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17 month wont sleep

Tanya - posted on 08/25/2009 ( 4 moms have responded )

162

My 17 year old son has never been big at sleeping. I have been trying anything I can to try to get him to sleep at night.

I have tired putting him to bed as late as I can keep him up before he passes out, putting him to bed as soon as he shows signs of being tired. We have played outside a lot to get fresh air, even whe he goes swimming he will not sleep more than 3 hours at a time before he wakes up to nurse again. And I know he is not needing it, he is just want to use me as a sucky.

He has proven that he knows how to sleep because he has given me a few teaser nights of sleep of 6-8 hours straight through.

I have tired co-sleeping with him, and as an infant it worked great, but now that he is older he things sleeping with mommy and daddy is playtime and he wont go to sleep at all. I also do not agree with putting him in his crib and letting him cry it out for a few hours until he falls asleep on his own. I have tired it a few times, and he gets himself so worked up he pukes, and then it is even harder to get him to sleep.

I am at my wits end and have no idea where to turn next.

I have also tired all the tricks of keeping the room dark, and talking to him in a calm voice, but it doesn't seem to help. Right now he is so wide awake he is sitting in his highchair eating a cooking and watching TV. He is not hungry because he is only taking little bites and more so playing with the cookie.

I really hope this makes sense, I am on 4 or 5 days of very limited sleep! Please help us!!

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Stephanie - posted on 09/02/2009

208

I always heard you should put a baby/ child to bed early and they wake up early.. I decided to try a set routine with my son and he sleeps from 5/530pm- 6/630 am. We start out feeding him dinner, letting him play in a bath using nighttime bubbles, followed by nighttime lotion and pjs, and a bottle... he's now starting to stay awake in order to get comfy in his crib- he's 10mos. old and this routine has worked since he was 6 mos.

Tanya - posted on 08/29/2009

162

I am going to have to try the 'movie' thing at bed time thanks for the idea. I did however move him out of his crib and but him on the floor of his room and he had an amazing night sleep. He was only up once, the bad thing come 4:45am he was ready to wake up because he has gotten so much sleep ... lol ... oh well, nap time with be really early this morning.

Geralyn - posted on 08/28/2009

1,615

We also do "movie time" before bed. Once his favorite movie ends, he'll go to sleep within minutes (usually) ... nursing of course. And Tanyam my son will sleep for up to 3 horus and then wants to nurse. He'll nurse for a few minutes and then pull himself off a turn over. He never really fully wakes up, which is helpful... I used to be able to sleep when my son nursed when he was smaller, but I have noticed its harder to sleep through it... unfortunately. But we keep cosleeping, and I just work on getting myself back to sleep. I wish you rest as you work through this...

Brenda - posted on 08/27/2009

2,386

My four year old went through these stages, and we worked them out slowly. He is still tough to get to sleep, but its the way he's always been. I personally would give cosleeping another try especially if he's needing to nurse during the night, just so you can get some rest.

With my four year old, when he was that age, I would feed him to sleep (he unfortunately had to be bottle fed). He would usually wake at least once during the night. My problem has always been my husband will play with him in the bed, roll around and stuff. The way I actually got him to sleep is before bed we'd have movie time. He was allowed to pick out a movie (usually Elmo or something short), and we would watch it with the rule that after it was over he had to go to sleep, and if he didn't he didn't get his movie the next night. Then I'd turn the tv off and we'd cuddle as he drank a bottle, and I'd either sing or tell him a story to get his mind to settle down after watching tv. I don't know if this would work for you, but it helped us out tremendously.