Latest / The Family Teams Podcast / Ep. 302 | Toddler Bed Training

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Ep. 302 | Toddler Bed Training · The Family Teams Podcast

• 0:00
  As a three-year-old, you should have the respect for authority to sit in your bed for two hours just because I told you to. Totally. It's like, come on, guys. Yeah.
• 0:14
  What's up guys, welcome to 5 Minute Fatherhood. So sometimes we talk about teens, and sometimes we talk about toddlers, and today we're going to talk about toddlers. Lee from Homeroom, our online community, asked this great question, which I think everybody who is parenting a toddler knows. We just transferred our son to a big boy bed, but he's getting up at 5, at 6 a.m. Is there any way to train him to stay in his room longer?
• 0:41
  And if there's one thing I've learned about Jeff and Alyssa, it's that they have really invested in how to figure out in their children's sleep habits. So I like more than anyone else I know. So I want to hear what your thoughts are about this, Jeff.
• 0:56
  Well, yeah, I mean, it actually starts with our sleep and like our sanity. And then we work backwards from there of like, hey, we want to set up structures, rhythms and boundaries where we feel like everyone is flourishing and that we can all be better. And for us and our family, that's been like, yeah, kind of sleep and just making sure that's important, stuff like that and kind of structures, not just for the kids, but for everyone. Yeah.
• 1:16
  So, yeah, this is I this is we so this is one that we really concentrate on of which we have, you know, the where we're at today is our oldest kids can't come out of the room till 8 a.m. And then we have kind of quiet time in the afternoon where they have to be in there for a couple hours to kind of do imaginative play and drawing and, you know, whatever they want to do in there.
• 1:33
  But we didn't get there easily. But I also say we didn't get there super difficultly. You just have to have the right kind of framework. What I mean by that is, you know, be prepared for the long haul, right? One thing you don't want to do is like, this is how we're doing it. And so just like do it like don't turn it into some technology.
• 1:49
  terrorizing thing, right? It was very small, subtle, and like a long play for us. And so what that means is, you know, yeah, probably the pattern that displayed with most of our kids is they get up around six, you know, not anymore, they probably get up later now a little bit later. But you know, when they're two, whatever.
• 2:08
  So how can we make the bedroom feel like a really fun place, a special place? And then how can we incrementally retrain? And so it's just really just like training, just like training you do with everything else if you practice it. So we would...
• 2:21
  Let's say, you know, 11 a.m., we would go upstairs with the kids and say, hey, we're going to practice. You know, I want you to pretend like and you make it fun. I want you to get in your bed. I want you to get up, but I want you to just start playing with things. And daddy will tell you when you can come down. And right. And you do that for five minutes and then 15 minutes and then 20 minutes. And so we didn't jump straight from six to eight.
• 2:40
  8am, we jumped from like six to 615, and then 615 to 630. And then, you know, with training in the days, and then make it really fun. And then there's baskets in the room of like, you know, fun things that like, they can only play with in their room. So the room is very like, they see the room is very special play place. You know, we don't say like that. And every parent's different. But like, our rule is like, we don't really care what you do. Just don't come out. Just don't open the door.
• 3:04
  Right. So some people want quiet. We don't really care about like they can talk to themselves. They can do that. They can jump around. Some people don't want them getting out of their bed. We don't care about that. So it's just like your own rule. Like, what do you want to do? And then just create structures around that in really small incremental ways. And I would say, yeah, it's usually a six to 12 month.
• 3:21
  kind of play before then it just like happens. Right. So I'd say that from like two to three is when it just then becomes like, okay, they start doing it now. Um, and I think that slow way, that training way, it just becomes really light, more gentle, um, and tends to now there's still plenty of days in there of like, oh man, this isn't going how we want it, but that's, that's training. Right. So, um, but yeah, that's it. I would say anything you'd add to that.
• 3:42
  So good. Yeah, you guys, the idea of sort of that iterative training that Jeff is describing, it's such a different perspective. I think that Christian parents sometimes come at every single one of these issues as a strict obedience issue. As a three-year-old, you should have...
• 3:59
  The respect for authority to sit in your bed for two hours just because I told you to. You know, it's like, come on, guys. Like that, like you wouldn't probably be able to do that at your age, let alone ask you. You've got to train them how to do this stuff. It's got to be iterative. It's got to involve, you know, some corrections, a lot of kind of reward. And it's a process and you got to sign up for it. And oftentimes when we refuse to do that and just want to go straight to
• 4:27
  do it because I told you, even though it's something way beyond probably what your ability, that's oftentimes where we might be just being selfish as parents. We've got the first thing to tell fathers to do, the main thing when Paul had one thing to tell fathers to do in Ephesians, he said, you know, train your children, you know, in the instruction of the Lord. So it goes both ways. Children obey your parents, fathers train your children. If both are happening—you know,
• 4:52
  then it's good. But if you're just saying, no, obey me and I won't train you, then you're not living up to that side of the role. And of course, you're the one who's got the maturity and the scriptures and the Holy Spirit. So definitely lean into training your kids. And this is a great area, but it does take time.