Toddler bed troubles!

[liss88]

Please help!!
My daughter is 21 months old and is learning to sleep in her toddler bed, day sleeps are not a problem but night time bed time is a killer!!!
Her bed time is normally 7pm and when she was in her cot she just easy as popping her in there and she was asleep, now she is in a bed she gets up over again and thinks its a game!! Where only just getting her to sleep at like 9ish its out of control, I need any suggestions to get her into a routine!! I don't want to have to sit with her and pat her to sleep cause I don't want to have to do that every night

If you have any tips or tricks please pass them on to me

[lupa]

after you read and say goodnight and I love you. Turn off the light and close the door. Did this a few nights with my DS and he soon go the picture that it's no time for playing, but for sleeping. Then you can leave the door open ajar etc, or whatever you want to do.

[erinn]

Does she cry or just get up?

We found when we moved our daughter we had two issues. Issue number 1 was she wanted to sleep on the floor instead of the bed, so we would put her into bed and she would climb out and curl up on the floor and go to sleep. We could put her back into bed 100 times before she actually went to sleep and she would always go back to the floor. In the end we put a foam mattress down on the floor and let her sleep there if she wanted, then moved her to the big bed once asleep. Took about 5 weeks of that before she got the hang of it and started sleeping in the bed so then we took the mattress away.

Issue 2 we also had the wanting to come out of the room and also found she is a little explorer. After she came out of her room twice in the middle of the night and we found her playing in random places we put a baby gate against her door. Because she doesnt cry/scream she will frequently be put into bed, then comes to the door, she may do that a few times to see if we are still around and then she puts herself back to bed. Unless she is screaming/distressed we don't go to her when she does this. We just let her look out and then go back to bed by herself. Seems to work, and eventually as she becomes more used to this we will remove the gate. We could have just shut the door but by having the gate she can see out and doesn't have to be scared because she can see us and knows we are nearby.

Our routine is very much get ready for bed, read a story in bedroom, dim lights, have milk, goodnights and into bed and then we walk away. Yes she may come out of bed but we dont pay attention to that unless she is super distressed and she just goes back to bed by herself. Might take a bit to get the hang of it but she will soon enough xx

[liss88]

No she doesn't cry she just thinks its a game I put her down say goodnight and come out to the lounge and she waits a few mins and come
Running out and she knows what she is doing is naughty cause she giggles and then runs back in there when she sees you getting up to put her back in, I tried waiting at the door and saying no lay down and it doesn't make a difference and like I said I refuse to pat her to sleep cause I don't want to start that bad habit, oh and I tried shutting the door and she started pulling things out of her cupboards and I'm worried she might get hurt in there cause its dark so I tried a night lite and that just made her play with the power point so I got a egg lamp night light she couldn't reach and that gave her enough light to play with her toys and be happy in there lol

[Cool Cookies]

Our DS was 16months when he went into a toddler bed & for the first couple of nights my partner or I had to lay on the floor next to his bed until he fell asleep (not facing him) & if he woke during the night we laid next to his bed till he went back to sleep.

[liss88]

I don't want to have to do that I need her to be independent with her sleeping especially now I have bub #2 due soon, I just tried putting her to bed with the door shut and she got out and cried so I left her for 5 mins and put her back to bed then so on and so on and she went to sleep a lot quicker and easier so lets hope tonight is the same scenario

[HouseOfFun]

We also use a safety gate on the door to stop nighttime wandering and because our son likes to hear household noises to know we are there when he is going to sleep. He gets upset with the door shut.

[carleena]

I pat DD to sleep as she is asleep in less than 5 mins. I'm hoping it's just a phase and she will go to sleep on her own with no dramas soon!

[liss88]

Yep def thinking about the baby gate see how we go with the door shut till she's asleep trial yer see my mum patted my sister when she was 2 and she ended up patting her till she was 6 I just think it would open up a can of worms I don't want to start.... I'm
Sure she will grow out of it most kiddies do