Four Year Old Fights Bedtime…HARD

[ambience00]

Good evening all,

So sorry if this has been done to death, but I could use some advice, or at least a sympathetic ear. I have a four year old daughter. I would say 85% of the time she’s a delight. Good reports from PreK, good manners, plays well with others, and super sweet to me and her mom. The problem is that when she hears the word “bedtime” a flip switches. We are talking Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. She stops listening, she argues, she throws fits, becomes mean; she’s like a whole different person. If we start her routine at 7:45 on average she’s asleep by 9:30,‘sometimes later. We have literally tried everything, the next step is therapy, more for me and her mom to learn some tips on what we can do to curb the behavior. The one small beacon of hope we have is that once she is down she VERY rarely wakes up until 7:30-8am the next day(knock on wood). Anyone else have this issues? Any tips? Thanks so much for reading and again I’m sorry if this has been asked a million times.

 

[bcarruthers]

@ambience00 We went through this. If you want her asleep by 7:45 you need to cut the 2 hour nap. Mine sleeps from 7:45pm-8am every night. If she happens to fall asleep in the afternoon her bedtime will be around 9/9:30. At four year old you’re looking at 10-13 hours of sleep in a 24 hour period. 7:45-7-45 is 12 hours right there.

 

[fremedios]

@ambience00 All of these are from us having the same experience... Kiddo needs to be tired earlier.

Various tactics we used:

1 - Wake her up earlier in the morning.
2 - No more naps. (HUGE)
3 - Earlier dinner if you eat late. Especially if you she's a carb-lover.
4 - Less carbs, more fiber and protein at/after dinner. (Full tummy, not much sugar energy)
5 - No screens at all 60 or 90 minutes before desired sleep time.
6 - Snuggles and reading before bed. Let the kiddo pick the story. Use a low calm whispery voice.
7 - warm bath/shower before bed, even if no real need to scrub.

I will say we actively avoided melatonin supplements. They're supposed to work, but my wife found some correlation to early onset puberty.

 

[fremedios]

Also, water or milk only after school. No juice or other sugar drinks.

 

[jentam]

@ambience00 We had the same issue.

Solution? We just let me son stay up later....everyone was much happier.

Many years later he's a good kid, does well in school, lots of friends etc.

No harm was done.

 

[emma1976]

@ambience00 If your kid has to nap, just embrace the later bedtime. I find once your expectations change, kids respond to your new calm. However, with the weekend coming up, it's a good time to implement some changes, as they usually tale 3 days or so for kids to adapt in my experience.

Have a longer, gentler nighttime routine. No talk of bedtime, just ease into it. You said you do a 20 minute routine, maybe bump it up to 45 minutes, just giving her your full, calm attention in that time. Sometimes, because the say was busy and she was at preschool, she didn't get time with you, and some (not all) bad behavior could be coming from a place of wanting that attention from you.

Turn off the lights. Damn, this one was amazing, and if you try one thing I suggest, let it be this. Get some little lights, candles, book light, night light, maybe even just cover a lamp with a scarf, and turn off all other lights in the house. We use some very soft led candles, which make everything feel calm and cozy. Pitch it to her as camping or a game. Maybe even play a game, like light tag, or hide and seek, before you go to her room to lie down. Lights out has really changed my kid's sleepiness levels. Once we turn them out, after ten minutes she is quiet, calm, and ready for bed. It did take three days or so for her to understand the tiredness and embrace it, there were some tantrums initially, but now it's so amazing. Lights go out, we have a drink (warm tea), talk quietly or listen to a story podcast. By the end of 15 minutes, she's almost asking to go to bed.

 

[brotherjay]

@ambience00 Info: What is her daily/bedtime routine?

 

[ambience00]

@brotherjay So bathroom, teeth, story, a few songs with me and her mom singing at her bed. Whole thing takes 20 mins.

 

[brotherjay]

@ambience00 That sounds really normal. What's her routine during the day? I ask because maybe she's not getting enough activity or maybe a screen too close to bed? Have you tried making bedtime later? I know doctors say 4 year olds need 10ish hours of sleep but that is an average.

 

[ambience00]

@brotherjay She’s in prek from 8-5, takes a two hour nap there from 1-3. One of the things we did was eliminate screen time after school, and it helped for about two weeks, then this all started again.

 

[katrina2017]

@ambience00 Most kids that age don’t nap. She’s not ready to go to bed at 8 pm and sleep for 12 hours, in addition to a 2 hour nap.

 

[depaul1203]

@ambience00 That's a really long nap for a 4 yo. Could the school change it to quiet time instead? I put my kids to bed as early as 6:30, they'd sleep until 6 the next morning easily

 

[brotherjay]

@ambience00 The only suggestions I could make is eliminate the nap, or put her to bed later, or get her up earlier. Or maybe sign her up for an afternoon swim class? My son quit taking naps at 3. Or maybe one mg of melatonin after dinner?

 

[stuart01]

@ambience00 This sounds like us with our 4 year old about 6 months ago or so. What finally made bed time easier for us was removing the nap, as someone else mentioned. We used to fight for hours with her every night, with her getting out of bed multiple times per night, ending in tears multiple times per week. Since stopping the nap, it takes her maybe 10-20 minutes to fall asleep and she doesn't typically wake up until morning.

 

[ambience00]

@stuart01 I’m seeing this a lot, but unfortunately her daycares policy is to nap, so there’s not much we can do

 

[ecat0r]

@ambience00 My son just turned 4 and does this some nights if he isn't tired. He has a laptop that we let him watch videos. I just tell him that if he can't go to bed on time, that i have to take the laptop away and that he won't be allowed to watch it for a while. This has been very effective; I haven't needed to actually take the laptop away yet.