The Parenting Coach

If you live in the United States you’ll be sitting down for a Thanksgiving feast tomorrow. What are you most thankful for at this time? Whenever I ask that question to parents the first thing that comes up is: “I’m grateful for my children.” We can’t imagine life without them yet we often focus on things that don’t really matter and we take their abilities for granted. We see them running when we want them to be walking. There are people who would give anything to see their kids running. We hear them talking non-stop and would like them to stop talking for awhile. There are parents who would give anything to hear their children talk. We complain because our teenagers want to be with their friends all the time. There are parents who would give anything for their teenagers to have friends. Let’s all take a moment and give thanks for our children’s abilities.

I am especially grateful for clean water. Here in Vancouver the heavy rains have affected our reservoirs and the turbidity levels are so high our tap water is undrinkable. We have to boil our water or buy bottled water. Clean water that we can access anytime we want is something I’ve always taken for granted.

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone living in the US!

I had a mom write me recently asking for some advice around her almost three year old who repeats the same question over and over. She said despite re-phrasing her question, she was still asking and it was driving her crazy. She said she even had to resort to putting head phones on to drown out her daughter. My first suggestion was to do exactly what she was doing and that is to re-phrase the question. This is typical behavior from a three year old. It’s almost like the response we’re giving them doesn’t make sense.

I suggested to her that after repeating her answer and re-phrasing the question to just  distract her. Try telling her a story or asking her question about something completely unrelated. Show her something out the window or start reading a book. Try anything to get her mind away from the question. You know you’ve answered her question and tried different ways of answering.

This question was asked on the mom’s forum, Connected Moms where I am the resident parenting coach so everyone gets to see both the question and the answer and it is open for others to respond. One mom responded saying what she does after her son keeps asking the same question and she has given him the same answer, is ask the question back to him. She used the example of him asking where they were going while they’re in the car. If she says “the grocery store” and he keeps asking, she then turns to him and asks: “Where are we going?” She says he will nearly always give the correct answer and that’s the end of it. What a smart way of handling it, I thought.

Part of my week is spent teaching American Sign Language to babies. Part of being with moms (and sometimes dads) of infants is that the conversation at some point centers around how much their babies are sleeping or not sleeping.

I have a mom in my Friday morning group who week after week reports that her 8 month old daughter will not sleep more than 2 hours at a stretch, and that includes during the night. Mom is nursing and they are co-sleeping. She is beside herself with exhaustion and frustration. Even though we’re there to learn Sign Language I’m happy to spend some time allowing her to vent. All the other moms understand and we’re all there to support her. Many have done sleep programs that have worked so they share their experiences with her.

On top of the frustration this mom feels around the lack of sleep both she and her daughter are getting, she and her husband are at odds around how this challenge should be handled. He is against letting the baby “cry it out” and wants mom to give in to her demands to make her happy.

Another factor about this situation is that mom is a lawyer and waited until later in life to have a baby. She is going through a major transition leaving behind a well paying job and the mental stimulation her job provided, to being at home full-time with an infant. Going back to work is not an option but the life change she’s experiencing is complicating things for her.

I offered this mom the perspective that both she and her baby daughter being sleep deprived is not in anyone’s best interest. It of course is affecting her primary relationship as well as her mental health. Is this good for her baby daughter? I have not done extensive studies on the effects of crying it out nor do I consider myself to be a sleep expert. It just makes sense to me that the long term affects of sleep deprivation are harder on both mom and baby than the long term affects of any trauma a baby might experience when left to cry it out when they’re beyond 6 months old.

When I was nineteen my boyfriend at the time was one of six kids. He always spoke lovingly of his mother and often told me things she used to do and say. I’ve always held a soft spot in my heart for her.

One of the things he told me was that every night she would sit at the end of each of the kid’s beds and ask: “Did anything bad happen today? Did anything good happen today?” It struck me at the time as a lovely way to end the day with a child so I did the same with my kids when they were growing up. It meant that no matter how hectic the day was, we always ended on a happy note. They loved the time we spent together. It was never more than about ten minutes.

Something else you can ask your child at the end of the day is: “What was the best thing about today?”

Every child wants to be noticed so when we can end the day making them feel they are the most important person to you at that moment, they feel loved and noticed.

I thought you might be interested in a mom’s account of the recent business trip she took with her infant son. You can read her 13 tips here.

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