Please watch my child sleep video on what to do when you can’t get your toddler to sleep.
Hi! I’m Dana Obleman, creator of The Sleep Sense Program. If you’d rather read than watch, I’ve transcribed the text of this video below.
This week’s question is from Nat. She writes:
“Our son is 18 months old and has never slept through the night. We have tried everything. We took her soother away, we have unplugged the night light, we have removed all distractions; we have let him cry it out. I do not think it is a comfort thing, because even if we come into the room, he continues to cry.
He usually cries for a bottle once in the night, but that does not account for the two or three other times he is up. We usually have to sit with him until he falls asleep and then put him back into the crib. Is there anything else we can do? We are desperate.”
Thanks Leanne. I can imagine after 18 months of not sleeping well, you are definitely desperate. Let us break it down into little pieces here. First of all, we are going to start with bedtime and I know, I sort of sound like a broken record about the bedtime thing but it is ultimately the very best place to start. You cannot do one thing at bedtime and then expect your child to do something completely different for night waking.
Teaching a child to sleep well means that every time they go into their crib or bed, whether it is bedtime, middle of the night, naps, they do the same thing. They need to be 100% confident with what their skills are so they can start doing it every time.
So bedtime, he should have a routine, a good routine as having a bath, getting into jammies, maybe having a drink of something while looking at stories, brushing teeth and going into the crib. Okay, he should be definitely going into the crib awake.
I get the feeling that because there seems to be some rocking going on in the night, my guess is that at bedtime, you probably rock him to sleep. Okay, after the routine, into the crib awake and then I suggest you do the stay in the room method with him. I know you have tried sort of letting him cry it out approach in the past which makes me think you probably were either leaving or checking or just staying out of the room altogether. I know that it might not feel like you are actually doing anything when you are staying there. He might be upset regardless, but I do find that it eases the transition a little bit and even if the first night or two is bad, it usually starts getting better by night three or four.
So you would sit right by the crib. If he stands up, you try to lay him down a few times. If that is not working, then you can just try coaxing him down by rubbing the mattress and saying it is nightie night, lay down and hang in there until he falls asleep in that crib.
Now, I know in your note, you mentioned that you let him cry it out and he threw up and I have actually seen that a few times today just going through the questions and it is unfortunate. I do not like to hear when it happens. I think it is probably upsetting for everybody involved. I can imagine that it is but you want to be careful how you handle it. Again, a child, I mean the life of a child is all about, what are the things that get me what I want. What kind of behavior do I do to get a reaction from people?
If a child starts figuring out that throwing up is a sure ticket into your bed or out of the crib or for this to all stop, they will start doing it more and more often. I had a client once with a two-year old who could throw up almost on cue, the minute she went in the crib, she would stick her finger down her throat and throw up and that got her into her mother’s bed, which was where she wanted to be.
Just be really cautious and careful. At 18 months, that is an age where they will start to put these pieces together and figure these things out. So often, by staying in the room, sitting right beside the crib, saying a common key phrase, doing a little bit of careful touch can keep the situation calm enough that the child would not throw up. If it happens, again, like I said, it is a pleasant experience but if it does happened and take your child out, clean them up, change sheets if you need to, have a little cuddle, sit together for five minutes or so and just be soothing and reassuring that everything is fine. But then, you need to keep going, you have to put him back in the crib and start again. So that is what I want you to do until he is asleep.
Then for night wakings, a couple of things in your note, it is said that he wakes for a bottle once a night. He should not be having a bottle at all in the night anymore. He is 18 months old, there is really no physical reason why he needs to have a bottle in the night and think about it from his perspective, it is kind of confusing if once in the night, you know you get a bottle. I mean, to an 18-month-old, he is not going to know when.
Maybe there is a special time that you are sticking to but he knows that he gets the bottle once in the night, so that could be why he is waking at other times wondering sometimes, I get a bottle and sometimes I do not. On the times that he does not, you rock him, so there are a lot of different confusing messages going on here. He uses the bottle as a prop, he is using you as a prop, so you need to eliminate all of those props.
So taking away the bottle, taking away the rocking and respond to every wake up exactly the same so that he knows what to expect for every wake up. Give him five minutes or so to see if he will work it out on his own. If not, then one of you will go in, sit beside the crib, do all the things you are doing at bedtime until he goes back to sleep, no bottle until morning. I usually do not suggest people consider morning anything before 6:00 a.m.
Then it is 6:00 a.m., nice to see him, good morning, get him up, start your day and then he would have either breakfast or his morning feed. Okay, so just clearing up some of the inconsistencies that he has starting at bedtime, continue on through the night and it is in a week’s time, you are going to be seeing huge improvements in his sleep.
I know you are feeling desperate but the situation is not desperate. You can definitely fix this. Okay, so I encourage you to get started. Thanks for you question and sleep well!