Sleep help

Hi mom’s,

Looking for some sleep advice.

I have 2 year old girls, they slept without issues until 8 months. A pretty severe sleep regression led us to doing sleep training, cry it out method. It worked very well and up until just before 2 we were doing well.

We then hit another wobbly and attempted sleep training again. This time we failed miserably, I found it much harder especially because they now actually screamed “mommy” and then the one fell out of her cot and landed hard on the floor. We were not prepared to risk her being hurt and stopped. We then shortly after moved them to beds. They are in separate rooms and hubby lies with one and I with the other until they fall asleep. Yes I realize I have created a sleep association. The other issue is that they have gone from falling asleep at 7 to now falling asleep only around 10. They both wake up during the night. My hubby cheated and kept bringing the one he puts to bed into our bed. The other one screams blue murder for me and will only go to me. I inevitably end up sleeping in her bed where she will wake me up a further 3 or 4 times asking for bottles and so on. I am literally ill with exhaustion.

My husband is away on business fairly often and has quite an extended trip coming up next month and I’m just not going to cope alone. I have tried putting them both in my bed out of desperation when he is away and this just leads to even less sleep for me.

I have now moved their beds into one room and put a baby gate up so that I can leave their door open. I am not keen to do cry it out as they are both fond of smashing their heads into the floor when they are upset.

I am at an absolute loss on how to solve this.

We do have a routine for bedtime. They have dinner, a bath, a night time bottle and then bed by 7. I have abandoned reading a book as they fight over the book.
They have a night light, white noise and there room is very simple with no toys to stimulate.

 

I think your bed time routine is nice with a bath and bottle-would they lay in bed to watch a video ( I know some kids this will wake them up more, but my kids would get sleeping watching certain cartoons) I'd leave the TV on until I went to bed and they were asleep and then turn it off. There are some really calming shows you could play such as the Goodnight show. Also, I know they are still little but some short stretches (yoga) and breathing meditation can help get them sleepy and calm them before getting in bed. We've also used dim lava lamps that they could look at and that helped as well.
But if you are exhausted and desperate, co-sleeping isn't the worst thing in the world. *hugs*