Saturday 16 April 2016

Toddler Sleep

When pregnant with my first child some friends recommended buying a porta-cot instead of a normal cot. The reasoning being it was easier to move around and didn’t take up as much space. Having a small and an irregular shaped room to be used as the nursery I decided it was a good idea. It also had the bassinet insert. However Master J seemed to hate the sleeping in that so I brought a traditional bassinet and moved him into our room till he outgrew the bassinet and moved back into the lowered part of the porta-cot at five months.

Fast forward eight months and my Master J still hated the cot. It took hours for him to go sleep and I felt like I had done everything possible when a friend suggested maybe he hated being confined. I thought maybe just maybe this person was correct but what was I to do? I couldn’t move a thirteen month old in to a bed could I? After a couple of weeks I decided I would buy Master J a single bed. I brought side rails to stop him from rolling out and was prepared to set it up when I was called by the hospital for my son to have an operation so I held off setting up the bed a moved the porta-cot in my room to be close to my son during his recovery period.

When Master J had recovered at fourteen months I set up the bed in his room beside the porta-cot which left hardly any room to move around but I wanted to cot in case the bed didn’t work out. He didn’t seem to notice the bed in his room. So after two nights I put him in his bed and followed our routine which at this stage was to stay with him until he fell asleep. It worked, he fell asleep cuddled up to his favourite bear. Apart from Master J being a terrible sleeper since birth up until about 19 months he settled into the bed quite well.

Now for Master T who is a fantastic sleeper and has been since we came home from the hospital. He also used the bassinet up until 5 months at which point we moved him to the cot that was given to us by my grandparents. It was good solid drop down side cot. Master T started having day naps in it from about four months and made the transition to sleeping at night with no problems. He was sleeping through by this time and I would have preferred he stay in my room for a bit longer but there isn’t enough space for a cot in our bedroom.

We then put Master T into a porta-cot just before his first birthday due to him constantly hitting his head against the bars of the cot which would result in him screaming. So we moved into the porta-cot and he was fine after about three nights.

After his first birthday I removed the side of the cot to turn into a toddler bed with a side rail and while he sleeps in the porta-cot at night he has his day naps in the cot turned toddler bed.

Now at almost fourteen months the question I ask myself and Mr C is when we transfer him to the toddler bed. Now or closer to age two when we buy him a single bed?

I’m interested in knowing when you moved your toddlers to a toddler bed or single beds.

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