kind as my mental state is rather fragile at the moment.

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Hey! Have you heard of taking Cara babies? She is a baby sleep consultant, and she has a blog that has schedules for different ages, and it is really helpful. She even talks about different reason that they might be waking up and so on and how to fix it. It is really helpful.

@Christina I have but only blog posts that pop up on a specific Google search. I’ll have to explore more. Thank you!

Have you pretended to fall asleep to fool her into sleeping sooner? Also try waking your son up from his nap ten minutes earlier each day? If you can start bedtime routine 10 minutes earlier, you can fit in a storytime. What about a light projector or light up toy animal for sleep to replace you to fall asleep? My older kids are not good sleepers. I can get by without, but a melatonin gummy at the same time every night is saving my sanity and not hurting them at all. Highly recommend you ask your pediatrician about it if it feels right for you. Just like the newborn stage, this stage is temporary. You sound like an excellent mama. Try to relax and fit in some self care. Take a day off if you can.

First, hugs to you. I know this is a lot. We went through a similar issue with my son when he was 3 and it felt so discouraging. I do think your 3 year old’s nap is too late. The nap is wiping out his sleep drive, which makes it hard to sleep at night. Moving the nap earlier should help. Many kids drop their nap altogether sometime between 3-4 years. If you move earlier and it’s still not helping w/bedtime, that could be a sign it’s time to drop it. I also agree your 22m old is probably overtired. W/O having more details, it’s hard for me to give advice. Wake windows at this age are 4.5-6.5hrs-ish, so try offering her a nap on the earlier side of the wake window and see if that helps. I help families transition from supporting to sleep/co-sleeping to establishing a sustainable sleep routine with more time for you. Message me here or on Instagram if you would like to learn more. My IG is @ConnectedHeartsSleep

@Ali yes, and I end up actually falling asleep 😬😂. Yesterday he woke me up by rubbing his stuffed animal’s tail in my face. He doesn’t really care what I do, just that I’m there! I’ll try the 10 min each day thing! We do have story time just not all together since they’re both so needy. Maybe when we put them in the same room we can start that? I can’t foresee that though!! We can try the light stuffy! He has a projector and we’ve given him a tap light, Spidey night light, and even a headlamp before. He used to be really scared to be in his room alone and is just starting to be comfortable going to play by himself so maybe he will be more comfortable with me leaving soon? Thank you for your advice!

@Ashley thank you! I’m only home for nap time on the weekends and my husband in a SAHD. I’ll have to have another discussion with him about moving up naps. He thought it would be too hard since he has to stay in the room with each of them until they’re asleep (now that I think about it I’m not really sure how time affects that tho!) and he also just didn’t think it would help. I’ll try again! My 22 month old is very difficult to get to sleep. She got really sick when she was about 5 months old and I started cosleeping with her. She needs constant skin to skin contact, like my hand on her face or our hands grasped. Right now she’s 6:00 WT, nap 1:00-2:00 if that, and anywhere from 8-9:30 falls asleep. If we move the nap earlier would you recommend a cat nap later? If she would sleep 2 hours I guess we wouldn’t need that as 12-2 would be 6 hour wake times on either end? Maybe an earlier nap would solve her short nap problem anyway? Thanks, I will message you!!

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