Mean Mommy

I did not really realize that I've been a very patient, kind, and loving mother up until a few weeks ago. But y'all, I have! I have always been really nice and never viciously yelled at my children or felt murderous rage, and I did not realize that was a big deal until I snapped.

Bedtime is doing me in. Now that Nathan is in a toddler bed, and sharing a room with James, I feel like I am screwed anyway I can think of to solve his refusal to stay in bed and be quiet. When he wakes up James at bedtime I feel especially rageful, but I also feel rageful when he's been jack-in-the-bedrooming for over an hour. I don't get it- when he was in the crib we never had these problems, but we also don't have this problem at naptime, so I don't know. I've moved bedtime later, and earlier, and later again. I've tried putting him and James down at the same time. I've tried putting him down first. I am scared to put a gate on his door because I know he'll just wake up James and then I'll go nuts.  My mother suggested staying down in his room w/him, but a)I don't want to stay in his room til 8:30 everynight (that's an hour and a half!) and b)when I stay in his room for three minutes he still jumps and yells.  I'm leaning towards moving James out of their temporarily, if we can fit the pack and play in our room.

Ugh. It is just making me crazy. Even "good" nights he's still out of his bed a lot, I just don't have to put myself in my bedroom and throw a pillow against the wall to calm down enough to deal. I've tried bribery and threats and everything in between and I want to kill Supernanny.

It's not the worst thing that could ever happen but it is by far the worst thing happening to ME (and the second worst isn't even close, the second worst is that when I am folding laundry I have a hard time telling James' pants from Nathan's shorts) and I just need to vent lest I explode.

Comments

[Joy]

Hannah, I'm not sure you remember the 6 weeks of sleep hell we had with Larkin? She was 2 and 3/4 at the time. She raged and popped up and tantrumed for hours at bedtime.

We started off treating it the way we normally did tantruming/throwing/doing things that were totally against the rules - time outs. Which just fed what I think was her needing attention. I also tried staying with her, reading or cuddling or whatever, thinking that maybe she needed that. And usually she would hit me or push my buttons in a million other ways, and it was terrible. I felt like I was fighting her, and guppy and I ended up fighting over the stress of what to do too.

What worked for us was temporarily moving Tess into the packnplay in our room, so that we didn't have the stress of L waking or inadvertently huring her (I was worried she'd chuck something into the crib, although she never did), and removing anything and everything from her room that she could throw/damage (although she still climbed on top of the dresser a lot - I figured if she fell it was on to carpet and she'd probably be fine), including putting all her books into the locked closet and fixing the light so that she couldn't turn it on and off anymore.

We told her why Tess had to move out of her room, and that we loved her, but that bedtime was for sleeping, and that we weren't coming upstairs anymore after she got books and cuddling. We also put speakers in her room so she had something to listen to while falling asleep, and listening for one or two songs with her became part of the routine.

It took about a week for her to chill out, but she did, and within a couple of weeks things were so very much better. And the biggest relief was that we weren't fighting with her anymore, and I knew I wasn't going upstairs to deal with it, and I knew she was safe, so I was much more able to deal with hearing her scream and bang the door. It was basically a toddler level CIO.

Anyway, just wanted to let you know that we got through a similar horrible time that I thought was going to kill me. I hope some of this helps you out too, and know that eventually it really really will get better.

[Joy]

By the way, in retrospect we realized this all happened just as Tess got very mobile, and I think she was reacting to all of a sudden having to share parental attention more.

[Beth]

Just in case you do wind up going with your mother's suggestion, I really love our bedtime routine because it is my downtime now. Jeremy reads Penny 2-3 books, and then we trade and I go in and lie down with her until she falls asleep. It's usually pretty quick, but I read books on my phone (yay free Kindle app) so I can read in the dark without waking her up. We have a few minutes of either reading another story or just chatting (usually the latter), and if she's really lively I give her a book light and a book to "read" to herself. But once I start reading my book there is no more talking, and she usually falls asleep within 20 minutes or so. If it takes longer (which usually means naptime was too long or bedtime was too early) at least I have a book so I am not getting angry and impatient.

Since she was never in a crib and went straight to the regular twin bed, this routine was kind of necessary for a while to keep her from wandering. Now we're just both really attached to it. Sometimes she tells me to go away and she goes to sleep on her own, though.

[hannah]

Yeah, I think it is mostly my problem as much as it is Nathan's- by the end of the day I am fried, and logistically getting dinner on the table for me and Jeff and him to bed is just a big mess. And I like things predictable and scheduled and orderly. I was not meant to have a 3 year old.

By the time Nathan is falling asleep I've already read a good chunk of a book while rocking James down; it has crossed my mind that an iPad would solve my problems, though!