Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #1209 - Bedtime Battles: When Your Kids Won't Stay in Their Own Beds

Transcript

#1209 - Bedtime Battles: When Your Kids Won't Stay in Their Own Beds · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

0:06
Speaker 1: One of those perennial parenting problems is what do you
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Speaker 1: do when the kids won't go to sleep in their bed?
0:09
Speaker 1: Or what do you do when the kids won't go
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Speaker 1: to sleep and you are exhausted. The number one parenting
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Speaker 1: hack that I have if you want to be a
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Speaker 1: better parent is to get enough sleep, but sometimes the
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Speaker 1: kids won't let you. Hello, this is doctor Justin Colson.
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Speaker 1: Welcome to the Happy Families podcast Real parenting Solutions every
0:29
Speaker 1: day on Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast. I'm just on
0:32
Speaker 1: here with Kylie, my wife and mum to our six
0:34
Speaker 1: kids and Kylie. Every single Tuesday, we answer questions tricky
0:39
Speaker 1: questions on the pod. You can submit your questions via
0:42
Speaker 1: our super simple system at happy families dot com dot you.
0:45
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0:47
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0:51
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Speaker 1: voice memo to podcasts podcasts with an s at happy
0:57
Speaker 1: families dot com dot you. All Right, here we go.
1:01
Speaker 1: This is today's question comes through from an anonymous lista.
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Speaker 2: Hi Justin, thank you for all that you do for
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Speaker 2: all the mamas and the papas out there. I was
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Speaker 2: wondering if you could help me. I'm wondering at what
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Speaker 2: age should I give up the bedtime fights. It has
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Speaker 2: mostly felt like a power struggle every year, every night
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Speaker 2: for years, and I feel like we're chasing them through
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Speaker 2: all the steps, teeth get ready and into bed, lights out,
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Speaker 2: and I feel more like we are micromanaging them, and
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Speaker 2: it's not helping them gain independence and personal responsibility for
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Speaker 2: their life and how their choices affect them, and so
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Speaker 2: we are the bad guy when it's time to wake
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Speaker 2: up or school is the problem, etc. But I don't
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Speaker 2: want to swing in an extreme direction and give them
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Speaker 2: full rain because I still strongly believe that dental health
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Speaker 2: is important and getting enough sleep. But I do feel
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Speaker 2: none of us are having evening routines we feel good about.
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Speaker 2: And one challenge that we share is that they all
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Speaker 2: have to stay in the same room. Sometimes we put
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Speaker 2: one kid to bed in our bed and then move
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Speaker 2: them later on, but it's not really ideal. My ideal
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Speaker 2: goal would be they would be all going to bed
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Speaker 2: in their own room. So thank you so much and
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Speaker 2: take care, Kylie.
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Speaker 1: I love those two words. Not ideal. Doesn't that just
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Speaker 1: describe everything when it comes to kids in sleep not ideal.
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Speaker 3: So she hasn't given us all the information. We don't
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Speaker 3: know how many children are involved, we don't know how
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Speaker 3: old they are, but the fact that she said they
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Speaker 3: all share the same room would suggest that there's more
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Speaker 3: than two. I could think, but one of them may
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Speaker 3: go to sleep in her room. This is really tricky,
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Speaker 3: and this is a challenge that we with six children
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Speaker 3: and sometimes houses that are too small, we have had
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Speaker 3: to deal with multiple times over.
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Speaker 1: One of the things that I always want to say
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Speaker 1: when questions come up about sleep and getting kids to
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Speaker 1: go to sleep and on their own room, and that
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Speaker 1: ideal that we have right, we want the kids to
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Speaker 1: go into bed. We give them the kiss and the cuddle,
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Speaker 1: sing the song, read them a story, say a prayer
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Speaker 1: if you've got a religious background, and then you want
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Speaker 1: to walk out of the room, close the door and breathe.
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Speaker 1: You just want to get your life back and have
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Speaker 1: an hour or two before you've got to hit the hay. Historically,
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Speaker 1: when we look at things anthropologically, across cultures and across
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Speaker 1: time I'm talking millennia, Humans until the last couple of
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Speaker 1: hundred years have generally slept in groups. That's what mammals do.
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Speaker 1: Look at puppy dogs, look at pretty much all mammals.
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Speaker 1: They sleep in groups. And once we started to have
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Speaker 1: ostentatious displays of wealth and build bigger houses, the children
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Speaker 1: started to have their own room, and the more rooms
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Speaker 1: you had, the more wealthier looked. And that's just become
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Speaker 1: part of the culture now. Not necessarily about the wealth,
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Speaker 1: but the kids sleeping in separate rooms, their own rooms,
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Speaker 1: not with their siblings, or definitely not with parents. Now
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Speaker 1: obviously in your case, the kids are supposed to be
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Speaker 1: sleeping together, but they get r right up and they
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Speaker 1: miss their parents and they want to be with you.
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Speaker 1: So historically we're up against it. Biologically, DNA, we're up
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Speaker 1: against it. Nevertheless, I think three principles can get us
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Speaker 1: out of our fix. The first one, in a word,
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Speaker 1: force creates resistance. Okay, that was three words, but you
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Speaker 1: know what I mean. While we're trying to control the situation,
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Speaker 1: we get a whole lot of resistance. And we've done that,
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Speaker 1: we've been there. It doesn't work particularly well. We need
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Speaker 1: to work with our kids.
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Speaker 3: You can really hear it in this mom's voice. There's
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Speaker 3: just an acknowledgement that they really have kind of got
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Speaker 3: themselves into a bit of a rut. There's a bit
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Speaker 3: of a vicious circle going on here. She feels like
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Speaker 3: she's nagging, the kids don't respond, so that whole idea
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Speaker 3: of her efforts to make them go to bed on
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Speaker 3: time is falling on deaf ears and actually pushing and
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Speaker 3: making it worse. And the biggest challenge we have is
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Speaker 3: how do we break that cycle.
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Speaker 1: Your favorite answer whenever we talk about this is that
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Speaker 1: we should all sit down and have a family meeting.
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Speaker 1: Is is that where you're going?
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Speaker 3: Yes? Maybe, if it's not a family meeting, it's a
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Speaker 3: one on one with each child and sitting them down
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Speaker 3: and asking them how they actually feel about night times,
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Speaker 3: What do they love about nighttimes? What do they not
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Speaker 3: love about nighttimes? How would they change it? Understanding what
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Speaker 3: they want out of their experience will help you to
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Speaker 3: navigate this challenge so much better.
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Speaker 1: It'll do something else as well. Whether you have a
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Speaker 1: family meeting you talk about what's working, what's not, and
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Speaker 1: what we're going to work on this week, or whether
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Speaker 1: you do one on ones, which I actually prefer in
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Speaker 1: this situation. So I didn't quite get it right. What
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Speaker 1: I like about either of those two options, though, is
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Speaker 1: that your child now feels like, Oh, your children now
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Speaker 1: feel like they have a voice. They feel like they're
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Speaker 1: in the driver's see a little bit of their own lives,
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Speaker 1: which means that as they say, well, we could do
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Speaker 1: this or I'd like that, and as you start to
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Speaker 1: work to warkards those as goals so long as their
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Speaker 1: reasonable requests and expectations, what this means is the kids
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Speaker 1: are going to buy into the direction that you're heading,
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Speaker 1: You're much more likely to get a result. Giving them
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Speaker 1: a voice is so powerful, so helpful.
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Speaker 3: So the reality is if you've got a child in
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Speaker 3: there who wants a ten thirty bedtime and they're five
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Speaker 3: years old or even seven or eight years old, and
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Speaker 3: it's completely not only inappropriate, but just not possible.
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Speaker 1: Yea're not going to happen.
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Speaker 3: You can acknowledge that that would be awesome, wouldn't it
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Speaker 3: if you could stay up every night?
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Speaker 1: Yeah, give them in fantasy what they can't have in
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Speaker 1: reality till ten thirty.
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Speaker 3: And you know, when you're a big boy, you can
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Speaker 3: have that. But right now your body needs lots more
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Speaker 3: sleep than that would give you. So what do you
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Speaker 3: think would be a good bedtime.
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Speaker 1: From time to time, I've had conversations with parents where
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Speaker 1: I've said, just give them full freedom here and just say,
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Speaker 1: so long as you get up on time, you can choose.
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Speaker 1: And what most of those parents have told me dealing
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Speaker 1: with kids from about five or six through to about
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Speaker 1: fifteen or sixteen, is that the kids think it's wild
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Speaker 1: and crazy for the first night or two, and by
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Speaker 1: about day three or four they're pretty grumpy. In the
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Speaker 1: house is not very nice. But by about day five
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Speaker 1: or day six, the kids are like, I'm tired and
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Speaker 1: I'm going to bed. Like they learned to regulate themselves.
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Speaker 1: They just want to have a level of control after
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Speaker 1: the break. Two more principles to help navigate the bedtime
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Speaker 1: routine where everyone's going to sleep and the toothbrushing stuff. Okay,
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Speaker 1: so force create's resistance. We want to give kids a voice. Kylie,
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Speaker 1: my second principle, you put much better words around this
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Speaker 1: than the words that I had for it. I just said,
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Speaker 1: you got to do what it takes. I don't know
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Speaker 1: if that's exactly what I meant. You said.
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Speaker 3: It's about a change in perspective.
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Speaker 1: That's so much better than what I said.
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Speaker 3: You know, I love those snuggles that you have with
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Speaker 3: young children. And our grand baby she's eighteen months old,
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Speaker 3: and every now and again I need to babysit her,
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Speaker 3: and I have the pleasure of having to put her
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Speaker 3: to sleep.
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Speaker 1: Not need to get to.
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Speaker 3: I get to, Yeah, I get to. And there is
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Speaker 3: something just magical about having her fall asleep in my
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Speaker 3: arms and not wanting to give that moment up for anything,
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Speaker 3: to the point where you literally you're there like a
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Speaker 3: still soldier, like a statue. Yeah, like a statue. You
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Speaker 3: don't want anything to change in that moment, and you're like,
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Speaker 3: I can't even breathe because if I breathe, maybe I'll
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Speaker 3: wake her. I love that feeling. And the reality is
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Speaker 3: that time goes so fast.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, you've got those adults forever.
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Speaker 3: But before you know it, they're no longer small enough
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Speaker 3: to be snuggled in your arms. And the reality is
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Speaker 3: this time frame when they're young and they're just full
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Speaker 3: of energy feels like you are running a marathon, and
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Speaker 3: in lots of ways you are. Ye, but it's not
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Speaker 3: going to last. And this is just such a small moment.
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Speaker 1: Don't you miss it?
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Speaker 3: Though? I too, God, I do.
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Speaker 1: But when you're not going through it anymore and you're
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Speaker 1: saying I miss it, and you say that to somebody
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Speaker 1: who is going through it, they look at you and
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Speaker 1: they're like, are you on drugs?
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Speaker 3: So let's paint a really clear picture. What we're saying
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Speaker 3: we miss is the nights where I had to sleep
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Speaker 3: on the floor with my hand squeezed through the cot
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Speaker 3: railings so that I could pat my baby off to
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Speaker 3: sleep because she just didn't want me to leave.
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Speaker 1: We both did that so many times, and I.
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Speaker 3: Would be there till midnight and then wake up and go, oh, yeah,
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Speaker 3: I sick. Why am I still here?
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Speaker 1: Or the nights where the baby goes to sleep or
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Speaker 1: the child the six or seven year old goes to sleep,
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Speaker 1: but then they come into our bedroom at two in
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Speaker 1: the morning, and so I get out of the bed
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Speaker 1: and I go sleep in their bed so they can
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Speaker 1: sleep in bed with you, because I don't really care
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Speaker 1: what bed I'm sleeping in so long as I'm sleeping,
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Speaker 1: and I know if I take them back to bed,
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Speaker 1: this might happen two or three more times, whereas I
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Speaker 1: just go to their bed. Problem solved for everybody, right,
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Speaker 1: It just it just works out.
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Speaker 3: Better, and so the reality is twenty six years later,
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Speaker 3: we're not doing that anymore. Yeah, but at the time
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Speaker 3: it felt like a really really heavy load.
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Speaker 1: Is this ever going to end?
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Speaker 3: Yeah? So that idea of changing perspective is just a
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Speaker 3: recognition that this is just a season.
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Speaker 1: You say, change perspective, I say, do what it takes.
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Speaker 3: And one day you'll look back and realize just how
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Speaker 3: small a moment in time it really was.
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Speaker 1: I want to summarize with some practical stuff here, Okay,
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Speaker 1: because a lot of that's theoretical. As a parent, maybe
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Speaker 1: you take one child and the other parent takes the
10:31
Speaker 1: other child. If you're doing it on your own, you
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Speaker 1: get a big sibling to help. If one child wants
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Speaker 1: to sleep in one bed, you let them and you
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Speaker 1: sleep in the other bed, or you let them sleep
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Speaker 1: in your bed and then you sneak out and sleep
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Speaker 1: into their bed when the three of them are all
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Speaker 1: sleeping in your bed, like you just do what it takes.
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Speaker 1: That's really what I'm getting at. You're highlighting when you
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Speaker 1: change your mindset and see it as something that you're
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Speaker 1: going to miss one day and you just work on it,
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Speaker 1: know that this too will pass. That's kind of the conglomeration,
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Speaker 1: the practical conglomeration of the prince boy trying to share here,
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Speaker 1: and that's kind of all we've got for the bedtime
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Speaker 1: routine sort of thing. There was only one other thing
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Speaker 1: that came up in this question, and that revolved around toothbrushing.
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Speaker 3: Dental hygienes. Important.
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Speaker 1: It is, It matters, and you're right to say that
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Speaker 1: the kids need to brush their teeth otherwise they get
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Speaker 1: gum disease their teeth. Just the whole lot is gross.
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Speaker 1: It's gross, furry teeth. It wants it. I only have
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Speaker 1: one thing to say on this, and that is that
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Speaker 1: if your children are under about the age of eight,
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Speaker 1: you really need to be involved in doing the toothbrushing
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Speaker 1: full stop and a story. Dentists recommend that parents help
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Speaker 1: their children brush their teeth until the age of eight.
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Speaker 1: If they won't do it, you could say, brush your
11:36
Speaker 1: teeth and I'll give you a LOLLI. That was a joke.
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Speaker 1: I'm so glad, so glad you love because that's the
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Speaker 1: funny bit, right, because you've just brush your teeth and
11:44
Speaker 1: then you put some sugar in you. No, don't bribe them,
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Speaker 1: you just you just say, hey, guys, this is what
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Speaker 1: we do. Okay, maybe maybe.
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Speaker 3: Those electrical toothbrushes work to treat without kids love those, yeah,
11:55
Speaker 3: or you've just got a two minute timeerer on them.
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Speaker 3: They know what they've got to do and they can't
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Speaker 3: stop brushing until their toothbrush turns off.
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Speaker 1: You just take them to the dentist and get the
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Speaker 1: dentist to explain the importance of it as well, so
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Speaker 1: that you're not the authority figure here and you're just
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Speaker 1: doing what the dentist said. That can be helpful as well.
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Speaker 2: Ge.
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Speaker 1: We really hope that was helpful, and that's it. That's
12:14
Speaker 1: our very best answer to help in these tricky situations.
12:18
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12:20
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12:44
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