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We are in a similar situation although my cosleeping LO is almost 2. I am due in September and would really like LO in his own bed, in his own room before then.

Bedtime has been a nightmare lately. He gets really hyper and worked up in bed with us and starts hitting and kicking. My husband was so frustrated on Friday night that he picked him up, put him in the toddler bed that's by my side of the bed and laid back down. My LO didn't get up and fell asleep on his own. I was shocked! He did wake up a few times at night and asked for back pats, but went down each time easily. I was dreading the fight and struggle of getting him out of our bed and so far we are 3 nights in of him laying down on his bed and falling asleep on his own.

I do think that him having a similar routine at daycare has helped us a lot. We tried getting him to sleep in the same toddler bed in the same spot by my side of the bed a few months ago but he would cry and crawl back into bed with us. I don't think he was ready at all a few months ago.

As far as transitioning him out of our room, I plan to do that this summer when I'm off for the summer and can devote the time to trek back and forth between rooms as needed. I'm hoping that the transition to his own bed in our room before transitioning to his own room helps!

Good luck!!

@caterw: I love the idea of the nest area! I'm going to remember this for the times we need it!

We had this issue and it's been tough. It's great that you are starting early! We tackled it in stages. We got our LO a floor bed (queen), then we coslept with him in his room. Then we put our queen mattress in the same room and got him used to sleeping by himself on his mattress with us on our own mattress in the same room. Then we moved our mattress out and just sat at the door till he fell asleep. Then sat outside the door.

Most people might laugh at this elaborate process!!! My husband rolled his eyes a few times but it was gentle and mostly tear free!

Good luck!

We did this at 2 years old so likely a 3 year old wouldn't need all this!

@PixieStix: maybe 2 months? I think it'd go faster since your LO is older

I just wanted to say you are not alone – we are currently working (mostly successfully!) with getting our 4.5 year old into her own bed.

What worked for us (because we did half-heartedly try and fail a few times haha) was to let LO pick out her own bed. She picked it and I assembled it Christmas Eve for a Christmas morning surprise. I think/hope that picking out her own bed and sheet set helped her buy into the idea and also gives me a good reasoning tool (“you should try to sleep in your bed tonight LO. Remember, you picked it out because you liked it so much. . . “) something like that.

Her twin bed is in our bedroom. I don’t know when we will move her to her own room. She mostly sleeps in her bed now, although she almost always comes into bed with me around 4am. She also still asks to sleep with me almost every night and sometimes I let her as a treat, or if she is sick.

I figure I don’t know any teenagers still wanting to sleep with mama, so we’ll get there lol

ETA: The only thing I would add is that where you plan to cosleep with the new baby, I would definitely try to get your LO1 into their own bed as much in advance of the birth as you can, so that your LO doesn't see it as you "picking the new baby over them" to sleep with. We only have one LO so didn't have that issue, but I can see that being a push to get LO into their own bed.

Do it now, go straight to the room and have DH stay there if needed for a while.

I have two girls exactly 2 years apart. Bed shared with DD1 literally till the night before I gave birth (part laziness, partly didn't want to move her b/c I loved having her next to me).

So DD2 is 3 months and DH still sleeps with DD1 in her room. She fought bed time like a month and then settled down. But when we ask if she's ready to stay there by herself she said she's not. Plus, DD2 still wakes up at least twice a night, so DH actually gets better sleep there so we're letting it be for now.

@PixieStix: If the goal is only to make space for the baby and there's no rush to get him into his own room, then you could let the older sibling sleep in the same room, but not the same bed, if there is space for another mattress. Maybe your husband could sleep with him for a while in the other bed at first so he's not alone.

I mean if you're okay with cosleeping, either sidecar a crib to your bed for the baby or sidecar a twin mattress to your bed to have your toddler sleep there next to you. You can make sort of a barrier with a pool noodle or a Snoogle to keep toddler away or you can have DH and toddler share the big bed and you and baby share the attached twin with a parent in between the kids.

We were in the same boat when I was pregnant. Our son already started the night in his own room, but came to our bed whenever he woke up (usually between 1-3am). But when my belly got bigger, we needed him out totally. My husband would go into his room and co-sleep with him on the twin bed, but he didn't get much rest. Plus, I had to look at it from my son's point of view: literally EVERYONE in our family sleeps in our room. Us, the baby, even the dog's bed is by our dresser. It seemed incredibly unfair to shut him out. So we made him a little nook between our bed and the wall. It's couch-cushions covered in a fitted sheet with a pillow and blanket. We taught him to come in quietly if he wants to at night & cover himself up. We celebrate heavily nights he stays in his own room (not many ) We actually love this arrangement!
I think you could probably just get him to be comfortable doing bedtime in his own room first and your husband should take the lead on this. You don't want your pregnant self sleeping on an air mattress! Decide what you want with your husband and how it will look and then tell your kiddo what will change. I'd suggest telling him a change is coming, but don't start for several days. This will give you all time to talk about it and prepare for the new routine. Then just stick with it and validate his feelings (since he'll likely not be jazzed about it) and support him as best you can while he learns this new skills.

I don't know anything about moving a toddler to their own bed; we never coslept. However, my 2 year old DS and 2 month old DD share a room. He has only been awakened at the early morning crying when she wakes for the day.

We moved LO to his own room a few months before his third birthday. He had been sleeping in our bed since he was 3-4 months old.

We set up a twin bed in his room and just started doing the bedtime routine there instead of in our bed. DH got in bed with him at first, then transitioned to reading to him from a chair. It really went a lot more smoothly than we expected. He got used to it within a few days.

He's 3 1/2 now and has recently started coming to our bed every night in the middle of the night. We haven't tried to put a stop to it yet, but I'm 36 weeks pregnant, so we'll probably have to do something about it soon.

@PixieStix: so we had the best intentions of keeping our nearly 4 year old bed bug out of our bed once the twins arrived. We lasted a whopping 2 nights. We are just too tired to get him back to bed and often he is quite the ninja nowadays and we don't even hear him entering our room. The twins don't cosleep completely either so we have ended up with all four kids plus us in our bed for a couple of hours not great but it works. The older two have to stay on the outside side of the bed on DH side and the babies get the middle. That works pretty well. So just to give you another perspective.
Oh and 9 out of 10 times the older kids don't hear the younger siblings.

@PixieStix: baby is due in July! So only a few months to sort out our permanent bedstay guest we seem to have acquired. He's 3yo too by the way.
I will say, once he's asleep, nothing seems to wake him so I guess that's potentially a positive for you too?! I just hear all the time it's a phase...so just riding it out for now. Good luck!!!

I would start with getting your LO used to going to bed in his own room first and see how that goes. We co slept with our 2 older kids. My oldest was only 20 months when his brother was born and he was still coming in our room every night. We had our second sleep in a cradle next to the bed. LO1 started to get annoyed about the baby waking him up so he slept longer and longer stretches in his room and once he was fully transitioned from crib to bed, he slept all night in his room. There were some nights once he was mostly staying in his room that he woulda wake and DH would get in bed with him. LO2 started sttn in his crib on his own some night starting around 2. He struggled with the transition to a bed and often one of us has to go in - sometimes just to cover him with blankets and sometimes to sleep but he is fine with not coming into our bed anymore. My advice is not to push too hard. Start with bedtime and then see if you can get him back to sleep motn once bedtime is established, just making the cosleep g portion of the night later and later until he is ok without it.