Would you like to have me answer your sleep question in my next video? If so, scroll down and submit your question in the comment section below. I will pick several questions a month to answer and post them here on the blog!
If you would rather read than watch my above video then here is the transcript of this week’s video: Hi! Kim West, The Sleep Lady. And today, I’m going to answer Runa’s question. She wrote in with the following. “I have a six-month-old and a 27-month-old. My 27-month-old starts out every night in his crib but wakes up at some point in the wee hours and comes in to our bed and finishes out the night and the morning there. We started this when I was pregnant with number two and was too tired to deal. Last night, I woke up to find him in our bed. He just started climbing out of his crib. My six-month-old has been in a co-sleeper and has slept all night 8:00 to 6:00 until recently. She also used to suck her thumb to help her go to sleep and now, she just cries. We thought about getting another crib versus transitioning my son to a bed and putting my daughter in the crib. They will share a room so she has been napping in his room. Please help. Where do I start? You’re right, Runa, you have your hands full because you also have two children very close in age and you have two children’s sleep problems that you have to improve. I would first say if there are two parents available that can help, I would probably start with them separately, not in the same room. If you want to, I don’t know if you’re fine with the baby continuing to sleep in the co-sleeper, then just make sure she goes in to her co-sleeper awake so that she can learn how to put herself to sleep and maybe you’re already doing that with naps which is great because that will make it very easy for her to transition and sleep through the night and they actually share a room with your 27-month-old. And then, with your son, you have to decide whether what his cognitive skills are and his verbal skills are and how articulate or not articulate he is and whether he can understand stay in your bed all night long because, of course, that will be your bigger challenge in terms of keeping him in a bed and not returning him to a crib. If it has been fairly recently, I might consider you going back to the crib and making sure that mattress is all the way down low, consider even a crib tent. You can also put him in a sleep sack, that zippers up, if he is the kind of a guy who climbs out of the crib by lifting the one leg up and then flipping over and hanging and dropping off crib. They’re usually actually pretty good at it. If he is a head first kind of guy, then don’t do the sleep sack thing. Think about a crib tent. And then, of course, you would perceive to do The Sleep Lady shuffle whether he is in the crib or in the bed and then once he is doing well and you also have somebody else working with the six-month-old, drowsy but awake at bedtime, then I would put the six-month-old into the 27 month old’s room and go from there. Okay. I know I made it sound easier than it is. But you just go in step by step and maybe even just one child at a time. If you don’t have two parents to work at the same time then start with the 27-month-old. Okay. Good luck! I hope that helps. Sleep tight, Kim Video filmed by In Focus Studios
If you have successfully conquered similar sleep problems, please share your encouraging words! Please feel free to click the “reply” link under this article and leave them a comment. Supporting each other makes parenting so much easier!
