Transition to Toddler bed

the new bed

On Friday night, we decided to move Matthew into his new room. I went to target and bought a toddler bed and put it together from the box before his bedtime. The first night and subsequent nights were painful. I guess Andy and I were naive to think it was going to be a smooth transition. We knew Matthew slept on a toddler bed in Michigan for nearly a week without any crying at all so we assumed this would be the same.

Boy, we were wrong. Matthew cried the first night but Andy calmed him down to sleep and then Matthew woke up multiple times in the night and turned the door knob on his own. We were shocked to find out that he was capable of getting out of the room on his own. At one point, Andy put him in our bed to get him to finally go to sleep. But after getting kicked, Andy decided to put Matthew back in his bed. Matthew had a runny nose and he was struggling to breathe out of his nose so we were a little sympathetic to that.

Saturday night was worse with Matthew waking every couple of hours and then we would have to tend to him by taking turns. We woke up exhausted on Sunday and both of us were suffering with another sinus cold so we really needed our sleep. One night I decided to sleep in the same room with Matthew but he woke up 4 or 5 times in the night asking for "mommy, water" and once he drank a sip, he went back to sleep.

To even get Matthew to go to sleep in the new bed, we resorted to closing the door and letting him cry it out for a while. This really made Matthew upset and he threw the biggest temper tantrum we have ever seen. He would be in a good mood after his bath and reading books but as soon as it was time for bed, he would scream at the top of his lungs once we shut the door. He would bang on the door, run into the door, and scream until he wore himself out - typically 30 minutes.

The new room doesn't have a lock on the outside so we would have to hold the door for the duration of the crying fit until he finally gave in. I think we are making progress.

The good news is that Matthew's runny nose is cleared up and he seems to be over his cold. For the past couple of nights, Matthew eventually stops crying and simply talks "mommy, daddy, water" and at that point we go in there and make sure he has his sippy cup and then ask him to get into bed. He has water all along it's just the one thing that he could yell during the middle of the night that would prompt us to go in there. But Matthew only woke up once last night and he stayed in his room without us tending to him so I believe we are slowly making progress.

For the record, Matthew was waking up nearly every night when he was in the crib. He would wake up crying from a dream or some unknown reason and usually Andy would tend to him to get him back to sleep. Matthew would require water to get back to sleep. And we don't blame him for wanting water at night because the air conditioning tends to make the air dry.

Each morning, Matthew has been waking up in a better mood where he runs around the house in his diaper and squeals. So we know he is getting good sleep each and every night. He says "nap good?" and I say "yes, I slept good, did you sleep good?" and Matthew replies "yeah".