I posted here a couple of months ago about weaning my cosleeping 2-year-old. Well I have an update.
Almost immediately after he was weaned, my kid started sleeping through the night. But then his tossing and turning started getting really wild. He would crawl around the bed in a half sleep and sometimes he'd end up at the foot of the bed (no footboard), I guess because he no longer needed to stay close to me for nursing purposes. It was starting to feel like cosleeping wasn't working for us anymore.
I got a toddler bed and set it up without much fanfare, and he would play in it sometimes, or we'd lie in it together and read. A couple of weeks in, I asked him one night if he wanted to go to bed in "his bed" or the "big bed" and he picked his bed without hesitation, and has slept there almost every night since! On the nights we don't ask him what he wants, he sleeps in the big bed, but when we do ask, he always chooses the toddler bed. The video monitor shows him tossing and turning in the toddler bed too, but he doesn't wake up from it. And now my husband and I cuddle all night
Bedtime for us is still a 5-minute routine. When he starts rubbing his eyes, either he tells us he's sleepy or we tell him he looks sleepy (I talked a little about teaching him to recognize sleepy cues in my earlier post). At this age, sometimes he resists for a minute if we say it first, so it's better to wait for him to come to us. Then we ask him if he wants to go to his bed or the big bed, and we ask if he wants books or songs. We read 1-2 books or sing 2-3 songs and he falls asleep pretty immediately.
My husband really misses him in the big bed so it's nice to have him join us and enjoy the cuddles sometimes, but I could never have imagined how smoothly the weaning and independent sleep process could be for us. Just wanted to share this story as one possibility among many for cosleeping families.
Almost immediately after he was weaned, my kid started sleeping through the night. But then his tossing and turning started getting really wild. He would crawl around the bed in a half sleep and sometimes he'd end up at the foot of the bed (no footboard), I guess because he no longer needed to stay close to me for nursing purposes. It was starting to feel like cosleeping wasn't working for us anymore.
I got a toddler bed and set it up without much fanfare, and he would play in it sometimes, or we'd lie in it together and read. A couple of weeks in, I asked him one night if he wanted to go to bed in "his bed" or the "big bed" and he picked his bed without hesitation, and has slept there almost every night since! On the nights we don't ask him what he wants, he sleeps in the big bed, but when we do ask, he always chooses the toddler bed. The video monitor shows him tossing and turning in the toddler bed too, but he doesn't wake up from it. And now my husband and I cuddle all night
Bedtime for us is still a 5-minute routine. When he starts rubbing his eyes, either he tells us he's sleepy or we tell him he looks sleepy (I talked a little about teaching him to recognize sleepy cues in my earlier post). At this age, sometimes he resists for a minute if we say it first, so it's better to wait for him to come to us. Then we ask him if he wants to go to his bed or the big bed, and we ask if he wants books or songs. We read 1-2 books or sing 2-3 songs and he falls asleep pretty immediately.
My husband really misses him in the big bed so it's nice to have him join us and enjoy the cuddles sometimes, but I could never have imagined how smoothly the weaning and independent sleep process could be for us. Just wanted to share this story as one possibility among many for cosleeping families.
