Apologies for not writing for a little while - have kept on running out of evenings! Part of the reason for this is trying to catch up after Christmas (where do you put all those lovely new presents?!) but also it is because our children are not settling down till really late. Our son is not too bad, although he is still in holiday mode, but our daughter is an absolute nightmare and is frequently not going to sleep until 9 o’clock. Now I know that this is not that bad and a lot of people have a much worse time, but it just means that by the time that she has settled and you have done all the essential jobs, it is time to go to bed. This means that a) you have no head time for yourself or b) you go to bed later and get up tired the next morning. So far the latter has been our favoured option - not ideal but I sooo need time to chill out at the end of the day.

I must admit I’m not really sure what to do about her. Due to her ADHD she cannot shut off so is wide awake when we put her down. I have tried doing it later but whatever time it is she is still wide awake bouncing in her bed and singing songs! She is so noisy that we have started putting our son, whose bedroom is next door to hers, in our bedroom down the hall as he gets really frustrated being kept awake. If we do not do this then it ends up in a shouting match between the two of them! We’ve tried to keep to the same routine, use PECS and have made her room as comfy as possible, but nothing seems to work (thanks to a previous correspondent who suggested Medised!) I wish that they bottled whatever she has got as 16 hours is a long time for a three year old to keep going full pelt. Wish that I was that energetic!!