Kids and sleep issues

[Gretchen]

Design-mom,
My dd used to have night terrors and would wet the bed. Amazingly enough they happened at exactly the same time every night, about 2 hours after bed time, no matter what time that was. Dr. said to wake her up about 15 mins before and have her go to the bathroom. We did this for almost two years, every night. If I didn't, she'd wig, and then pee. Poor kid. She was having trouble moving from sleep states, and couldn't wake up to go potty. Every once in a while she will have trouble and kinda sleep walk, but she has mostly grown out of it. Antihistamines, esp. Zyrtec can cause sleep problems.
Good luck-
G

 

[xbatman]

We had to get tough with the older one when she was around 2 2 1/2 years old -- she used to get out of her bed each night and come into ours. Then she would give us the hardest time about going back to her bed. The problem was that since she had woken us from a sound sleep we were too tired to fight with her and she ended up staying in our bed too many nights.

Before this problem she had slept fine in her own bed. But suddenly -- ack! The other issue was the fact that she was a whirling dirvish in her sleep. She rolled and even turned sideways. She ended up taking up all the room and DH and I were at opposite edges of the bed.

We finally told her she could come in but not sleep in our bed. So whenever she got scared dh would take her toddler mattress from her bed and put it on our floor for her. The problem was that it was happening very often and it was disruptive. The teacher at mommy and me told us that she had sleeping bags for her kids that they would use, but they had to bring them in themselves. But come on -- she was a tiny 2 year old no way she could drag a sleeping bag.

Finally, DH's cousin told us we had to use tough love. She could come in, but she couldn't have her bed. she had to sleep on the floor. I struggled, but in all reality we had new, really soft carpeting. The cousin said that if we made it too nice for her she wouldn't want to sleep in her own room. So she came in and slept on the floor (with a blanket.) That happened for a couple of nights and then she started moving towards our door. the next night she slept at the door and then in the hallway (which was ok -- we kept the gate at the top of the stairs closed.) After that she actually slept on her own floor and then finally back in her bed. That was the end of that problem.

We also had monster spray at one time. I decorated a spray bottle with stickers labeled to read "monster spray." She was allowed to spray it a few times around her room. We had to limit the number of sprays or she would have soaked her room.

That's what DD4's pediatrician told us - let her come in the room if she wants, but tell her she has to us a blanket on the floor. He said that she'd soon get tired of sleeping on the floor. So that's our next thing to try. She's never been a good sleeper and has slept through the night about 5 times in her life no matter where she sleeps. We're getting desparate here!

 

[design_mom]

Design-mom,
My dd used to have night terrors and would wet the bed. Amazingly enough they happened at exactly the same time every night, about 2 hours after bed time, no matter what time that was. Dr. said to wake her up about 15 mins before and have her go to the bathroom. We did this for almost two years, every night. If I didn't, she'd wig, and then pee. Poor kid. She was having trouble moving from sleep states, and couldn't wake up to go potty. Every once in a while she will have trouble and kinda sleep walk, but she has mostly grown out of it. Antihistamines, esp. Zyrtec can cause sleep problems.
Good luck-
G

Thanks -- DS can be a bed-wetter sometimes too and we usually do get him up to go right before we go to bed ourselves. The sleepwalking issue happened right as we were coming upstairs to get him up, so I wondered if his body sort of felt like it was "time," you know? Thanks for letting me know about the antihistimines. I hadn't heard that, but DS doesn't take meds regularly anyway, so I don't think that's our specific issue.