Horrid nights and teething

amother

Sat, Jun 13 2009, 9:46 pm

Gradually, thanks to mine and my husbands misplaced rachmanus, our 2 year old has picked up some bad habits that are now unbearable and I need advice how to fix it.
He used to go to sleep with no bottle, in his crib in his own room, and only had a bottle for his afternoon nap. He was sleeping through the night, but now is waking up 3 or 4 times a night, demanding a bottle, screaming bloody murder if we don't get him the bottle.
He refuses to fall asleep in the crib and will only fall asleep on my bed, my husband's bed, or the couch, and only after he's asleep can we move him to a crib in OUR room.
When he wakes up, often he's even screaming his head off when he has the bottle, in my bed, etc... He'll take over my whole bed, not leaving any room for me, and I end up spending the rest of the night on the couch, or in a very uncomfortable position falling off my bed or being kicked in impossible places.

The reason its got to this point is because he is teething majorly, getting in molars, along with fever, and is so miserable from the pain etc... If it were one or two nights of this, maybe... but its continuing for too long, as his molars are taking forever to actually come in.

I need to break these habits, they're making mine and my husband's nights miserable.
I need suggestions.
I'm not opposed to letting him cry it out in another room. I just don't know if that is the best course of action when he is so miserable from teething. But I need my sleep, as does my husband, and feeling like we're gonna explode from annoyance at him in the middle of the night (when NOTHING we're doing for him- 2 bottles, in my bed, etc, and he's still screaming bloody murder) is good enough is no good for any of us.

Would you just suck it up until he's done teething and then work to break these horrid habits? Or would you break these habits now, and if so, how?

rowo

Wed, Jun 17 2009, 9:10 pm

maybe try some medicine for his pain.
or some sort of positive reinforcement system. at abt 22 months ds was coming into our room almost every night. I made a poster for him with a few boxes and his name and we decorated it together. I told him that if he stays in his bed the whole night we'll put a sticker in a box. and when they r all full he'll get a present (I put a little pic of a present at the bottom).
I wasnt sure if he understood properly, but in the middle of the night we could remind him abt his stickers and prresent and it worked most of the time. I also made a big deal about the stickers in the morning if he had stayed in bed all night. it worked pretty well. he still wakes up sometimes, but now I think its night terrors, and he stays in his own bed.