A little background: I am a single mum, and I work full time, this wasn’t a problem until recently. My son has been sleeping in his own cot from around six months old. He usually wakes once through the night to feed (bf) then goes back to sleep. This was working well for us up until around three weeks ago. It initially began with a cough that disrupted his sleep, and he was waking more frequently, then he began to refuse point blank to be put down in his cot! I tried the normal methods first, soothing him back to sleep, controlled crying, but as soon as I took a step away from his cot, he screamed blue murder (I don’t mean the usual sleepy cry, I mean distraught, struggling to breathe screaming)! I then tried Calpol with the same effect. By this point it was 4 am, and we are up at 6 am so I stupidly brought him into my bed (creating a rod for my own back I know!) because I needed to sleep, I am a nurse and am regularly giving out medication and am in control of other people’s children, so I need to be alert. This behavior has continued now for three weeks, and I am completely at the end of my tether! Each night I do the same thing, complete our nighttime routine, then put him in his cot. Each night he is waking at 2/3 am for a feed, falling asleep, then refusing to be put back in his cot. It doesn’t matter how many times I soothe him back to sleep; the second I step away (I have tried the army crawl too!), he wakes in distress. As I mentioned before, I am a single mum, so I need the evening to do the daily chores and have some downtime. I can’t do this safely whilst he is in my bed. I have no annual leave left until April apart from the week running up to Christmas, so I feel like I don’t have time to sort it without affecting my ability to do my job. I am so stuck, exhausted, and stressed with it all. I honestly don’t know what to do anymore. Does anyone have any suggestions?
How old is your son?
I understand you need sleep I’m a single mum of 3 so I totally get it but consistency is the key. I take it your son is still quite young due to him still being in a cot, don’t do something that you’ll constant be in his room every night. Maybe get a night light that shines on the ceiling so he can look at that. Kids go through stages, I know it’s tough but you just have to ride it out. If he cries calm him down give him a cuddle and kiss then put him back down and just walk out his room. After having 3 boys I have now found that walking out slowly or being a ninja hasn’t worked, I put my 8 month old down and walk out his room and shut the door and he goes to sleep within 5 mins same as if he gets up in the night. It’s harder as you can’t ask him what’s wrong and why he’s doing this. My son was 2 months when I put him in his cot in his room and he’s been brilliant. Consistency is the key x
What age is he? Is he old enough for a toddler bed? Maybe he might settle better
No advice. My 8 year old sleeps in a twin size bed in my room and my 3 year old son sleeps in my bed with me still. Single mom tat works 12’s in law enforcement…
Maybe put him to bed a half an hour later than usual and make note on what time he wakes up every night.
With my kids (1-3 years old) I used to change them or get them to use the bathroom, feed them, give them a drink, then tell them it’s bedtime still because it’s still dark out.
Usually I found that when they are going through growth spurts they would eat more…even if its at 2am or 3am.
If that didn’t work, I knew they might be at the start of getting sick or teething, so I’d give them a dose of infant Tylenol. Teething and growth spurts are momentarily.
Wear a shirt to bed a few nights in a row then wrap it around a pillow or stuffed animal so the baby has your smell when they go to sleep.
My son also had this problem. He would notice when I was away from him and wake up. I used a heated up rice bag to put next to him for a while until he eventually didn’t need it.
Get bed rails so he can’t roll out of your bed.
My daughter has severe separation anxiety and we had to put extra padding on her cot for her and we let her sleep in our bed and then move her to her cot when she’s fully asleep and on the super rough nights she sleeps in one of our shirts with one of her big stuffed animals but it took a lot of trial and error to figure out what worked for her she’s 2 1/2 and we only got her out of our bed a couple months ago she’s been cosleeping since she was 9 months
I have seen bed guards on amazon for pretty cheap to keep baby from falling off the bed as well 
Play quit music on radio station try a night light get him stuffed animal dog or favorite bear toy car trucks Disney tape favorite book
Do we know babes age? Wondering what happens when he wakes, can you leave him for say 10 min and see if he will fall back to sleep
When he’s ready, he will, don’t worry
Night lights with music worked wonders for me .
My 2 year old does the same exact thing- wakes up at 3am and wont go back to bed. Honestly, we just bought a child gate, child proofed the room, so when she wakes up, she can roam around her room and play with toys. Fighting it is pointless.