Reader's question about waiting out the 18-21 month transition

Many of you have written about being in the middle of one of the major stage transitions in development and not knowing what to do if sleep-training isn't a good option during these sensitive ages. Here's a typical question, from K:

I have a 20 month old daughter who has most definitely been in
the 18-21 month transition you describe: her language acquisition has
been breathtakingly fast, she has been suffering from extreme
separation anxiety, and she has gone from a once a night wake-up to
three or four times a night.  She has been getting her eyeteeth for
what seems like forever, and she's been a *terrible* teether--she
really suffers--so I have been saying that I would not try to night
wean her till she's done with the eyeteeth. She is still nursing, and
we co-sleep, albeit she sleeps the beginning of most nights in a kid's
bed pushed up against our mattress.

I am writing tonight because, for the last several weeks, our usual
nurse-to-sleep routine has been intermittently inneffective. On those
nights when I had to put her down "sleepy but awake" she initially
would squirm around for a bit, and then, after 30 or 40 minutes, fall
asleep. Only the last week or so, and the last two nights in
particular, she has not fallen asleep at all, rather she has gotten
more and more active in the bed, finally chanting "Mama? Mama? Mama?
Mama?" till I am ready to scream... My tack has been to get up and
move towards the door, which gets her to stop chanting my name, but
starts her crying. Oy.  I know this is not a good thing, to get up and
make her cry, but I am sooooo tired, burnt-out, and done with it, and
I just don't know what else to do.  Clearly, my sitting with her is
not helping her fall asleep.  Tonight, after I gave up after an hour
of sitting with her, her father went in to her, and she just screamed
and screamed for 30 minutes, till he brought her downstairs to me
because he was afraid she would hurt herself screaming.  So I calmed
her down, went upstairs, and nursed her to sleep, finally, at 10pm.
(We started what I call the "wind down" at 8pm)

I am of the opinion that what's going on is separation anxiety of a
sort--she knows I will leave the room at some point, and gets more and
more anxious when I don't leave the room, and more and more awake. I
am really not sure what to do about it, though.  Night-weaning has
suddenly become a hazy goal for another time: right now I just want
her to get the sleep she needs by going to sleep before 10pm.  This is
not good for any of us... But she's in that transition period where
sleep training seems to be not such a good idea, right? Would it make
sense to just allay her fears by staying with her till she falls
asleep no matter how long it takes and how hyper she gets? Would
nursing her downstairs and having my husband take her up just transfer
the problem to a different person? (She would not do this without much
protest, I am sure.) Or is it time to take on a sleep training
routine, grit our teeth and make a go of it?

Oy indeed! Most of what I've got for you is huge amounts of sympathy; this really is so hard. I think you have a very good grasp of what's going on in your little girl's head and anxiety is exactly the root of the problem. Unlike before the age of 18 months or so, she's now able to hold in mind her own goals and intentions (I must keep Mama HERE!) while simultaneously being aware of your conflicting goals (Mama wants to leave/get a life away from this bed). This is a phenomenal achievement! But the fact that she now has this advanced social understanding also means that she is in a constant state of negotiation with you for MORE! NO GO! MOMMY STAY!

The toddler at this age is somewhat of an addict. She wants nothing more than to continue to have access to your attention, your approval, and your presence. ALL. THE. TIME. That’s why 18-21 month old kids repeatedly call after mother, even though she is RIGHT THERE. (I remember distinctly when my boys were this age and they'd both be in my arms, climbing "uppy, UPPY" ever higher until there was no where else to go, no closer they could come to me, no more smashed up against me than they already were... and still they'd wail MAMA!). So, as I've mentioned before, your child at this age, though feisty and independent, is also insecure and often anxious, especially during times of impending separation (as you described perfectly in your question).

Given the powerful emotional vulnerabilities of this stage, now is not the time to entirely reconstruct bedtime habits, centered as they are on closeness, shared routines, mutual affection, and assurances of continued emotional connection. Ideally, now is a time to comfort and reassure, not to challenge or withdraw. But what on earth do you do when your regular acts of comfort, valiant and consistent as they have been, are not enough anymore?

I think the key goal here is to try to minimize your little girl's anxiety levels. That requires a context or routine that is completely predictable. I suspect that if she knows exactly what to expect from you and your husband and she knows that she can't do anything to change that, then her anxiety about figuring out how to keep you there will be start decreasing over time. This isn't about "breaking her spirit" or anything nutty like that. It's about letting her know that she doesn't have to WORRY about finding the right thing to say, do, yell, cry, whatever so that mommy stays with her. You will provide her with nourishment, love, physical comfort, and then you will let her fall asleep. So... what can you do to create an environment that decreases her anxiety? Unfortunately, I can't think of any magic bullet here. There's probably 3 general approaches:

1. The first is the "grin and bear it" approach. Given that she'll be out of this stage in a month or so, you can try to resign yourself to a longer bedtime routine. Lie next to her, nurse her, repeatedly tell her it's time to sleep and provide lots of warmth but as little stimulation as possible. This might really suck if she's still tap dancing on your head to the tune of "Mama, mama, mama", but if you show her that you'll consistently stay until she's asleep, then her protests may become less intense and shorter lived. At this point, her refusal to sleep might be in large part about not knowing whether this will be one of the nights you'll stay or finally get fed up and go.  

2. You can try to go with the old routine which will surely now require some distress on her part. In other words, you can lie with her, nurse her, and then after 30 min or so, leave, saying that it's time for bed, not playing. This will feel like you're actually sleep training her. And in a way you are, but back to the OLD routine. If you come back and check on her regularly, but stand firm on staying out of the bed with her, then she will eventually realize that her protests don't work to get you back. Although in some ways that sounds heartbreaking, the other way to look at is that you are actually RELIEVING her of her source of anxiety. If you know for sure you can't get what you want, you stop being preoccupied with that goal. Without that preoccupation, she may actually enjoy her time WITH you more and feel less anxious after, when you do leave.

3. If the crying gets unbearable for you and the hours of lying with her becomes equally crazy-making, then you can just bite the bullet and try your preferred sleep-training method that will teach her new sleep habits altogether (this can be where your husband really steps up to the plate). This isn't what I usually recommend during this stage, but if the alternatives become too unbearable, it is doable, it's just really, really hard.

To sum up: I think what you want to avoid are those acts that heighten her uncertainty. Walking away because you (understandably) have had enough may be the first step to triggering her distress, but what keeps it going is her knowledge that you MIGHT come back. So, predictability is key -- in whatever form you feel you can provide. Walk out and stay out (within reason of course) or hop in bed for the night with her until this freaking awful stage passes. Because it WILL pass.

Anyone else in a similar situation, stuck in a sensitive stage with no way out but through? Does knowing it IS just a phase and it WILL pass help at all?

Comments

[paola]

K could have been me 6 months ago. My daughter went thru this super clingy, only mummy stage from 18-24 months on and off. We flew from Italy to Australia when she was 19 months old and she wanted only me the whole flight and preferrably nursing. She had my nipple in her mouth for hours at a time. Turbulance was hell!

It does end. IN fact it ended about 4 days after her 2nd birthday. What worked for us? A mix of Isabela's point 1 and 2. I'd start out with a more gentle approach, stay with her till she fell asleep and then slip out unseen. Sometimes, she was faking it and she'd see me leave the room and call out and it would all start again. Sometimes, I'd be so fed up that I'd leave her in her room crying, but I'd cave in after only minutes of sobbing and be back again to soothe her and start the whole process up again. We also switched her bed time so she was going to bed with her older brother an hour later. Having someone in the room with her worked for a while too, but after a few days she was back to only wanting me again. It was torture. Leaving the door open a bit and explaining we were on the other side of the wall, or in the next room, made a difference, but in the end Time was the only thing that really helped.

Good luck K

[Marsha N]

My daughter did this exactly. She actually head-butted me a few times and once I split my lip. It was crazy and intense and we were both miserable. It lasted for probably about a month, but it felt like years. I wish I'd had access to this kind of info, although like the original poster I kind of guessed most of it. What did I do?

* I did, for the most part, resign myself to it, although that didn't stop me from having a really hard time with it. We would go into the bedroom at 7.45pm or so and I was lucky to be out of there by 9pm. But I was able to resign myself because I felt good about the choices we've made in terms of her sleep--we choose not to sleep train, we stay with her until she is alseep, I waited until she was old enough that night-weaning was a breeze and we co-sleep. I know everyone makes different choices, but I guess key is feeling happy about them being right for you and for your babe. SO I didn't spend a lot of time second-guessing the why of her phase.

* I didn't change much. It just didn't seem like anything would work anyways. The only thing I think I did was refuse multiple ways of falling asleep--if she wanted the ergo, then we stayed in the ergo. If she wanted the rocking chair, then we stayed there. I was done moving from ergo to rocking chair to bed and back. I guess I was trying to minimize my frustration--if we were going to be in the bedroom for a long time then I wanted to at least relax somewhat (while watching for her crazy body-throwing maneuvers) by pretending I was falling asleep myself on the bed. Yes, I'll stay with you until the bitter end babe, but I don't want this to be total torture for me too kind of attitude.

* My daughter would be fine with her dad putting her to bed--but only if I was out of the house (and that took some nurturing to get her to that place, but was one of the best things we gently introduced and was a lifesaver for me). And he had a way easier time as her separation anxieties were very mama focused. So in that period I would either not come home or leave 30mins before bedtime. Those breaks for me were totally necessary.

Hang in there. It's crazy-making while it lasts.

[Mom to Elise, 26 months now]

My 18 month old did this for naps. She would scream and cry and not want me to leave so in order for her to get some semblance of a nap, I'd sit in the room with her (no eye contact, no talking, just told her to lay down, it was time to sleep, etc). This went on for about 3 months and I finally had enough of it (was getting nothing done, really resented it, etc) so when I realized that her cries at the beginning of naptime were more out of anger that I might go instead of real fear, I let her CIO. She cried (whined really) for 35 mins the first day, 5 mins the second day and then not at all after that. She's been napping well and with zero separation issues since then (she is now 2.3 yrs). It is a hard stage and feels like a slap in the face when it comes seemingly out of nowhere. All of a sudden you have a problem where once there was none! The good news about it is that language is developing and they really do understand things when you tell them. So, saying "I love you, time for sleeping, see you when you wake up" in a cheerful tone really worked for us at the time, but she had to be ready for it. I wouldn't have let her CIO when I could see that she was really afraid of being left.

[Amy M]

For me, reading Moxie and figuring out that it was just a phase was enough to get me through it. We were lucky in that we didn't have an increase in overnight waking (until 2 months later when the eye teeth came). But bedtime went from 5 minutes of cuddling and putting 18 month old DD down awake to 30 or 60 or 90 minutes of rocking. Sometimes we could put her down drowsy, but many times we had to let her rock totally to sleep.

It drove me nuts for about a week, and then I just accepted that it was a phase that would pass. I kept her as quiet as I could and I tried to rest my brain a little and take advantage of the enjoyment of rocking her. It helped that I was a couple of months pregnant, exhausted and starting to mourn the end of having just one child.

I don't remember exactly how long it took, but the rocking time gradually got shorter and shorter. Until she started to anticipate the arrival of her baby brother and started requesting rocking with mommy again. The upside to all of this was the incredible language explosion - not only words but phrases and soon sentences. Having good communication limits the number of tantrums we deal with, so the 'repayment' for difficult nights is that we have a pretty pleasant toddler during the day!

[Mia]

Well lots of sympathy. What helped me through this stage was to just try to make it bearable for ME. So that I felt less trapped. I brought a really good book, my laptop or even my (very quiet) yoga dvd. I didn't actually ignore my son, but pretty close to it. That way I could cater to my son's need for closeness without going completely crazy. That and taking turns with his dad...

[Ashley]

I am so grateful for having found Bed Timing and Ask Moxie because it ABSOLUTELY helps to know this is a phase. Why?

Because for the last couple of weeks of (hell) no sleep all night long with our 18 month old, our husband and I did not meet eye to eye on what to do. He wanted to forge ahead with "sleep training" but I didn't because I could just sense her distress.

Well, now knowing that in fact, her distress is cognitive development related, we can both feel a lot more laid back about re-introducing whatever gets us through the night (co-sleeping and BF'ing at night) again!

And its working for the most part. Although after pretty much having just self weaned about three weeks ago, she's now back to BF'ing all night long...

But in time, this shall pass, and for the couple hours sleep, it's worth it.

Thanks so much!