At what age do kids put themselves to sleep? - Page 2

[ammiga]

My dd is 2.5 and after her bedtime routine and tucking in, she can usually fall asleep by herself. She will call one of us back in there a few times to make sure we are really here if she needs us, but we don't need to rock her to sleep. I would still say she needs help to sleep, because it isn't like we just say "good night" and go. It's a process and takes a lot of love and comfort. And there are still plenty of nights that we are in her room until she is asleep.

We only started weaning her off of us being in there when we were stimulating her more than comforting her by being in there, regardless of how calm and quiet we were. That started about 2 months ago. Now, if she keeps us in there, she really does need us to relax to sleep, and we would never deprive her of that need.

[KatWozBlue]

I think my son was 2 1/2 and took six months of laying with him until finally we would just kiss and leave the room and he would sleep, he was a bit of a struggle, but once he dropped his nap it went much easier

my daugther was around 18 months old, same thing, we would lay with her less and less and she actually became the easiest child to put to sleep

today my son is 6 and my daughter 3 and we literally read books, kiss goodnight and my daughter is sleeping by 7:15 and son is asleep by 8:00, both are up at 7

[Katie T]

I think every child is different. My 3 1/2yo can put him self to sleep if he is tired enough but usually I still lay with him. I have to lay and nurse his sister (almost 2yo) to sleep anyways.

My oldest didn't start putting herself to sleep till closer to 4yo. Good luck thought.

[bobandjess99]

MY 5.75 won't sleep by herself at all, period. The 2,5 yo won't either.

[Artichokie]

my 29 mo old still nurses to sleep 100% of the time. She has started resettling herself at night so she HAS started to fall BACK asleep without help, but to initially go to sleep she still needs me.

[Xerxella]

We have a nice routine. Bath, stories, prayers, etc. The key to DS falling asleep was the "we'll check on you" clause. We check on him a couple of times and then tell him we'll check on him after he falls asleep.

The reason I want my daughter to go to sleep on her own is that I think then when she wakes at night she would be able to go back to sleep on her own, too.

We actually had fabulous success at nap time yesterday. She fell asleep after about 20 minutes with just me sitting in the chair by her bed and slept 1 1/2 hours. I figure over time, I'll do the long good bye sort of routine. (When you move the chair farther and farther away from the bed until you're "just outside the door.")

P.S. She did wake up last night when her brother woke up to go potty. I nursed her back to sleep and fell asleep myself before I woke up and put her down. I guess I'll have to try to stay awake to get her to go down on her own!