I personally do not like the co-sleeping idea. My daughter moves too much and wakes me up and then of course the intimacy thing. Unforunatly my four year old doesn't like sleeping on her own. Part of it is my fault. I always rocked her to sleep when she was a baby and as she got older she would go to sleep with one of us either on the bed or sofa and then we would carry her to her own bed. She basically never learned to fall alseep on her own in her own bed. We've talked to her lately that she's a big girl and needs to sleep in her bed. She just tells us she's not a big girl and likes mommies bed better. She still wakes up almost every night and walks over to our bed. It's like she needs to have someone next to her. If she sleeps with us she doesn't wake up. Any tips to stop this habit?
I am currently reading The No-Cry Sleep for Toddlers and Preschoolers for my 1 year old. So, I am in a different boat than you, but I think the information would work for you. Here is an excerpt that deals with your situation. The Link
I used to baby sit a boy who had to sleep with his parents when he was 6. I know it was a pain to the parents but he would throw a fit about going into his own bed.
Keep sending her back to her own bed not matter how painful. If there are some issues wither her sleeping arrangements, you may want to address them. Night light, no night lite, bed arrangement? At some point after she is used to it, the occasional 'I had a bad dream' excuse is allowable. Just my opinion. We fought this more around the 2-3 year old range.
You should have corrected this earlier, it will be more difficult now. At first you may want to let her get to sleep in your bed, then move her to her own bed. So she gets used to waking up in that bed. But at some point after that she has to start going to sleep there.
I teach four year olds so I might have some insight into the 4 year old mind. I have never been a parent though. I would sit her down with all family members and have a "big girl talk". I would start off very positive and talk about how big she is getting and all the things that she has recently learned how to do. I would have her talk about all the cool things big girls get to do. Then I would add that big girls sleep in their own bed. I would add a privilege that will go along with her sleeping in her own bed. Then comes the hard part. Tuck her in with a story and a kiss and say goodnight. Everytime that she comes into your room you have to drag her *** back. If you have to stay up all night then you have to stay up all night. If you even give in once it will be that much worse in the future because she will think that she has a chance if she is persistent enough. If she cries and yells in her room dont worry about it. Tears never hurt anybody. I would bet that she will be fine within a week.
You must crush their spirt and outlast them in a battle of wills and sleep deprivation! Be HONEST and tell her she is hurting your sleep, and that she is a big girl. I also suggest getting her into bed a bit earlier and letting her read, or look at a book for a period of time BEFORE you would like her to nod off. Then go in give her the kiss and tuck and that's that. She comes to your room, you walk her back to hers, and you MUST win the first time as stated. Failure to stick to your guns once you decide this (or future) behavorial changes are necessary and all your future battles will be more difficult. Or.... you can just give her a little Benedryl decongestant and she will likely wake up in hrer own bed..
We've had the Big Girl talk and what big girls can do and can't do and isn't it better being a big girl. At the end of the conversation she agrees to sleep in her bed but then freaks out when the time actually comes. She cries out bloody murder. We take her to her bed every night after she's asleep but she just wakes up in the middle of the night and comes back to our bed. I know we have to stick to our guns because we can't let her make the rules and believe me if we let her she will.
Our youngest is about to turn 4, and he ends up in our bed almost every night. He's pretty sneaky -- we often don't even know he's there until the alarm goes off. This has gone way beyond "getting old". He's starting to show some progress in a few other key developmental areas, so I'm hoping this will end soon, too, but I'm about to start laying down the law and dragging his *** back to bed. Easier said than done, though.
Enjoy it. They grow up so fast that they won't need you at all before you know it. You'll come to miss it. I promise.
I'm a child psychologist, so here's a tip that I talk with parents about regularly. Set up some kind of reward system. It can be simple, like earning stickers for getting in her own bed, staying in her own bed all night, etc. Sometimes those stickers are incentive enough for 4 y.o. girls. You can call them bravery stickers or big girl stickers, and she should be involved in helping put the stickers on the chart every morning when she does well. As she progresses, she has to do more to earn a sticker. So at first she could earn a sticker for just getting in bed and staying there for a certain amount of time, but later it might take her sleeping in her bed the entire night without coming to your room to earn a sticker. As she masters each level, it will seem natural to progress to the next as you see fit. If the stickers aren't incentive enough, you can make a certain number of stickers earn a "special reward." This does not have to be something tangible - it can mean 30 minutes of play time just with mom or dad, getting to watch a special tv show or movie, going out for ice cream, etc. So, if she has 5 good nights in a week where she earns stickers, then she can earn this special reward. Obviously this is an internet BBS, and I'm not yet licensed, so you can take it for what it's worth. But i thought it might be helpful.
One time I locked the door for a, well, let's call it a "special occasion". At the most inopportune time, our young lad wandered down, tried to get in, and then sat outside our door and wept. And wept. And wept. It kinda ruined the moment.
We weaned our kids by making a pallet of blankets and pillows on the floor next to our bed. They took right to that and then the next step was a pallet in their own room or a nest on the couch in the room adjacent to ours, and finally into their own bed. Worked for all three of our kids, but the one drawback is the young ones (now 7 and almost 9) sometimes still want to crash on the floor. But that's cool. It's not in our bedroom.
I don't have kids but my ex girlfriend had a three yr old. She had let him sleep with her before we started dating so it was a pain in the *** trying to get him to stop. It was almost like she didnt mind he was there. I say, and I dont have kids, but why let them sleep with you in the first place? ever? I never slept with my parents, ever.
i am single (at least by living arrangement) and have been for several years. my daughter is 11. she always wanted to sleep with her dad. she felt safe. she would always sleep with me in my bed when she came over for the weekend... until she was about 7 or 8. while she is older now, sometimes she will still come in and go to sleep in my bed with me. i don't see any kind of problem. my daughter and i are real close.
I like sex. No kids in the bed. I am the kind of guy that lets his girlfriend and future wife (yet to be named) get their way with pretty much everything they want. Decor of the house, where are we going out to eat, etc. I pick my battles when they are really important to me. No kids in the bed policy will not be negotiable.
our oldest son is almost 3 and he goes down easy but comes to our bed at 6:30am or so and we love it. in a year or so we'll have to change it but right now we're just enjoying it. just doesn't seem like a big deal, but it really isn't co-sleeping, its co-waking up.
My son is 17 yrs old, and I will sometimes crawl into bed with him in the morning to talk, and vice versa. We don't snuggle up, but I love those morning chats. If he gets sick, reallllly sick, he asks me to come lay in the room because he thinks he may choke to death when he has to throw up. I dont care how people react to that. We had to do the pallet thing too, but it didn't take long for my kids to realize, their bed was much more comfy than the floor.
