It is 9:08 PM and I am ignoring the voices, footsteps, thumps and loud crashes from the direction of the “big girls'” room. Yikes. Bedtime is pretty hairy yet, two weeks into our new sleeping arrangements. I’ll start with the good news: once they are both asleep, they stay in their room until morning. Also, our six month old sweetie has adjusted beautifully to the crib.
Well, okay, so she is still up several times a night to nurse and hang out with mom (got to work on that), but she goes back down happily. She likes her crib, and thinks that her older sisters’ room is pretty cool, too.
The challenge is getting the “big girls” to settle down and go to sleep at night. Every night, we go through the same preliminaries. After brushing our four year old’s teeth, we ask her, “Now, what are you going to do when your sister jumps on her bed, gets out of bed, or makes a lot of noise?”
“Just pretend it’s not happening!” she exclaims, fist pumping the air. We then talk about the reward she can earn for ignoring the commotion that night.
She has mixed success. It is pretty hard to watch your sister get out of bed and do whatever she wants, while you are confined to your bed.
She has come up with some creative solutions, including whispering requests to her sister to fetch her certain books or toys lying on the floor. Her sister is happy to oblige.
Yes, that adorable two year old. She seems pretty comfortable in her new bed now. She’s not pining for the crib. So we do need to curb the jumping out of bed. And the jumping on her bed. We have started to crack down on both.
But what should we allow? Should we let her read a pile of books until she falls asleep?
Somehow it doesn’t seem like a good solution to let that go long term.
And at what point should we spank? The other night she even pulled all the tights and underwear out of their tights and underwear drawer and had them strewn all over the floor. (I like to say that I have a tights and underwear drawer. I really do have one. I actually took the time to reorganize the dresser in their room. It makes me feel like I have a tiny bit of control in a sea of chaos.)
She did get a spanking that night. And when my husband left, he said, “If you get out of bed again, you’ll get another spanking. Do you understand?” Our two year old is not a big talker, unless it is reciting verbatim her favorite books or Paw Patrol episodes, so my husband was surprised when she looked him in the eye and said, “Stand completely!”
My friend reminded me that no matter what, we should not stay in their room every night until they fall asleep.
“DO NOT lay down on their beds with them to get them to sleep!” she cautioned. “That was the mistake we made. Then we needed to lay down with my son every night. And we’d fall asleep in his bed. I was exhausted all the time! You won’t believe this–I actually made a dummy of myself! I stuffed my clothes with plastic grocery bags!!”
I cracked up. “You’re kidding me!”
“Nope—I was that desperate! And, no, it didn’t work. So don’t go there. Actually, what Alita said is good advice for you: “’Just pretend it’s not happening.’ ”
Well, look at the time. It’s 10:18. And…quiet. All three finally gave up. I guess sometimes ignoring it can be the best parenting strategy. Now it’s time for the adults to get some much needed sleep, too.
