sleep?

I previously mentioned that we were trying to switch Jack to a big boy bed, and we are still TRYING!! It has been such a frustrating time. We started with one of us staying in the room until he was asleep, but that didn't work very well. He noticed when we left so the time spent in his room was much longer than we had anticipated. He never stayed in his room the whole night, and he started waking up for the day much earlier.

After a few nights of this not working at all, we tried a new approach. Pete would read to him in our bed. I would say prayers and sing songs while laying in his bed with him, and then I would camp outside his door. He would cry, peek out the door, stop crying, play, peek some more, all the while never actually leaving his room, but not falling asleep. With this method, it took an hour or so and sometimes two before he would fall asleep. He slept a little longer through the night until he came into our room and he still woke up at 6am.

Last night the staying in the hall approach didn't work at all. He fell asleep for about an hour or two then was awake- this is after my sitting in the hall for two hours already. Being frustrated and not knowing what to do Pete brought Jack's mattress into our room so he could sleep in his own bed while being near us. This seemed to work very well at first, but he still ended up in our bed.

So now we are trying another approach. We are locking him in his room. At nap time this was not too difficult. He did cry and even tried to take the door knob off using his tools, yet after 30 minutes he was asleep and slept for quite awhile. I was so pleased. However, tonight has been much more difficult. He cried and yelled and had a huge fit. He fell asleep and stupid me went in to check on him- he woke up. He fell asleep pretty quickly after that so I was relieved, but then an hour or so later he woke up screaming his head off. He was crying out to me, and I felt torn. What to do? I let him cry it out. So we shall see how this new approach works.

This process has been more difficult than the transition from family bed to play pen to crib. Of course I may have just become spoiled over the last year of having a child fall asleep early and wake up 'late'. I am not used to this whole process of trying to fall asleep and staying asleep.