Keeping Toddler in Bed at Night - Minneapolis,MN

Considering your situation I would think back to before the baby was born... What was your bed time routine? Then every night go about your normal routine for bed time. When he gets up the first time tell him its time to go to sleep, lay him down, tuck him in and leave

The second time lay him down and tuck him in with out saying a word....

The third just walk him to his room, and continue this.

It worked for my 3 yr old. There are lots of factors to take into consideration, like does he want to see the baby lay down first,or say good night to the baby.

When moving our toddler into a bed to make way for baby no. 2, we put the playpen in her new bedroom with jusst a blanket and pillow in it and we put fun things in her bed and told her she could pick whichever one she wanted to sleep in. If she got out of her bed, we would put her in the playpen, which she began to not like. Yours might be a little old for this. Our girl was 22 mo at the time. Not sure.
They are all about exploring boundaries right now.
Best of Luck

J.,
I used a gate on the bedroom door of all of my three kids now ages 14, 9 and 5. I told them, "It's not safe for you to be up wondering around the house at night when Mommy and Daddy are sleeping. This gate is here to keep you safe in your room. If you really need me, call me, and I'll come." Then, just like trying to get a baby to sleep through the night, when he calls, don't go in immediately, take your time.

I think the other mom who responded had a good point, don't interact too much with him at night. Mimimal words, no play and if you rock him, keep it short. He's wanting you to interact with him in the middle of the night so don't feed that hunger. Also, I always gave my kids a shirt of mine to sleep with so they could smell me while we were apart at night. My 5 year old still sleeps with my shirt and she snuggles with it.

Another local resource is child psychologist and parent coach, Tina Feigal. She's awesome, I know her personaly and highly respect her methods. Her web address is www.NuturedHeart.com She has a lot of articles and info on her site.

Best of luck, hang in there, we all go through this and I know you can tackle it. One day you'll say to your husband, "Remember when he didn't sleep through the night? Aren't you glad those days are over!"

T.

I think whether or not a child needs a nap has more to do with them and their own personality/energy level than age alone - I think my mother-in-law said my youngest brother-in-law stopped napping at about 18 months old or something like that - I think it's just he has a lot of energy. If your son can make it through a full day without getting overly tired or cranky, it might work out to eliminate the afternoon nap.

As far as getting him to stay in his bed, I suppose it depends in part on how badly you want to get him to stay there and how much patience you have... I think you'll have to weigh the cost of how stressed out and/or tired you're getting with all this fighting vs. how important you think it is to sleep in his bed.

Personally, I often found it easier to just let my son sleep on the floor or the couch or whatever, as long as he was comfortable. He was comfortable, and I wasn't fighting with him. He's 7 now and still asks to sleep on the couch (or my bed), but he's pretty good about sleeping in his own bed too. In fact, the other night, he fell asleep on the living room floor, but then in the middle of the night he got up and went to sleep in his bed.

Hope that's of some help :)