I feel like we have a newborn at home. We’re readjusting our schedules, totally clueless to what we should be doing, constantly trying out new scenarios, sleep is interrupted and I find myself being really grumpy and short during the day.
Why? Because Maddie is officially in her toddler bed now.
Up until this point (well, at least since colic) we’ve been totally spoiled by her sleeping habits. She would wake up at 7:30, take a 1 hour nap at 9 with her brother, take another nap at 1pm, again with her brother and then be out for the night at 6:30! Sure she is non stop when she’s awake, I love that about her, and the blissful sleep schedule the two of them shared helped me to keep up.
Now, there’s no stopping her. I try to keep her awake as long as my nerves can take it. I finally put her in her bed, her eyes red, she’s visibly exhausted and……for two hours we struggle. Each. Single. Attempt. At. Sleep. we fight. I hate it. I find her throwing things into her brothers crib, climbing on top of the dresser and dumping out all of the contents, emptying out her ENTIRE closet, jumping on her bed, crawling into bed with Christian and keeping him awake….and those are just some of the highlights.
We’ve tried positive reinforcement, we’ve tried spanking, we’ve tried laying down with her, we’ve tried casting demons out of her (just kidding). NOTHING IS WORKING!!!!! It’s been about 3 weeks now and I’m spent. Right now I’m sure she’s climbing into bed with Christian and teasing him my taking away his tiger. I’m so tired of disciplining her I’m going to pretend like I don’t hear it. Bad mommy.
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It takes me 2 hours to put Carter to sleep at night. I feel your pain in the battle.
We got seriously spoiled with Little man because he treated the toddler bed just as a crib and never got out. Can you go back to the crib and try again in a month or two? Oh, but wait, she was crawling out of her crib wasn’t she, I forgot.
I guess if spanking or positive reinforcement isn’t working I would try taking away privilages or toys??????? The supernanny approach is the first time the child get’s out firmly tell them it’s bedtime and they are not to get out of their bed and replace them, the second time they get out tell them it’s bedtime and replace them, every time after that replace them without saying a word. Keep replacing them everytime they get out and supposedly after a couple days they stop getting out. It always works on TV, I guess it’s worth a shot.
Ooooh, that definitely sounds challenging! I am not looking forward to that phase. I’m sure it will be very similar!
I’m SO jealous of the 13 hours at night. I can’t ever get Shea to sleep more than 12 in a 24 hour period. Fingers crossed that the next one is a sleeper.
As you know, we’ve very recently moved Lila to a toddler bed as well. We’re having no problems at night, but she is not napping at all. I saw that Amanda mentioned the Super Nanny technique, which is what I’m about to resort to for nap time. It is so time consuming…I’ll have to make sure I’m having a calm day when I attempt that. Good luck!
Oh how I remember the days of toddler bed “training”.
It did go smoother than your issues, admittedly and I apologize for saying that, but we did struggle many a night. Mostly with them just not staying in their bed. But they each had their own rooms.
I wish I had advice, but I don’t. Different things work for different kids.