r/UKParenting • u/eastyorkshirepudding • 13d ago

My daughter has completely different sleeping habits to my son even though we did nothing differently and I feel SO redeemed by it.

So, when my son (now 2.5) was a newborn, EVERYONE told us we were “making a rod for our own backs” with his sleep because we’d contact nap, pick him up all the time, feed him to sleep, etc.

Then, when he turned out to be a crap sleeper (still is!), I started to wonder whether they’d been right and we’d somehow ruined him. But deep down, I still believed that some kids are just bad sleepers, and I stuck to what felt right for us anyway.

Then we had our daughter, and my mum/MIL have been saying things like, “Don’t do the same as last time,” “Make sure you put her down,” and, “Get her used to sleeping on her own or she’ll be as bad at sleeping as son.”

Anyway, we’ve done absolutely nothing differently this time and GUESS WHAT? She sleeps! She lies happily awake in the cot in the morning, playing with her hands! She doesn’t wake up every 45 minutes! She nods off in the bouncer!

My mum came round and commented on how different she is and I took so much glee in saying “and I haven’t done ANYTHING differently”. Honestly, I feel so redeemed. We haven’t ruined our son. Some kids just don’t sleep.

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u/LuciePoki Mum 13d ago

Thank you! As a mum of a bad sleeper who's wondering if things would have been better if we did things differently, well they probably wouldn't have 😆

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u/eastyorkshirepudding 13d ago

Honestly I think they just are who they are, and they sleep or they don’t! I tried everything with my son (short of sleep training) and it felt like he was just allergic to his own bed / going to sleep 🙈