Toddler in bed vs. crib? (kinda long)
Ok, this might get involved, but I sure hope someone can help us out! A little background... my son is 14 mos old. He has never been a great sleeper...wait, he was from 4-6mos old! He does not nap in his crib; he naps and rests in his playroom where he has a "cozy corner" - a whole area of comfy blankets, pillows and a little spiderman pull-out couch thingy. He naps there during the day, and in the mornings when we're taking our time getting moving. He goes to school (daycare) 3 half-days per week and sleeps wonderfully on a cot there. So, what's the problem, you ask?
Well, our current night ritual has been to relax in the playroom for a little while, usually <eek!> watching an educational video, until DS gets really sleepy, then we take him up to bed. It used to be that we could rock him for a few minutes and then put him in his crib and he would roll over and go to sleep, or even we could just take him up and put him down. No problem, right? Well, now when we take him up, he won't let us sit down in the rocker. Ok, skip that then. So, we try just rocking back and forth for a few minutes and then put him down. Well, nothing is working anymore. I don't know if it's the crib, the room itself, the sounds (we've used a white noise machine and Pachabel Canon in D Minor for over a year), or just that he feels confined (?) or just plain uncomfortable in his crib now. He rolls around, puts his lovey on his head, over his head, throws it around, etc. So, what we end up doing is standing over his crib until he's calm enough, and then watch him in the monitor for 10 minutes more while he finally exhausts him self to sleep!
So, if you've made it this far, I'm wondering, even though he's only 14 months old, does anyone think a bed would be a better alternative at this point? My husband thinks he's too young for a bed (afraid of covers and pillows). I disagree. I know that if he had a bed, I could lie down with him, even change our ritual a little, and he would possibly sleep better. Any opinions, thoughts, ideas? Thanks!
^_^:
Is his room toddler proofed?
If so, why not try a bed. I think that a larger sleeping space might work well. You certainly do not need to include blankets and pillows in a bed when he transitions into a toddler bed, let him continue to sleep like he is.
Keep in mind though, that once he is in a bed, you can't confine as you do in a crib. What I mean is, some babies who are put in cribs, know that they can't get out, so they settle down and go to sleep. DS sleeps in our bed, and knows how to climb down. We have never been able to get him to sleep by containing him in a crib, and are unable to contain him in our bed.
^_^:
The above poster said it all. :) My son is 14 months old but has co-slept with me since day 1. He now has a toddler bed that butts up to our bed and it has a rail to keep him from falling out but he can get in and out if he chooses. It works very well for us but again, we've always co-slept and an open bed has always been apart of his life. I doubt I'm helping much but I thought I'd share. I hope you find a solution soon. :love
^_^:
To the PPs: does your son often get down in the middle of the night? Is he then confined to the room somehow? And what does he do when he gets down?
We kind of co-slept for the 1st 3 months - he was in a bassinet pushed right up to and at the same level as our bed. Unfortunately, every time he made even the slightest noise, I was wide awake for hours (first time mama syndrome!) Eventually, we transitioned to the crib, which back then wasn't an issue because he would eat and then go to sleep. Now that he's so big, a bottle before bed doesn't work anymore (needless to say, I'm not nursing him at this point)
^_^:
My DH and I had to move my daughter out of her crib at about 15-16 months because she had learned to crawl out of it and we have wood floors. :( Not fun! We do not have a regular bed for her, and don't want to get one yet because we are about to move and will have limited space for extra stuff. We also worried about her falling off of the bed. So we found an idea online that has worked really well for us. We put her crib matress on the floor! now she has a little bed that is short enough that she does not hurt herself when she rolls out (and she does relatively often!) but she still had the familiar matress and sheet and blanket. It worked really well right from the get-go for bedtime, but naps were a little shaky for the first two weeks. (she would play for two hours and not nap at all.) But she has finally fotten the idea and had done great at both for the last month and a half to two months. Once we move we will probably put her in a regular bed . . . but then this has worked so well, we may wait a while.:) I like the little bed on the floor because, like you suggested, I can lay down with her (I lay on the floor and use the matress as my pillow) at bedtime and cuddle with her. She likes that just as well as being rocked. HTH!
Aprilynne
^_^:
I second the mattress on the floor idea - it works well for dd naps (at night she co-sleeps). She just comes out to join us when she wakes up. Though she does nurse to sleep...but you could always give it a whirl. If you are worried about him running amuck through the house at night, you could put a gate in his doorway (which some might object to, but it is no more confining than his crib is now.)
Angela
^_^:
The mattress on the floor or a toddler bed would probably be safe, but it may not fix the problem. He may just need to squirm around a while to settle. My daughter (23 months) has a little bed of her own that she can get in and out of, but it still can take hours of sitting with her before she can sleep. If it takes him 10 minutes in his crib that may just be how he falls asleep.
^_^:
it still can take hours of sitting with her before she can sleep. If it takes him 10 minutes in his crib that may just be how he falls asleep. Eek - hours?! Hugs for you on those nights!!
I think the thing that's making me think outside the crib is that when he goes down for a nap at home or at school not in in his crib, he doesn't do any of that rolling around, etc, he just falls right to sleep!
Thanks for the responses.
Any suggestions on how to talk dh into trying something new? :D
^_^:
Any suggestions on how to talk dh into trying something new? :D :LOL When you find the magic potion send it my way, ok? ;)
Seriously, it sounds like you're on the right track. :love
^_^:
I would just try putting the crib mattress on the floor of his room (leaving the crib set up), that way if it doesn't work out, it's not hard to just pop the crib mattress back into the crib. It would be pretty hard for your DH to argue against at least trying it out for a couple of days, when it won't cost anything and it would be easy to go back to using the crib. This is what we did when we switched our ds to a twin bed and it's been great. He loves his bed, climbs right in at bedtime. Good luck convincing DH!
^_^:
I don't exactly understand what the problem is. . . I think it is perfectly normal for anyone (toddler or grown-up) to toss around a bit before falling asleep. 10 minutes of restlessness before sleep sounds completely reasonable to me.
I would be very surprised if the crib was the cause of your son's tossing. Unless he is protesting being put in the crib, or crying once he is in there, I would guess that he is happy to sleep there. If you put him in a bed or on a mattress on the floor, my guess is that instead of tossing around in bed, he'll be getting out of bed and prolonging his bedtime even more.
My twin sons are 20 months old and have never slept in a crib. We coslept full-time until they were 18 months old, and since then they have started the night in their own twin bed, and then join us in our bed around 3:00 a.m. I nurse them before bed, and then lie with them until they fall asleep. There is often lots of tossing and rolling, playing with blankets, etc. I'm just glad when they don't get up and off the bed!
So, if I were you, I wouldn't change a thing!
HTH!
^_^:
My oldest son switched to a bed at 12 months because he would climb out of his crib, my middle son got switched at 10 months for the same reason. (Youngest is a co-sleeper so no issue there!) Both of them got switched to a twin mattress put directly on the floor instead of a regular bed or toddler bed - the twin mattress is bigger then the toddler bed so more room to move around and having it right on the floor made me feel better in case they rolled out of bed. It worked out great, just need to make sure the room is thoroughly baby proofed. :)
Kitty
^_^:
I don't exactly understand what the problem is. . . I think it is perfectly normal for anyone (toddler or grown-up) to toss around a bit before falling asleep. 10 minutes of restlessness before sleep sounds completely reasonable to me. I don't disagree with what you're saying, but my concern is that he doesn't do that ANYwhere else he sleeps. On his little cot and his little couch bed, he falls to sleep without issue. He's a very light sleeper through the night (but deep sleeper during naps not in crib), so that's where my wondering if it's the crib comes from. And it's not always just 10 minutes - more often than not, the entire getting to sleep portion of our bedtime ritual is longer than an hour.
I think I might try the crib mattress on the floor and see if it makes a difference. Dh doesn't want to jump into anything (and I agree), so we'll try that first. If that works, I get carte blanche to decorate his room in more of a big boy way to make the transition to bed more fun! :)
Oh, and about the climbing...it's funny, because everyone asks IRL if he's climbing out. He's not YET, but I know that it will happen sooner than later and isn't switching him then kind of like closing the barn door after the animals get out? I mean, if I know he's going to do it eventually, I think I want to be proactive, rather than have him fall to the floor! (No offense intended or anything, Kitty. Your kids were pretty advanced climbers, eh??)
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Well, our current night ritual has been to relax in the playroom for a little while, usually <eek!> watching an educational video, until DS gets really sleepy, then we take him up to bed. It used to be that we could rock him for a few minutes and then put him in his crib and he would roll over and go to sleep, or even we could just take him up and put him down. No problem, right? Well, now when we take him up, he won't let us sit down in the rocker. Ok, skip that then. So, we try just rocking back and forth for a few minutes and then put him down. Well, nothing is working anymore. I don't know if it's the crib, the room itself, the sounds (we've used a white noise machine and Pachabel Canon in D Minor for over a year), or just that he feels confined (?) or just plain uncomfortable in his crib now. He rolls around, puts his lovey on his head, over his head, throws it around, etc. So, what we end up doing is standing over his crib until he's calm enough, and then watch him in the monitor for 10 minutes more while he finally exhausts him self to sleep!
So, if you've made it this far, I'm wondering, even though he's only 14 months old, does anyone think a bed would be a better alternative at this point? My husband thinks he's too young for a bed (afraid of covers and pillows). I disagree. I know that if he had a bed, I could lie down with him, even change our ritual a little, and he would possibly sleep better. Any opinions, thoughts, ideas? Thanks!
^_^:
Is his room toddler proofed?
If so, why not try a bed. I think that a larger sleeping space might work well. You certainly do not need to include blankets and pillows in a bed when he transitions into a toddler bed, let him continue to sleep like he is.
Keep in mind though, that once he is in a bed, you can't confine as you do in a crib. What I mean is, some babies who are put in cribs, know that they can't get out, so they settle down and go to sleep. DS sleeps in our bed, and knows how to climb down. We have never been able to get him to sleep by containing him in a crib, and are unable to contain him in our bed.
^_^:
The above poster said it all. :) My son is 14 months old but has co-slept with me since day 1. He now has a toddler bed that butts up to our bed and it has a rail to keep him from falling out but he can get in and out if he chooses. It works very well for us but again, we've always co-slept and an open bed has always been apart of his life. I doubt I'm helping much but I thought I'd share. I hope you find a solution soon. :love
^_^:
To the PPs: does your son often get down in the middle of the night? Is he then confined to the room somehow? And what does he do when he gets down?
We kind of co-slept for the 1st 3 months - he was in a bassinet pushed right up to and at the same level as our bed. Unfortunately, every time he made even the slightest noise, I was wide awake for hours (first time mama syndrome!) Eventually, we transitioned to the crib, which back then wasn't an issue because he would eat and then go to sleep. Now that he's so big, a bottle before bed doesn't work anymore (needless to say, I'm not nursing him at this point)
^_^:
My DH and I had to move my daughter out of her crib at about 15-16 months because she had learned to crawl out of it and we have wood floors. :( Not fun! We do not have a regular bed for her, and don't want to get one yet because we are about to move and will have limited space for extra stuff. We also worried about her falling off of the bed. So we found an idea online that has worked really well for us. We put her crib matress on the floor! now she has a little bed that is short enough that she does not hurt herself when she rolls out (and she does relatively often!) but she still had the familiar matress and sheet and blanket. It worked really well right from the get-go for bedtime, but naps were a little shaky for the first two weeks. (she would play for two hours and not nap at all.) But she has finally fotten the idea and had done great at both for the last month and a half to two months. Once we move we will probably put her in a regular bed . . . but then this has worked so well, we may wait a while.:) I like the little bed on the floor because, like you suggested, I can lay down with her (I lay on the floor and use the matress as my pillow) at bedtime and cuddle with her. She likes that just as well as being rocked. HTH!
Aprilynne
^_^:
I second the mattress on the floor idea - it works well for dd naps (at night she co-sleeps). She just comes out to join us when she wakes up. Though she does nurse to sleep...but you could always give it a whirl. If you are worried about him running amuck through the house at night, you could put a gate in his doorway (which some might object to, but it is no more confining than his crib is now.)
Angela
^_^:
The mattress on the floor or a toddler bed would probably be safe, but it may not fix the problem. He may just need to squirm around a while to settle. My daughter (23 months) has a little bed of her own that she can get in and out of, but it still can take hours of sitting with her before she can sleep. If it takes him 10 minutes in his crib that may just be how he falls asleep.
^_^:
it still can take hours of sitting with her before she can sleep. If it takes him 10 minutes in his crib that may just be how he falls asleep. Eek - hours?! Hugs for you on those nights!!
I think the thing that's making me think outside the crib is that when he goes down for a nap at home or at school not in in his crib, he doesn't do any of that rolling around, etc, he just falls right to sleep!
Thanks for the responses.
Any suggestions on how to talk dh into trying something new? :D
^_^:
Any suggestions on how to talk dh into trying something new? :D :LOL When you find the magic potion send it my way, ok? ;)
Seriously, it sounds like you're on the right track. :love
^_^:
I would just try putting the crib mattress on the floor of his room (leaving the crib set up), that way if it doesn't work out, it's not hard to just pop the crib mattress back into the crib. It would be pretty hard for your DH to argue against at least trying it out for a couple of days, when it won't cost anything and it would be easy to go back to using the crib. This is what we did when we switched our ds to a twin bed and it's been great. He loves his bed, climbs right in at bedtime. Good luck convincing DH!
^_^:
I don't exactly understand what the problem is. . . I think it is perfectly normal for anyone (toddler or grown-up) to toss around a bit before falling asleep. 10 minutes of restlessness before sleep sounds completely reasonable to me.
I would be very surprised if the crib was the cause of your son's tossing. Unless he is protesting being put in the crib, or crying once he is in there, I would guess that he is happy to sleep there. If you put him in a bed or on a mattress on the floor, my guess is that instead of tossing around in bed, he'll be getting out of bed and prolonging his bedtime even more.
My twin sons are 20 months old and have never slept in a crib. We coslept full-time until they were 18 months old, and since then they have started the night in their own twin bed, and then join us in our bed around 3:00 a.m. I nurse them before bed, and then lie with them until they fall asleep. There is often lots of tossing and rolling, playing with blankets, etc. I'm just glad when they don't get up and off the bed!
So, if I were you, I wouldn't change a thing!
HTH!
^_^:
My oldest son switched to a bed at 12 months because he would climb out of his crib, my middle son got switched at 10 months for the same reason. (Youngest is a co-sleeper so no issue there!) Both of them got switched to a twin mattress put directly on the floor instead of a regular bed or toddler bed - the twin mattress is bigger then the toddler bed so more room to move around and having it right on the floor made me feel better in case they rolled out of bed. It worked out great, just need to make sure the room is thoroughly baby proofed. :)
Kitty
^_^:
I don't exactly understand what the problem is. . . I think it is perfectly normal for anyone (toddler or grown-up) to toss around a bit before falling asleep. 10 minutes of restlessness before sleep sounds completely reasonable to me. I don't disagree with what you're saying, but my concern is that he doesn't do that ANYwhere else he sleeps. On his little cot and his little couch bed, he falls to sleep without issue. He's a very light sleeper through the night (but deep sleeper during naps not in crib), so that's where my wondering if it's the crib comes from. And it's not always just 10 minutes - more often than not, the entire getting to sleep portion of our bedtime ritual is longer than an hour.
I think I might try the crib mattress on the floor and see if it makes a difference. Dh doesn't want to jump into anything (and I agree), so we'll try that first. If that works, I get carte blanche to decorate his room in more of a big boy way to make the transition to bed more fun! :)
Oh, and about the climbing...it's funny, because everyone asks IRL if he's climbing out. He's not YET, but I know that it will happen sooner than later and isn't switching him then kind of like closing the barn door after the animals get out? I mean, if I know he's going to do it eventually, I think I want to be proactive, rather than have him fall to the floor! (No offense intended or anything, Kitty. Your kids were pretty advanced climbers, eh??)
More Topical: