I don't post much here but I read often and enjoy all of your posts. I need some advice, my son who will be 4 at the end of January does not sleep all night. We get maybe 2 nights out of 2 weeks where he will sleep all night long. He very very rarely takes naps and is in bed at night by 9pm. it is always between 2:30 and 3:30 am and he is awake. wide awake. he yells MOOOOMMMM and about makes me jump out of bed lol. i'm not sure what to do, i am at my wits end. i need my sleep too. i have two other kids that i get up with at 6am for school. what would you guys do? i am up and down all night long with him and it is very frustrating. he doesn't usually wake up crying just wakes up and either wants in bed with me, wants a drink, wants cartoons or is just awake. and if he is awake so is everyone else. so i just need some advice. do you think its something i should talk to his doc about or what? thanks for everyones help.

jenny

How does he fall asleep when he does go to sleep? Just curious as I'm a fan of Ferber sleep methods (I was in your shoes) and he correlates how a child falls to sleep with nighttime waking and the ability to fall back to sleep on one's own.

cj/

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I was walking home one night and a guy hammering on a roof called me a paranoid little weirdo. In morse code. -Emo Phillips

When he wakes up in the middle of the night, make it as boring for him as possible and just tuck him back in and go back to bed. Never let him lie with you in the middle of the night, even when he is sick. You could try rewards or a sticker chart too.

Rebecca

I agree with the others. It's usually just back to basics, re-teaching them how to fall asleep, and how to get themselves back to sleep when they wake at night. Quiet bedtime routine, maybe a lullaby CD playing softly. Don't bring him in your bed, or lie in his no matter what. (Hard to stick to when you're delirious, I know!)
Set up a chart for him where he can give himself a sticker for working towards staying in his bed through the night, and absolutely minimum interaction if he gets up in the middle of the night. It can take awhile, but if you stick to your guns, he'll progress.

I feel for you--hope it resolves soon and you get a good sleep!

Is this new behaviour or has he always been like this? I recall mine doing the same thing at around 2. I just told him that it wasn't time to get up and mommy needed to sleep. I'll admit it, he was easy.

at 4 he should be able to understand, "Do not wake me up." My children have a CD player next to their beds and if they wake up in the middle of the night they turn it on. (I will often hear the Wiggles at 3am . When my son was really bad we put the sleeping bag by our bed. I would let him know that if he wakes up he has 2 choices. He can listen to music quietly in his bed, or sleep quietly on the floor next to you, but waking up the family is not an option. We would often wake up with my son on the floor, and not know when he came over. (this stopped after about a month.) You can keep a drink of water by the bed too if that is an issue. I would never do tv, or anything at all fun. If he yells "MOM".. I would yell back "I love you.. see you in the morning!" This is his "normal" sleep pattern now, and you need to change it.

A reward chart may be helpful too.

I feel your pain hon! I have an 11 year old autistic son, who doesn't know what sleep is! But I also have a almost 5 year old and 3 1/2 year old that have had sleep issues off and on....some things that we have tried that have helped, are no music or tv when they go to sleep. If they watch Tv, have it on in another room, and turn it off at least 30 minutes before sleep time.....They should go to sleep in the same atmosphere that the experience when they wake up in the middle of the night so they are comfortable with it. We had the girls pick "protection" blankets to keep them safe, and they have a night light (actually a glade lightshow) I put a lavendar vanilla scent in for calming....don't know if it works, but smells good! The hardest thing for me is when they wake up on the nights that I'm extrememly exhausted, I have to get over the temtation to just climb in bed with them, or have them climb in bed with me. I take them back to their bedroom, I stop at the door and tell them to climb back into bed, tell 'em a quick I love you, and let them know next time I will not be walking them to the bedroom.....We have gone from sleeping through the night for 1 or 2 nights to about 5 or 6, not perfect but I'll take it.....It doesn't help that sometimes when my oldest son wakes up he sometimes wakes them up too.....The sleeping bag is a good idea too.

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"You can never really pay back. You can only pay forward."

Wayne Woodrow “Woody” Hayes

O-H-I-O

thanks for all the replies. he goes to sleep on his own every night. he was up from 2:30 this morning until almost 5 before he finally gave up and i don't know how many trips i made back and forth. he doesn't get tv or anything but maybe a drink of water when he wakes up in the middle of the night. the little stinker just refuses to give up. he sounds like a broken record yelling mom over and over and over. this isn't something he has always done. i tell my husband that he slept better before he was a year old than he does now. at first it started out that we had trouble when he was 2, he had a febrile seizure one night about 3:30am and then he started waking every night about that time. then after about 6 months or so he was back to sleeping a little more regularly. then in may of this year he had another febrile seizure about 4am and then we are back to not sleeping well again. he does have his nights where he sleeps well but not very often. i just worry that this kid is going to start preschool this fall and there is no way after staying up all night that he can function a day at school. he is a very hyper little boy and always on the go and always into something. thanks for all your help. i just needed some advice from other moms and it is nice to hear that i'm not the only one lol.

Any chance you could withhold something from him as punishment?

If he's four, he's old enough to entertain himself in his room, etc. It sounds like he hasn't gotten a clear message from you that you *won't* continue to come appease him. He knows that as long as he keeps on yelling that eventually you'll walk through the door. Exasperated and frustrated, but still, there with him. I think he's gotten used to having you there and like a pacifier, until that need is broken, he'll not go back to sleep of his own accord.

By 'punishment' I don't mean mean and angry punishment... just simple cause and effect stuff that *you'll* know is intended as something of a punishment or rather a means to re-train him. Is there something he really loves to do that you could tell him you will do the next morning if you get enough sleep? For instance, does he like the McDonald's playland? Could you say, "Junior, I was thinking about running errands in the morning and stopping by McDonald's for awhile so you could play. How does that sound? Good? Great! I'll tell you what, Mommy isn't a very good driver when she is sleepy, and when you holler at me in the night I end up very sleepy. If Mommy doesn't get a good nights sleep then we won't be able to go to McDonald's, but if I get a good night of rest, we'll go."

And then be prepared to follow through. If the promise of the fun keeps him from waking you, great! If it doesn't, just go in with him in the night as usual, and be prepared to play the, "Oh, I'm so sad - Mommy is too tired to take you to McDonald's today" card, and don't give in and take him no matter how hard he begs.

Then, I wouldn't present another opportunity like that for another week or so. Even if he said, "Mommy, if I don't wake you up TONIGHT can we go tomorrow?" you should say, "No, honey, I'm sorry - today was the day it was going to work out, and now it's not. Maybe next week." Let the anticipation and the angst build in him just enough that he really, really wants to have the determination to prove to you he should get to go, rather than getting into a frantic "What about tomorrow, mom?" every single night. It looses its power if the 'frantic plea' drives it rather than your calm and collected and measured response.

He'll feel very proud and competent to have mastered it, and you'll feel much better, too!

Ummm...what does his pediatrician say? This may not be something that he actually has control over! There may be some organic/medical issue that needs to be addressed.

It may be something like an anxiety attack(given that a seizure seems to have triggered these episodes) and punishing him or withholding something will NOT help an anxiety attack.

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Mental that one, I'm telling you. ---Ron Weasley, "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets"

i haven't discussed the sleep issues with his ped yet. i haven't been sure of what to do. my other 2 have slept all night since 6 months old so this is all new to me. i have often thought that maybe the seizures have had something to do with his sleep but then again he will go a few nights and sleep fine and then we have issues again, without seizures. so i really don't know. doesn't seem that anxiety wakes him because he doesn't act scared or anything when he wakes up. just is awake and wants everything but to go back to sleep. i'll continue doing what i've been doing which is not giving in to him and maybe buying some earplugs lol j/k and i'll discuss this with the ped at the next appt at the end of jan.
thanks again

I think those scenarios are far less likely than it just being a habit. Doesn't make him a bad kid or anything - it just makes him a kid. They learn what actions will get certain reactions from the parents.

OP, did I misunderstand when I thought you were saying the seizure was a couple of years ago, and that since that time there was a pretty good stretch where his sleeping habits were fine? If so, I wouldn't quickly jump to the conclusion that it has a medical basis. You didn't describe him as freaking out (anxiety-attack-like) but rather that he calls your name repeatedly until you appear, and then he just wants to hang out with you until he's too tired to stay awake. If I mis-understood, I apologize.

If you don't see the ped. for another month or so, I'd try doing something to motivate him to want to get a good night's sleep - or for him to see the power of a well-rested mommy. If you don't run rescue him from his boredom, it won't be nearly as much fun for him to hang out in his room alone, and I bet after a few nights of that, he'll be putting himself back to sleep in no time.

he had a seizure in may 2006 and one in may 2007. i'm leaning towards that this sleep issue is just a bad habit he has acquired not a medical issue however i will mention it when i take him in next month. we are going to start working on this problem tonight when we go to bed, i'm going to try a different approach and see where it gets me. thanks for all your help.
jenny

Ah - I see. Sorry I misuderstood.

The book by Richard Ferber mentioned above is really a great resource. Our now-teen son had night terrors for about a year when he was 2, and boy was that freaky! He also went through several patterns like the one you're describing with your son through the years. Now that he is in high school, it's not such a big deal anymore, but I remember those sleepless years like they were yesterday.

The Ferber book talks a lot about helping them develop the habit of just falling back to sleep when they come to partial wakefulness during the night. I can't recommend it enough!

FWIW, Ferber's techniques can seem drastic to some. Even if you're not comfortable implementing them precisely, there are ways to take the underlying principles and adapt the techniques to still be successful.

Amazon.com: Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems: New, Revised, and Expanded Edition: Books: Richard Ferber

cj/

__________________
I was walking home one night and a guy hammering on a roof called me a paranoid little weirdo. In morse code. -Emo Phillips

I actually use the Ferber method by mistake with my daughter when she was about 1. She was having a hard time getting to sleep and I got fed up and left her in the crib to take a break in the living room for a minute and before I got back she was out like a light! The next night I left after a little while and she cried a little but went right to sleep. SHe has always been my good sleeper, but now she even wakes up occasionally at night (she's 4 too).



You can also try reading the Baby Whisperer for Toddlers, I don't remember what she says on the subject, but there a website out there and her books are at the library. ( I gave all of mine away or I would look it up, sorry).

He kust be getting something out of getting up and you have to find out what that is and take it away. I have sent my daughter to time out for getting up. I told her it's the time out step or her bed, her choice. SHe's allowed to read or turn her music thing on, but that's it.

Good luck, and yes we've all been there! It'll pass, I never hear a peep out of my son at night anymore. I sure wish they'd sleep past 6:00 AM though!

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"A true friend is someone who thinks that you are a good egg even though he knows that you are slightly cracked." ~ Bernard Meltzer

My daughter(who will be 7 on the 23rd) STILL has nights when she wakes me up. Just last night she woke me up twice. She doesn't yell for me just comes in my room and taps my feet until I jump, LOL. Usually she says she can't breathe (she has allergies and almost always has stuffy nose) or she just wants somebody to sleep with her. I don't mind crawling in bed with her if it gets her back to sleep without everybody else waking up but I won't go to bed with her(and believe me she asks every night. LOL)

My 8 year old DD still wakes up once in awhile, but I must be a heavy sleeper, or she is VERY quiet. I bet about one morning a week I wake up with her in bed with me.

Sorry I don't have any fixes for you, but I hope this is short lived. I agree with the other posters that he just needs to know to stay quiet until morning.

I would reward your DS for staying quiet and in his bed if/when he wakes up. Tell him he can only get up if something is *really* wrong (and then talk about things that would be consdiered ok to get out of bed for). Give him some kind of small treat in the morning (for my DS, we used Matchbox cars -- he loves them). My DS is 4 1/2 (will be 5 in May) and he will get up in the middle of the night too and either wake DH & I up or wake-up his older brother.

I talked to DS's Dr. this summer (at his 4 year old check-up) about this and he said that DS needed to learn to go back to sleep on his own. Everyone has a natural sleep/wake cycle and kids need to learn to put themselves back into deep sleep. He suggested the rewards system and it works for us, for the most part.

My DS will still get up in the middle of the night and come into our room, but DH & I 'pretend' we are sleeping. Usually DS will go right back to bed. If there is really something wrong, then of course we will attend to DS, but usually he is just awake and wanting something to do.

Sarah.....mom to Jason & Devin

Is it possible that he is STILL having seizures at night without you knowing it Seizures can range from very mild to very severe. It is possible that he is having mild seizures at night and it is waking him up . . . Talk to your pediatrician to rule out anything medical before trying anything else. I have the same sort of issue, but not as severe. My son is 1 and wakes up every night between 3 and 7:00 am. We got into the habit of bringing him into bed with us and now whenever he wakes up he wants to sleep with us! Sometimes we let him cry it out and he will just go back to sleep on his own. Other times that doesn't work . . . It isn't a huge problem for us yet!

i will talk to the ped about this sleep issue when we go in january. he has slept all night long the last few nights. we've had a talk before bedtime each night about sleeping all night long and he has been pretty proud of himself in the mornings when he realizes he slept ALL night long. lol so we'll see how everything goes. thanks for all the suggestions.