2 year olds that stall at bedtime, climb out of the crib and wake all night!
Do you have a 2-2.5 year old that makes the bedtime routine into a 2-hour long process, is an escape artist as soon as you put her in the crib or is STILL waking up in the middle of the night?
These are three of the biggest behaviors I typically see with this age, so if your toddler is doing one – or all! – of these, you’re not alone!
Here are some tips to help with these three issues:
Stalling at bedtime
Stalling at bedtime is often associated with parents not clearly defining expectations around sleep.
One way to improve this is by having a very consistent bedtime routine. I love physical bedtime routine charts where kids this age can “check off” activities in the bedtime routine and visual timers to keep the process moving. This makes it much easier to say no when your child asks for “just one more book”. For ideas of making a homemade routine chart, take a look at my Pinterest board on charts. And here is the visual timer that is very effective at helping children understand that they get 10 minutes in the bath or 5 minutes until the bedtime routine starts to help minimize the “one more minute” requests! The timer can be “the bad guy” instead of you when you say, “The timer went off so it’s time to….”
Trying to climb out of the crib
Many 2 year olds are tall enough to figure out how to climb out of the crib (thankfully many of them don’t realize it’s a possibility!). The problem is that they’re not developmentally ready for the independence of a bed until ~3 years old. There are several strategies I use with my clients to keep these kiddos in the crib, but first we always:
make sure to flip the crib around if the taller side is against the wall,
put the sleep sack on backwards so their child can’t remove it easily (so much harder to climb out wearing a “potato sack” as one dad recently called them!) OR sew a piece of fabric between the legs of the pajamas so it’s incredibly hard to lift one leg over the rail
make sure there’s only one blanket and/or lovey in the crib – and that they aren’t thick enough to use as a step up!
If you do those three things and it isn’t a deterrent, then it’s time to think about a sleep training method that likely incorporates rewards and consequences.
Thinking about starting sleep training? Download your free PDF to help set you up for success!
Waking up in the middle of the night
And lastly, there are two main reasons why children this age wake in the middle of the night: they’re overtired and/or they’re looking for attention from you.
Overtiredness makes it harder to fall asleep and stay asleep so making sure your child is on the right schedule for naps and bedtime is key.
And when they wake in the middle of the night and you come re-tuck them in or give another goodnight kiss…guess what? They just got positive reinforcement for waking up at 2am! Even if you go in frustrated and exhausted, they’re still getting negative attention. Once a child is on the right schedule and getting their “attention bucket” filled during the day, these middle of the night wakings go away quickly.
If it seems like you’ve tried these things to get your 2 year old to fall asleep easily – and stay asleep all night until a reasonable time in the morning – and it’s just not clicking, I’d love to chat and give you my evaluation of the situation!
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This post is for informational purposes only and may not be the best fit for you, your child and/or your personal situation. It shall not be construed as medical advice. The information and education provided here is not intended or implied to supplement or replace professional medical treatment, advice, and/or diagnosis. Always check with your child’s physician or medical professional before trying or implementing any information read here.