5 year old waking up every night!

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racheltravel
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Joined: Fri Apr 08, 2016 7:12 am
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by racheltravel on Tue Oct 15, 2019 9:31 am

5 year old waking up every night!

My daughter, who is 5 years old, wakes in the night and we’re at our wits end! As a baby, she slept really well, and was in her own room from a young age, but for about the last 18 months, she’ll go to bed fine at 7pm, and go to sleep totally fine, but then wakes about 0230/0300hrs, and comes into our room – and climbs into bed (she sometimes manages to get into the middle of the bed without us noticing!) – we’ve tried to move her back to her own bed, but she just cries and comes back into us – if we let her sleep in our bed, she falls straight back to sleep, but is such a fidget – so not the best night’s sleep for us. At some points, my husband or I will go and sleep in her bed, but again this isn’t ideal.

We’ve tried to talk to her about why she wakes up, and she doesn’t have an answer, but nothing seems to help….we’ve tried nightlights, meditation, teddies, extra blankets but nothing seems to have worked.

Any ideas or thoughts would be greatly appreciated – as we all need a good night’s sleep!

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Vicki Dawson
Posts: 14
Joined: Tue Oct 08, 2019 11:48 am
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by Vicki Dawson on Thu Oct 17, 2019 10:09 am

Re: 5 year old waking up every night!

Hi there,

That sounds exhausting for you! We sleep in cycles and have points of partial wakening during the night, it sounds as though your daughter is waking fully at these points and the key is to work out why.

You said that she goes to sleep fine at the start of the night. What you need to consider is are there any changes? For example are you with her at the start of the night? Are the lighting conditions changing? Are you leaving a lullaby type show on that switches off?

If you are with her at the start of the night then leave when she is asleep then it is around gently working on her falling asleep without you there. When you take her back to her own room in the middle of the night you will need to repeat whatever you do at the start of the night, which might mean you have to stay with her initially until she is able to fall asleep by herself. You also need to make sure you wake up to take her back if you are deciding that you don't want her to sleep in your bed. This needs to be consistent. She sounds very good at sneaking in so you need to be creative here - if you have a wooden floor for example try some cans stacked up behind it so they clatter when she opens it. Or put pillows on the bed so she has to move them to get in which may help to waken you.

Whatever you try in terms of strategies stick at it for 2 weeks, sometimes it may seem that it is getting worse before it gets better but often we do have the right strategy we just haven't carried it through for long enough.

Hope that helps, Vicki
Vicki Dawson
CEO and Founder of The Children's Sleep Charity

http://www.talkhealthpartnership.com/on ... dawson.php

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