Pre-baby attention seeking?

[sconeonamission]

the 'refusing to go to bed then calling out attention seeking' stops when baby arrives... right? DS (3yo) went to bed an hour ago and keeps calling out for me. When I go to him, he wants me to stay with him. Sweet, yes, but it's 830pm kid, way past bedtime!

For the last few weeks (2 maybe), his bedtime routine is all screwed around coz I'm finally getting confused with it still being light at 7pm. Bedtime is 730.

DS, with encouragement, brushes his teeth and heads to bed with 3 stories read by DH and 3 by me. Then it's lights out (with the toilet light on up the hallway). It's not dark. He's not afraid of the dark. He can make it in the middle of the night from his room to ours with no issues whatsoever.

But these last few weeks, after lights out, he calls out he needs to go to the toilet. Which he doesn't coz I make him go before he brushes his teeth. DH tells me DS' called out he's hungry. He's also called out he's thirsty. So, he's got a drink bottle down there.

Tonight, I go down when he calls out, and he just wants me to stay with him. Yes, it's a sweet thought, and I would love to stay with him. But with baby due in 6 weeks, I'm worried it's going to keep up when baby arrives.

Please tell me he's just getting his attention seeking out of the way, not gearing up for when the baby arrives.

What can I do to make him go to sleep? He is tired. But not overly so. Maybe he really is not tired yet.

I've promised him tonight that if goes to sleep now, we'll go to the library and Bunnings after daycare tomorrow afternoon. He LOVES Bunnings, so I was hoping that would work. It did, for about 10 mins.

He's just called out again right now, and DH has gone down there. DS cracked it and told him "I called for mummy".

IS this going to be a battle where I just have to cave and stay with him til he falls asleep?

[Calluna]

Not sure about when it will stop but a person I used to babysit for would do the routine then say "I'll come back and check on you in 1 min", go in check on him then "I'll come back and check on you in 2 mins" up to 5 then check on him every 5 mins til he's asleep. After the first few nights he'd be lucky to make it to 3 mins before he was asleep.

[KalinaJane]

My DS had this problem too. Once my DD came along though it was almost in instant stop as soon as I brought her home from hospital.

[Michelle71]

DS is 3yo and has been doing this intermittently for the past few weeks. Not related to his siblings at all. It seems to be a common theme in 3yo for a while where they are reluctant to go to bed or fuss around for ages until they go to sleep. Unfortunately I have no cure as yet. DS just went to bed again for the third time ................