HELP My 2yr old still wakes for a bottle at 2am!

[cwsmum]

Hi, I have two problems, I hope someone can help me. Please?

My son, just 2 yrs old, goes to bed with a bottle at 7pm, then he wakes at around 2am and asks for another bottle, not just crying, asking for milk. He was sleeping through til 6:30am until he turned 1, then this started.
To make things worse, he sometimes wakes twice for a bottle, at around 11pm and 4am. Then is up by 6am and playing.

If he doesn't wake twice he wakes up at 5am, ready to play.
He also doesn't have a daytime sleep very often, but that doesn't bother me at all.
We have tried moving bedtimes, bringing him into our bed at 5am, blockout curtains, and everything else we can think of. He is also sleeping in a single bed as he worked out how to climb out of the cot.

If anyone has any suggestions about how to break the bottle habit, I'm starting to think that's what it is, or how to get him to sleep later in the mornings, i would love to hear them.

Any help would be greatly appreciated :)

Thanks in advance from a rather sleepy mum ;)

[Graeme]

Not surprised you're sleepy!

Our girls go to bed quite late by some people's standards (7.30 to 8.30) which helps a bit with them sleeping in a bit. To break the habit of the night feeds I used to settle them (as they were breast fed and they weren't going to get any from me no matter how hard they cried ;) ). We also tried controlled crying (probably not very effectively) which also helped.

I suspect that we have also been helped by Cathy's genes - she loves to sleep. Getting up at 8.00 is early.

Good luck with it
Graeme

[mamafelix]

Hi there

I got to a point where I didn't want to feed Felix during the night anymore and we decided to 'night wean' him to stop those night feeds. Because he was old enough to understand things what we did was to talk to him about how big he was getting now, and how big kids didn't have feeds during the night- we did this for about two weeks, and counted down the days for him (one more night till Felix stops having booba at night..).

We prepared ourselves for a few unsettled nights and did it over the weekend when DH was able to help me out a bit more.

Every time he woke and asked for a feed we'd say 'not until the birds start singing and the sun comes up, Felix is a big boy now'. We would offer some water as well. He was a bit cross but did go back to sleep without much trouble. This lasted for maybe three nights and then he started sleeping through till 5-6am.

I've found that if I'm really quick and feed him as soon as he wakes he sometimes goes back down, but any delay and he's up for the morning... The fact that he sleeps in our room helps with this, but also if it's light he will want to get up anyway.

The other really important thing has been to make sure he has a big dinner- preferably with some protein in it- before he goes to sleep, that way he's not hungry in the middle of the night.

[xkwzit]

I'm not an expert, but I would guess that this is a habit and that he doesn't really need a bottle of milk at night, he may also be using the night bottle to top up if he hasn't eaten enough during the day - but now solid food is where he should be getting his calories. What about sending him to bed with a water bottle? Once he's in bed, its water or nothing. I knew a lady who would send her kids to bed and tuck a water bottle in behind their pillow at night. If they were thirsty, they knew where to find it.

There's a definate payoff for him in getting you up to get him a tasty bottle, if you reduce the payoff by offering water - he might decide that its not worth it (and its much better for his teeth as well).

Just a suggestion...

[Lachlan's Mum]

Hi

I agree with what Samantha says.

But also my thoughts are (and Im not an expert because I dont have a two year old) that:-

1. he needs to eat more during the day?

2. he needs a daytime sleep...which sounds ridiculous when you want him to sleep MORE at night..but I've found with Lachlan that the more sleep he has during the day the better he sleeps at night..as he is not overtired.

Hope this helps.

[mumof2girls]

All I can think of is he is in the habit of getting what he wants, so that's why he does it. If you give him water to go to bed with he will probably not want it and eventually sleep through the night.

I'm a believer of not putting children to bed with bottles in the first place, just in case of choking etc and it becomes a hard habit to break (as you have noticed).
If you try this you will have a few unsettled nights but then they will realise that their not going to get it and hopefully break the habit of waking in the night.

All the best, I hope this works for you if you try it.