Posted by twinkle on February 17, 2008 at 00:49:05:I really hope I can get some much needed advice here. My 2 year old son just will not go to bed or settle in the evenings and it does not matter how late he actually eventually falls asleep, he is still up at the crack of dawn in the morning. A few weeks back I had managed to get him into a routine using the controlled crying technique, and after a few days of this he was going to his bed absoloutely no problem at all. Now however, he screams, sobs, cries, and keeps getting out of his bed and running through to the living room.
I had been putting him to his bed at 8 o clock every night, which some of you will probably say is too late but I figured that if I put him down any earlier he would just be up at 4 o clock in the morning. He has a 2 hour nap every day without fail and i'm not sure whether I should try and stop this nap completely.
He also frequently wakes through the night asking for juice or his dummy and it then takes me ages to fall back asleep after getting up to him. This is driving me round the bend because he now does not fall asleep until about 10 o clock at night and I am getting no time to relax. I am a single mother so there is no father to lighten the load.
I am so tired that I just feel so tense and irritable all the time and I just wish he would sleep. It would not be so bad if he would just go down at a reasonable hour, and sleep right the way through, getting up at the crack of dawn probably wouldnt be so bad.
I dont know whether to try putting him down at 7 o clock as I think he would probably just get up even earlier. Can anyone advise me what to do or what the problem could be?
Thank you.