Sleep training doesn’t get easier

I thought we had passed the challenge of sleep training a few years ago since our baby is 5, but turns out I was wrong.  Although all our girls have their own rooms, our youngest daughter does not like sleeping alone, and we have always been firm about not letting children sleep in our room.  In fact, my husband wasn’t even thrilled with the girls sleeping in our room when they were infants.  So, the youngest girl, who is now 5, was sleeping on a mattress on the floor in one of her sister’s room, but developed the habit over the last few months of climbing into her sister’s bed at night.  Big sis didn’t like it.  She was okay with little sis sleeping on a matress, but not in her bed. 

So, we have to sleep train all over again.  We have to train a 5 year old to sleep in her own bed—all night.  I made a chart and told her she would get a prize when the chart was filled.  She had to sleep in her own bed.  Unfortunately, for four nights in a row she woke up crying in the middle of the night, and had a very hard time falling back asleep.   

Since she is 5 and very verbal, we had a long talk about it in the morning, and asked her what to do.  She said she will be brave enough soon to sleep all night, but “not tonight.”  Ah!!  I don’t do well without enough sleep, nor does she. 

We talked about it again before bedtime that night, and told her she had to sleep all night, but maybe she wants something to cuddle with.  She said she really wanted a human to cuddle with (no joke, she said it).  We offered a stuffed animal to cuddle with.  She said she needed all the stuffed animals.  You can imagine that a house with three girls (four really when you include me) has a lot of stuffed animals.  Here is a picture of her bed.  She slept all night last night with all those stuffed animals, and here’s to hoping it works again tonight.