Bedtime Issues - Orange Park, FL

If he already has eating habits just take it slow. Try letting him pick what he wants to eat. Try making it fun (like sandwiches cut with a cooking cutter.) Show him byt eating it in front of him that it is really good too. with the drinking, get him some cool looking sippie cups, they have some with a straw that pops up and lites when you press this button from target. Make it fun for him. maybe it'll get him to se what all the yummy sounding is all about! LOL! Good luck!

My children like to listen to audiobooks at night. They choose the story they want to listen to each evening. I let my two year old turn on the CD player before he gets into bed. It works pretty well for us. They get some form of entertainment and the story automatically shuts off when it is finished.
Is there one food that he particularly likes? If he gets vitamins and only eats peanut butter sandwiches or something, he may outgrow the fussiness soon and he'll at least be getting something into his system. My daughter went through that for a long time. We now insist she take one bite of each food on her plate then if she doesn't like it, she can make herself a sandwich.

I hope you can nip that in the behind fast, I am a mom of 4 kids and when I had my first I let that happen. (being a first time mom at the time) Now after four I have resolved that problem in my home. My suggestions would be to make sure you wake him up early in the morning reguardless the time he went to bed the night before. It will be hard on you at first,but he will start getting tired earlier. Even if it's appearing to be alittle at a time. With my first child, she took naps and I had to shorten them by half as well as wake her up early and yes she was cranky at first and more than untolerable. It was only for about a week or so though. The rest of my kids I learned to stick to a bed time routine from day one and that has help.

Also my daughter also thought she should have middle of the night snack too them she would go right to sleep, try giving him a snack before you try putting him down for bed. She had eatting issues, she stopped eatting well at one(had problem with wet or soft consistence foods). We would have to place lots of dry snack on the table for her to pick at through out the day(dry cereal, gold fish, carrot sticks, chicken nuggets, blocks of cheese,bread,things she could walk by and see).
I hope this helps!
good luck
C.

You poor thing. You have got to be exhausted. SOme things to consider. You are in charge - not your 4 year old.
Eating issues are two fold - my son had severe acid reflux and threw up everything we gave him. Do let him get involved in what he wants to eat - take him to the grocery store and have him pick out some stuff. And if he wants chicken nuggets 5 times a day - make him chicken nuggets 5 times a day. Let him help you prepare things and work in the kitchen. I found they all go through little stages. Fr the longest time all my son would eat was madarin oranges. And I mean that's it! But the more you get them involved the more likely they will be excited about the food itself.
Bedtime needs rules. The TV needs to go off early. Or better yet wean it from him completely and give him only a few shows a few times a day that he's earned special time to watch. When bedtime comes around, play some games - little board games like hi ho cherry oh to help calm him, pop up books to intrigue him and help settle him down, fun mommy time activities like coloring or putting stickers in a book. He can have a plate full of various snacks while your doing this to give him a full tummy for sleeping. Blueberries and fruit snacks and little pieces of apple and banana. Make it a special time that he can share with you that is also quiet and calm time. Then comes bath time - give him a ton of toys to play with and make it as warm as he can stand it. The warm water alone really soothes my son. Then read to him - go to the library together and pick out special books that can only be read at bedtime to give him something to look forward to. Then lay down with him, hold his hand and have a game of who can be quietest the longest, who can hold their eyes closed the longest, who can be still the longest. Be consistent. If a child knows whatto expect, he is more likely to follow along - game time, sanck time, bath time, potty time, brush teeth time, reading time, sleepy time. Make a chart with him and mark the things of as you go. I swear it works - my son is six and we still do all these things. He is out like a light by 8 PM every night and he was not that way until we started doing this process. We start the process at 7 and work through all of the things I just told you. It will save your sanity but stay consistent - he will fight you for awhile but then he will realize after 3-4 days that I get mommy to be with me if we go through all this together and you will get some sleep as well!

J. p, i read this and had to reply. its kind of funny cause my grand son does the same thing. i feel that the mid night snack should not be given that the feeding times are set as you say. you have to train him to this way and it will take time maybe a week or so he will choose to go to bed hungrey a few days untill he realizes you are the one in control not him.feed him dinner only dont let him run you crazy every day trying to satisfy his request thats away of staying up later,and until he is old enough to understand the t.v. is a enterainment for the day time not sleep time i would take it from the room so he can understand that is where he sleeps not stay awake watching tv. you need to get this under control now before school starts other wise you will have to get used to alot of visits to the school and teachers.

well my advice is this. first get the book the NO CRY SLEEP SOLUTION FOR TODDLERS by Elizabeth Pantely. she has alot of great tips. i use her orignal book and it worked wonders. then i would suggest that when you get up in the morning you get him up. He is getting his recommended sleep, his biological clock is just messed up that's all. you need to reset it so he goes to sleep at a decent hour. Also, i would suggest removing the t.v., vcr and dvd from his room. place a gate up at his door so he can't get to the one in the living room. Start a bedtime routine if you don't already have one. and stick to it. for the first month never ever deter from his routine at bedtime. and keepit the same following the same steps with it all leading to one place, his bed. my son's routine is as follows.
9pm bath
9;15-9:30 messege, naked time, teeth brush, hair brush, p.j's
9;30 sits in crib and plays with crib toys while i clean the house
9:45 bottle, story, rock
10pm bedtime

Now because your son is older and doesn't need a bottle i would suggest a sippy cup filled with his pedisure (since he has eating issues and if his ped wants you to consitrate on getting his weight up) or water. One snack before bed and that's it. at 10pm it's lights out. Also, take some pics of him taking a bath, getting ready for bed adn sleeping. Make a chart on poster board. write on the top, "my bedtime routine" at your preditermined time to start teh routine, have him tell y yhou what order things are to happen by looking on the board with the picture of what he is to do at what time. this way this gives him the independance to do his own routine. and it iwll make him eager to go to bed. Expect some resistance at first. It will happen, but it will get better quickly once his body adjusts to the new routine. If he wakes in the middle of hte night for a snack, give him pedisure or water only,and only in his bed with the lights still out. htat way he doesn't get confused and think it is time to play. Don't allow his bed toys to be used in regular daytime play and don't use regular daytime play toys for bedtime toys. Have him pick what he wants to sleep with and use that same thing every time you put him down.

Also, you may want to try carnation instant breakfast if he doesnt' like pedisure in his sippy cup. it has all the same wonderul nutrients and fats he needs, but it tastes a whole lot better. Almost likea milkshake.

hth
B.

You need to set some ground rules with your child. Yeah waking up at noon is ok now but what about next year when he is in preschool and then kindergarden, he will have to get up early for school and the late nights will have a very big negative impact on his school performance. You are the parent if you turn off the Tv then it stays off , he is the child. I know it can be hard because I hate to see my daughter cry and be upset but sometimes you need to do what is best for your child and they don't know what is best yet. What I do with my daughter is work her out at night. Most people advice to have a calming down routine but that doesn't work for my daughter. I play the wiggles and we dance together or we go for walk where she runs in front of me, anything to wear her down before she goes to bed works. Even just sitting outside and looking at the stars and saying goodnight to the witch (decoration outside) works. You can give your child some breaks by allowing him to stay up late on the weekends but it sounds like he might be watching too much TV. Children under 5 yrs old aren't really suppose to watch any, although that is really unrealistic. I would set a standard he can watch 1-2 hrs a day and once that time is up off the Tv goes. As for eating, find out what he really likes and use it to sprouce up the rest. My daughter loves cheese so I put cheese on her vegetables and she eats them all. My daughter goes through periods where she doesn't eat much either and my pediatrician's advice was that she will eat when she is hungry. You should give your son one or two alternatives and leave it at that, if he doesn't want to eat then that is ok but don't keep giving him different stuff until he does because you will end up having him eat the unhealthy alternatives like chips, ice cream etc. Also, eating so late at night isn't good for anybody. I would definitely not give him a snack just before he goes to bed maybe an hour before. Set a bed time schedule lights out at this time and follow through. Be consistent every night at this time the TV and everything goes off. If he doesn't want to go to sleep then he can lay in his bed. Good luck !

My kids have tried turning the TV back on in the past and I solved the issue by unplugging the TV and having the outlet blocked by heavy furniture so they could not plug it back in.

For getting to bed earlier, I have had success with a good hard-core play session in the early evening. Lots of running around, swimming, bike riding, or anything that really wears a kid out works on my 3 year old. Only I have to be careful to keep her awake at least until 8 pm after playing hard or she will wake after a couple hours and want to stay up.

When my kids have a hard timegoing to sleep, I lay down or sit with them for a little while. I'll sometimes leave after a few minutes ("gotta change baby's diaper") and only come back if they are still awake calling for me. Many times, they fall asleep before I "finish changing the diaper".

As another poster said, it might be best to make small changes. Try waking him half an hour early and getting him to bed half an hour earlier. Move the time up gradually until you find what works for your family. But most important, be consistent. If my kids just cna't fall asleep, I tell them they do not have to go to sleep, but they do have to lay still. Even play pretend sleep or have a contest to see who can fall asleep fastest. Anything that's just enough fun to not be stressful or cause crying, but not too fun to cause more excitement.

I've gone through several varying stages in my own life: getting up at 7 am for school; sleeping in past noon and working late nights; to getting up at 5:30 am for work and early to bed; the total number of hours is more important than the time of day the sleep occurs.