Daddy, Can I Sleep With You?

How do you tell that face no?

I was laying in bed with my wife when I heard a strange thump from my sons room. A split second later, I heard crying. This little punk had figured out how to escape from his crib! So he slept with us that night. The next night, the same thing happened, so I acted like I left the room after putting him back in his crib to see how my first born was escaping this miniature night prison. I turned off the light and hid in the dark, commencing my sting operation in the shadows armed with a pen light. It didn’t take long before I heard rustling in his bed, BOOOM! I hit him with the light and I’m sure he will need therapy because I literally had to change his diaper after that. I felt so bad I scared him that he slept with us again. This was the 2nd night in a row he had slept with us. He ended up sleeping with us for a few more nights while I came up with a plan of attack.

I looked online for a toddler bed, as we decided we didn’t want our son to kill himself trying to escape. So the hunt began. We tried to find something themed, because my wife was worried our 18 month old wouldn’t be cool with just a regular bed, ya know, he needs to be the popular toddler. Well, I finally found it, the perfect bed! It was a pirate ship!

$200 of plastic and a lifetime of NOT SLEEPING!

HE LOVED IT! He played in it ALL DAY! I stood there proudly, thinking I may get to have my side of the bed again at last! He napped in it peacefully that day, and I was getting more and more convinced that it was totally my idea! I was wrong.

Bed time rolled around, and it was a nightmare. There is a nightlight on the bed that is more of an industrial spotlight, so he could now play all night. I failed. I was exhausted and beat. I just wanted to give up. What was I going to do? He could open the door and sneak into our bed. So, short of putting bars on the doors, we were helpless.

Eventually I figured out that if I kept him up late and he was too exhausted to play, he would stay in his bed through the night. After about a week of this, he got into a routine and we only occasionally had to go back to war.

The point of this is that we had to learn the hard way, after buying a cool bed he really didn’t care about in the end, that routine was the only thing that was going to save us. The youngest son was easy. You tend to tolerate less as you get done with trial and error with the other one!

Toddlers want to feel safe, this means being around you all the time. You’ll see it when you have to leave them with the sitter or in a new place. You can expect the occasional nightmares, and the teething nights, but for the most part, it is pretty simple. You just have to stay strong dad! Don’t fold to the tears and the sad little faces or you’ll be sharing your bed with a teenager. Below is 5 tips to help.

1. Check the schedule: One reason toddlers refuse to stay in bed every 10 seconds simply because they’re not sleepy yet. Maybe your toddler’s schedule needs to be changed – is bedtime too early? If your child still takes an afternoon nap, then bedtime shouldn’t be happening before 7 or 8 p.m. How close is that nap to bedtime? Your toddler needs at least 5 hours of wake time between the end of the afternoon nap and bedtime.

However, the opposite is also true – sometimes, toddlers are sleepless at night because they’re actually too tired, believe it or not. If your toddler is done napping, or is in the midst of a nap transition, from one nap to none, you’ll need to do an earlier bedtime – aim for 7 p.m. or so.

2. Develop a strong bedtime routine: Toddlers depend on routine – particularly sleep routines. A strong, consistent bedtime routine will do wonders for helping your toddler understand that it’s time to settle in and go to sleep. Be sure that your routine isn’t too long (15-30 minutes is perfectly sufficient) and that it’s not too stimulating (no tickle-fights before bed!). Also make sure that your routine is, you know…routine! You need to consistently do the same thing each night in order for it to become routine for your toddler.

3. Try a sticker chart: It’s incredible what a toddler will do for a sticker! If bedtime drama and jack-in-the-box behavior is an issue in your home, try a sticker chart. Maybe your toddler gets to put a sticker on the chart before bed if she is cooperative during the bedtime routine, and then another sticker on the chart before breakfast if she stays in bed all night long.

4. Consider using the door as an immediate consequence: Sometimes, your toddler’s jack-in-the-box behavior will be due to real anxiety or perhaps a nightmare; in those cases, you’ll obviously want to comfort your toddler and help him feel safe. However, more often, repeated jack-in-the-box behavior is more of a discipline issue. For this reason, some families find it helpful to respond with consequences. Remember, to be effective, the consequences of your toddler’s behavior need to be immediate – threatening ‘no TV tomorrow’ after your toddler gets out of bed for the fifteenth time isn’t effective, since the consequence is delayed.

Instead, some parents use the bedroom door as a sort of consequence – mom or dad may leave the bedroom door open 90 degrees, on the condition that their toddler stays in bed. When toddler gets up, the bedroom door closes to 45 degrees. If toddler gets up again, the bedroom door is closed all the way for 1 or 2 minutes, at which point the whole process starts all over again. (Note that this tip isn’t for everyone; some parents feel this is too harsh, and not all toddlers respond well. Use your judgment in determining if this would work for your toddler.)

5. Employ the covert sleep: Even if you tweak your toddler’s schedule, implement a great bedtime routine, and provide incentives in the form of stickers to encourage your toddler to stay in bed, you will no doubt have some jack-in-the-box moments here and there. This is just to be expected – toddlers love to test boundaries, after all! In this case, we recommend that you try the ‘Silent Return to Bed’ – that is, when your toddler wanders out of his room, silently walk him back, tuck him in, and leave. You want these interactions to be as boring as possible – no threatening, no bargaining, no discussing. This will help discourage your toddler from repeat attempts to engage with you by getting out of bed. We find that if parents are consistent in doing this, it can significantly reduce jack-in-the-box behavior relatively quickly.

By: Dad Hack