Moving to a "Transition" Bed

My DD has PDD/NOS (pervasive developmental disorder)/ High functioning Autism, so I know what you mean about speech delays.

We moved our daughter from her crib to a Full size bed when she turned 2 1/2 and put a LONG rail on the side because she is all over the bed. To her it is like her crib but knows not to stand in it and says in it for the most part.

Her crib is like yours but chose not to convert it to the toddler bed because she would stand in it and also she needed more room to flop around because she would fall out.

NOTE: remove the crib all together when you buy a new bed...she will get confused. Found this out the hard way...my DD kept trying to move to her crib.

So my advice...MOVE TO A FULL SIZE BED and add a EXTRA LONG RAIL and leave enough room at the bottom end of the bed for her to get in and out on her own but the rest of the bed is secure. Chose a bed with a Head and Foot board.

Full size bed is better so if she has a sizure she has plenty of room in the bed without hurting herself.

Unless she is trying to climb out of the crib I would hold off on transitioning for her safety given her problems. When we put our daughter in a toddler bed at 21 months old we threw a few big floor pillows (cheap at Garden Ridge, but I had them for our reading area) around her bed. She hasn't ever actually fallen out, but she likes to "play" like she is falling out because the big pillows are soft and fun. Our crib converst to a daybed too, but because our daughter stood in the crib all the time we decided to get a cheap toddler bed and use it. She has tried standing on it, but we told her that wasn't okay and she hasn't tried again (she's pretty easy going in that area).

Hi D.:

I'll just tell you what I did for both of my boys. It worked great, but I did have to put a child lock on the inside of their bedroom doors so they couldn't get out in the middle of the night - after the 'Sharpie marker incident'.

I went right from the crib to a twin size mattress on the floor (with a guardrail). I got their 'big boy' bedding and had it done up really cute. A couple of months later, I added the box spring. Then a couple months after that, the bed. It was such a nice gradual transition.

I always thought that putting a crib size mattress on the floor might be too small and that they would fall out of it too often and not get used to sleeping on the mattress.

Good luck with your big girl!

Unless she is climbing out of her crib and you are worried about her getting hurt I would keep her in her crib. My boys are language dlayed also and they are 27 months and I still have them in their cribs. I plan to keep them there until they climb out or just get too tall because it is nice to have a safe place to put them.