Question
Dear parent guru,
My wife Sarah and I have two darling children Pippa (3yo) and Bennett (10 months). Bennett has been sleeping well through the night, but Pippa has become too much to handle in the middle of the night. Her nighttime activities are a huge burden on the family. No sleep = cranky family = no bueno.
My wife and I have tried so many approaches and strategies for the past 6 months. Yes, her nighttime scream-athons, have been going on for 6 months.
Here is a description of a typical night I am discussing. Either Sarah or I will go through our bed time routine (bath, 2 stories, 1 song, prayer, kisses, hugs, and uga-muga (Daniel Tiger fans will know what I am talking about). Then, before bed we often remind her of the bed time rules of: don't make any noise until the bunny wakes up (toddler alarm clock), meaning its bed time and sleep quietly in your room. She will adorably say yes Daddy/Mommy and even repeat back to you the rule. She is quiet convincing and cute when she does this.
After 30 min of quiet, Pippa will yell down to mom/dad on the first floor that she needs a tissue, or water, or something. We will usually sush her becasue and remind her of the rule and that she will wake up her brother. Our efforts don't seem to send the message, so one of us goes upstairs to her room where her door is open and she is standing at child gate in her doorway. In 20 words or less we give her a brief review of our expectations for bed time. A hug usually works in the end to get her back in bed.
After everyone is asleep, Pippa starts crying in her room. softly for a moment. Then louder and louder. Its about 1am. Sarah or I take turns dealing with said midnight screamer, and after waking us up, we will give a loud shhhhhhh! down the hall. We try to ignore it and go to back to sleep, but Pippa continues to louder. By 5 min, I get up and stand at the gate and remind her of the rule.expectation that she be quiet until the "bunny wakes up"(toddler alarm clock). I will walk back to bed. She will continue.
After about 3 more min of this, baby Bennett wakes up. Now we have two babies crying in their room, two parents awake, and a dog that wonders why we ever decided to add human children to our pack (Brody the dog was our furry-first born).
This can sometimes go on for about 20-30 min. And this has been known to happen multiple times in one night.
Half the time it seems like she wakes up and is having night terrors, but the other half it seems like she is awake and just in the worst mood imaginable and won;t listen to anything. Its like she ids having a 10.0 tantrum in the middle of the night. Since Pippa was 2 we have instilled the trantrum place when she has a tantrum. Its the bathroom. If she is really defiant in a midnight tantrum as I am describing, I will take her downstairs to the bathroom and put her in her tantrum place with the door open while I wait outside. But sometimes it works sometimes it makes things worse. But I could say that about almost all our measures to enforce family sleeping rules.
So we need advice, parent guru.
Should we spank her in the moment when she gets very defiant, tantrum is at an 11.0 (Spinal Tap), and she kicks and screams, banging on doors?
Should we invoke the ROSEMOND ticket system here? if so, how would you do it?
Should we buy more expensive ear plugs?
Thank you for your insight thoughts and time.
