We have always been fortunate that Nate sleeps fairly well during the night. Occasionally he might wake up crying but will go right back to sleep after we comfort him. HOWEVER...........just last week he started something new. It was 1am and I must have been half awake because I heard our bedroom door squeak open. At first I thought it was the dog needing to go to the bathroom but when I looked up, I saw this small dark shape standing by the foot of our bed. It took a moment to register that it was Nate. "Nate?" I asked and suddenly the little figure turned and ran out of our room. I got up and walked out and Nate was standing right outside our door just looking at me. No crying, no distressed look, no sweaty head from a bad dream, no......nothing. He was expressionless, just staring at me and didn't say a word. It was kinda creepy. I told him to go get back in his bed and go to sleep...and he did. He stayed in there until we got him up a few hours later.
Weird, huh?
Well EVERY night since then, he has got up in the wee morning hours and run to our room to open our door. At first we thought he was sleep walking but we've discovered he seems very much awake (and a little TOO consistent). When I put him back in bed and tell him he needs to stay in his room and call out for us if he's scared, he nods his head yes and says "yes". We've always kept his door closed and a nightlight on.
I don't know why he's decided to come running to our room every night, expressionless and seemingly fully awake. When he goes back to bed, he'll stay in there until we get him up in the morning. Frankly, it's bothering me because, 1: I don't enjoy waking up between 1am - 4am every morning and 2: I'm worried if I don't hear him get up, he'll find other things in the house to amuse himself with...that are not very kid-friendly.
Sooo..........anyone have any suggestions or experienced this before? I thought of putting up a baby gate but it looks like we still need to teach him to stay in his room until it's time to get up and to call out to us if he's scared (which I don't really think is the problem at this point). Maybe it has something to do with the newfound 2-yr old independence. By the way...he's also got a 2 yr molar poking through. Ahhh....fun.
6 comments:
I just wanted to say Nate is just adorable. I have 2 brothers adopted from China and I am myself. I am 13 years old and was adopted when I was 6 months old.
Happy New Year
Kennedy
http://yangzhoufundraising.blogspot.com/
Hi, Denise,
We put a gate at Owen's door to keep him from wandering while we were sleeping too when he moved from his crib to his big boy bed. He now goes to the gate and calls for us if he wakes up. We put his baby monitor in there so we can usually hear him if he wakes up and go to his room and put him back to bed before he wakes all the way up. Just an idea! :O)
Adrienne
We have a baby gate up at Grace's door. I found out early on when we switched her to the big grl bed that she does occasionally leave the room. She calls to me in the morning when she is up and ready to come out. She also knows how to open doors so just closing it does not help ether!
You could always hang abell around his neck...Just kidding sis. Our boys will do the same thing at times and we just tell to go back to bed. It took a few times, but they are generally good, unless someone had a leaky diaper/pull up.
No idea but that would creep me out too!
Our doctor told us 2 is a big transition time...sleep etc. We also have a gate even though he can climb out of it :)
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