4 year old....

gingin_2

Going to be harsh here....


If she is, by your admittance, an attention seeking child, then she might well be doing that - attention seeking. And you are playing right into her hands.

She's already getting you up in the night (and being comforted?) and has now got a new toy out of it. It sounds like it might be a crafty plan to me, especially as it is whingey crying and not full blown tears.

In my opinion, you need to be firm with her before bed and warn your other children that a few nights of tough love might be needed and they will have to put up with the tears. Give DD a sticker/ progress chart and let her put one on every morning that she has had a quiet night. Allow your other children to do this too and any child that has gone the week without disturbing others at night, can have a reward. Be seen to reward the others even if dd doesn't manage it and then hopefully the next week she will follow suit.


Good luck

mumslave

cloverfan wrote: »

will try popping another blanket on tonight when i go up,

mumslave, she is perfectly capable of telling me whats wrong but she just says she doesnt know. she is quite an attention seeking type of child and if there was a problem would relish in it and use it to the best of her advantage with everyone so am sure she would say.

|My daughter is 5 in april. She is not a good sleeper. It has nothing to do with attention seeking, she just doesnt settle well, despite up to the age of 4, sleeping 7-7 every night from when she was 3 months old, even when ill. She used to say she didnt know what was wrong then eventually she would say she just couldnt sleep. I was and still am a terrible sleeper as a child and I remember how horrible it was not being able to sleep when everyone else is, its lonely, scary and you feel physically horrible.

You say she sleeps with her two younger siblings. How much younger? Is she expected to be in bed at the same time as them? My 4 year old shares with her 3 year old sister and we have found by using a video monitor, that my 4 year old doesnt actually always wake up her sister when she has a bad night, sometimes its my three year old, but if you ask the three year old if she woke her sister, she will say...yes she did. Blatant lies! Unless you can actually see whats going on in the bedroom, dont immediately presume your other two are totally innocent.

With three to one room, I dont think there is much you can do. You cant make your 4 year old sleep, contrary to what most people think. They arent robots. However you can tell her she doesnt get out of bed and she doesnt wake her siblings. Use a reward chart to back this up, if she has say three nights of not waking her siblings, out of the seven she gets a reward. I would also consider taking her to the doctors, to make sure there is no medical reason she isnt settling. With tjhe younger siblings, if they are tired in the day from being woken, they need a nap. I suppose what I am trying to say is not to dismiss your 4 year old as necessarily attention seeking. Perhaps she is, but I find it odd that she isnt coming out with a load of excuses such as she is thirsty, needs the loo, blah blah blah. I dont know your child but I think at that age, there isnt any fun in it for her being awake in the night is there....so you need to try and work out why its happening.

*Louise*

My 4yo was doing this for a while - we figured he was having bad dreams, then when he woke up he was still scared but he couldn't say what had happened.

How many times have we as adults had a disturbing dream, then when we wake up we can't remember what happened?

We got him a small nightlight and that seems to have helped him a lot - when he wakes up he can see where he is and find his teddy etc.

Jakesmummy

My son is nearly 4 and is quite often like your daughter, it is so frustrating especially as my baby sleeps so well at night i never hear a peep out of her!

i normally have to go and tuck him back in, quite often he doesnt even seem properly awake, and doesnt make any sense so am assuming its bad dreams tbh, ive had to start leaving the landing light on too because he gets quite distressed if he wakes up and its pitch black, x

tandraig

I think she is having disturbing dreams which are unsettling her, rather than nightmares which would wake her up crying - then naturallly when she does wake she isnt remembering them. possibly to do with whatever happened back inOctober, she may not be clear about the actual events but is carrying over a feeling of fear or uncertainty.
the dreamcatcher idea is a good one - I make them and know little kids love them and if you tell them the legend they beleive so absolutely in them its sometimes all you need to help them have a good nights sleep.
If you cant get hold of a suitable dreamcatcher PM me and I will make her one.
and no I am not drumming up business - I wont charge.

tiamai_d

I have dreams that wake me up and leave me crying or upset or generally unsettled and I'm 28!

I bought a dreamcatcher for DS1 who had night terrors as well as night mares and it did help a lot. We would go through the story of how they work and make sure that there was some attention focused on it before bed. The nightmares have stopped and he is slowly growing out of the night terrors.

I remember when I was 6 I had a terrible time at nights. I could only sleep in one position, but it changed every night, or the aliens would find me and take me away. Sounds so silly now but at the time I firmly believed it (no idea where I got the idea from). Then I had a spate of horrible dreams which featured Satan, he saw me and knew who I was and could find me in my dreams. Eventually my mum took me to the doctors and I saw a nice lady every week who taught me how to lucid dream so I was in control of the dream. I can still do it now if I practice. But even now my dreams are very vivid, I often don't actually know if I have dreamt something or if it is real and at night when you are confused and sleepy it is hard to rationalise things. Even worse for children who don't know whats going on.

And yes, events that happened years ago can often crop up in my subconscious at night.

Just reassure her before bed, get a dreamcatcher and a bed buddy, focus her attention on them before going to sleep, if she goes to sleep thinking that her dreamcatcher will stop her bad dreams then it will work. Teach her to remember her dreamcatcher if she is having a bad dream.

Best of luck, poor sleep is no fun at all.

ailuro2

There are a few things here that can possibly be improved - you know her best.

is she settling down well enough? - do they still have a nice relaxed bedtime story, do they have a milky drink and a little supper before bed, no excitement etc. and at the same time every night, to help them get into a good bedtime routine?

Is it a sugar crash - is she eating something high GI too close to bedtime, then waking when her sugar levels get low.

Is it because the nights are getting lighter again and this has disrupted her sleeping patterns?

Is something different in nursery or at home that she is worrying about.

Is she waking because she needs the loo?

Once you have thought through everything, you might notice something has changed.

She might be going through a growth spurt, I know my DD used to get dreadfully painful knees when she took a stretch, talk to her and remind her about how to describe where things hurt.

If you think she's attention seeking then she'll be doing it during the day too - work on the daytime stuff first and the nightime stuff should follow.
I wouldn't leave a child to cry itself back to sleep in the night, I was left to do that when I was little and had nightmares, it was so terrifying and miserable to be sent back to bed and left to deal with it, I still remember lying there thinking the things chasing me were still there, waiting for me to go back to sleep so they could get me.:o

Savvy_Sue

Is she actually waking up? Because if she is, the thing to tackle is the disturbance. So a nightlight on all night so it's not scary dark, a teddy or special friend to cuddle so it's not scary alone, and maybe a quiet cassette (or CD) player for her to drift back to sleep by so it's not scary quiet. And no crying, because there's no need.

chumbasmum

I know straight away that by saying this I will be shouted down and said to be terrible but this worked for us....
My ds was 4 and had always been a good sleeper but out of the blue he was waking in early hours saying he had bad dreams and he could tell us. He was hysterical, couldn't be left and no manner of night lights, talking, etc would help and we were exhausted as it happened every night. It eventually became and issue of being frightened of having a bad dream that was the issue. I remember being at my wits end and me and OH we not feeling very good at all.
I eventually took him to the doctor (who also said that he looked like a very tired boy) and we agreed to a mild sedative that we would give for a week max. It worked like a treat. After feeling guilty for drugging my child I only used it for 4 days and it seemed to get him out of the habit and we haven't looked back. He still has the odd bad dream but not at the level that this was at and after lots of hugs he quiet happily gets himself back to sleep.

It is a thought and a suggestion - please don't be too unsympathetic to me.

tandraig

chumbasmum - it worked for you didnt it? while i dont advocate drugging kids - sometimes it can break a cycle used short term. I dont have a problem with that, and you used it for the childs benefit not your own! your child was suffering night terrors though, this child isnt.