Parenting Forums

Posted: 08 July 2008 at 10:15pm | IP Logged

Joshua has been going to bed and left to fall asleep alone since he was 4 weeks old (he's now 5 years old). Ive always taken him up, tucked him in and left him to fall asleep, never have I had to sooth him to sleep (unless he was ill) or had to let him sleep on the sofa and transfer him to bed. Yes some nights he is restless and up and down or tries to play a little while longer, but on the whole he goes up, reads himself a story and goes to sleep.

For the last 2-3 weeks he has been a real handful to get to bed. He goes up ok, but gets upset as soon as I leave the room. I havent been giving in to him, I have told him its slep time and left him. Most nights he has cried, real sobbing crying. I ask him whats the matter and he said he is scared to be upstairs alone. Some nights he will force himself to stay awake until I come up to bed, and then seems to instantly settle and fall asleep.

I have tried talking to him, and he has a very good understanding and ability to communicate back, but he tells me he doesn't like to feel alone. He has always been such an out going boy, and from 6am until 8pm he is no different. This just kicks in at bedtime, and I dont think he is toying for more time, because he is genuinely upset about something. Ive bought him a new bedspread and teddy to snuggle him in bed, and he can put his light on and off as he wants. I dont know how to get to the bottom of this. He hasnt slept out any where so I dont think its stemmed from that. He has always suffered night terrors, but they have been very infrequent in the last 18 months. There seems to be nothing that has happened, and all he will tell me is that he doesnt like to be on his own. What can I do to help him? He needs his sleep or he is really hard work the next day. I hate seeing him upset, I just want to be able to do something!

Posted: 09 July 2008 at 7:32am | IP Logged

Hunny my eldest went through a stage similar to this.... all of a sudden he was scared to be alone upstairs and it turned out to be 1 of 2 things.

1) he'd woken in the night and was scared of the shadows etc..... I didn't want to go down the whole night light route and left the ladding one on so he knew i was still close and i was fairly noisy downstairs (if that makes sense).... clattering the dishes etc. And when i knew he'd settled i'd turn the light off.... this got earlier and earlier and we went out and brought a tourch so if he needed to he could have light etc which he slept with on velcro to the edge of his bed.

2) he was worried he was missing out on bits at night time and wanted to be an adult and go to bed at the same time.

I might be off the mark but these cropped up at about 5yrs.

Good luck hunny x