Considering transition to crib

[2happymamas]

Can anyone offer any adive or insight? DD, 13 months, is driving me crazy in bed. For the past several weeks, she is restless and thrashes around all night. She wants to sleep sideways, with her head in my back and feet on DW. This position leaves DW and I without any room. She thrashed around and kicked us the first part of the night last night and then woke up at 3:30, sat up, and started chatting. She threw a huge tantrum when I tried to lay her back down. I ended up getting up, putting her in her carseat, and rocking the carseat until she finally fell back asleep.

I don't know what it is. She is not sleeping well. We are not getting good sleep. It's seriously driving me crazy and I find myself extremely irritated with her when she kicks and moves around all night. DW and I both work FT and are not getting the sleep we need to function. We are considering moving the crib into our bedroom and trying to get her to sleep in there. It's getting really frustrating and the lack of sleep is taking its' toll.

Suggestions?

[rzberrymom]

My DD was very similar, and we ended up putting a little mattress for her next to our bed--it was a few inches lower than our bed which kept her from kicking us all night long, but it was still close enough to make night nursing easy.

We also played dead whenever she did that 3am wake-up stuff. If we stayed perfectly still, she usually would get bored and resettle herself within 15 minutes. But if I engaged her at all, tried to nurse her, tried to resettle her, etc. she was up for 2-3 hours.

That age was really hard for us--so many new skills that they're learning, molars start to come in, separation anxiety is still in full swing, etc.

[Maluhia]

I think her own little mattress could be great but note that this is just a really really hard age with the new skills, etc. so know that you are not alone!

I 2nd the playing dead for the random wake up, it worked well with DD and we could figure out in a few moments if she was actually hungry or just wanted to play.

[2happymamas]

Playing dead makes sense when she sits up to play -- but that's only happened once. The bigger problem is that she kicks, thrashes, and is generally restless all night. We constantly wake up due to her restlessness. We are not getting deep sleep and I question whether she is able to, either.

I am not sure we could do the mattress on the floor. We have an older cat who thinks it is now her life mission to pee on any bedding or clothing left on the floor. My little brothers (ages 4 and 5) stay the night with us frequently and we started to put a twin mattress on the floor for them. Yup, the cat has peed on the mattress and bedding the last three times with the boys still in the bed. We have tried closing the door to lock them out of our bedroom, but they scratch, meow, and cry at the bedroom door all night. In addition to a restless toddler, I would then have pissy cats.

I love sleeping with DD. She was born in the bed and has slept there every night of her life. But the thrashing, kicking, scrouging, and restlessness is wearing very thin.

Does this restlessness pass or is it here to stay? FWIW, I had planned to have her in bed with us for the next 9 months or so (plan to get pregnant in 3 and have her sleeping on her own by time I was 6 months along).

[rzberrymom]

Originally Posted by 2happymamas

I am not sure we could do the mattress on the floor. We have an older cat who thinks it is now her life mission to pee on any bedding or clothing left on the floor. My little brothers (ages 4 and 5) stay the night with us frequently and we started to put a twin mattress on the floor for them. Yup, the cat has peed on the mattress and bedding the last three times with the boys still in the bed. We have tried closing the door to lock them out of our bedroom, but they scratch, meow, and cry at the bedroom door all night. In addition to a restless toddler, I would then have pissy cats.

You could use a bed frame with her mattress. We used one that put our mattress a few inches above her mattress--this kept her from thrashing and kicking us, but we were still there for comfort.

Or you could keep the cats out--that's what we do with ours.

[starlightsound]

DS is 21 months, and we transitioned him to a crib in our room a couple of months ago. It was the same story: we got kicked and prodded All. Night. Long. So, now he sleeps in his crib for the first part of the night (usually 9:30-10pm) until he wakes up (1-3am). Then he comes into bed with us for a quick nurse and settles back down pretty quickly. Some nights he doesn't wake until 6 or so, then goes back down for a couple more hours after a quick nurse.

We're working on lengthening the sleep time right now (NCSS-style), and I'm half-heartedly trying to decide if it's time to night wean. A full night of sleep on a regular basis would be AWESOME!

[MujerMamaMismo]

Hi! Nice to see you around these parts.

If not a mattress, what about a toddler bed?

My sense is that kids this age don't transition well into cribs but a toddler bed jammed between your bed and the wall could work safely and would make nursing to sleep easier too.

Does she sleep through all her thrashing about or is she waking and needing to be resettled?

[2happymamas]

Putting a toddler bed next to ours might work. The problem I foresee is that our bed is really high. We have this platform bed and it is approximately 40 inches from the ground to the top of the mattress. I do not know that we would find a toddler bed close to that height and even if we did, I would not want her to be so high off the ground. Maybe when she's a bit older and walking.

We got out the PNP tonight and we are going to see how she does in there. We decided to put her in there initially and then bring her into bed with us once she wakes to nurse.

[ktmama]

We had the same problem with dd2. We put her in a crib in the hall outside our bedroom door and she slept through the night the very first night (and most nights since). That was at 15 months. Turns out we were the ones bothering her sleep!

[claddaghmom]

I'm very pro-family bed but what you describe is how two of my siblings were...they needed to sleep alone and went effortlessly into a toddler bed.