My husband and I really enjoy playing games of strategy. One of our favorites is Settlers of Catan, with the expansions. The board is set up randomly each time so each time you play, it is a different game involving different strategies. You build settlements, cities, and roads among other things to earn points. One night after we finished playing the game with some friends, my husband made an interesting observation. He said when you first start the game, you look at the board and come up with a game plan. You decide where you want to build and which commodities you are going to strive to acquire. As the game progresses, however, other people usually do things like build in your path that interfere with your original plan. If you remain stubborn and stick to your original plan, you are sure to lose. In converse, if you change your strategy to accommodate the new game conditions, you have a good chance of winning the game.

Last week, I was reflecting on my 11 month old daughter’s current schedule. It has changed a bit in the last few weeks (as it often does throughout the first year). I was thinking about her current evening eating schedule and realized I needed to change my strategy with her.

My daughter has always been a big sleeper. She held on to her third nap for a long time. For her, this nap hasn’t even been the short 45-60 minute nap many babies have. It has been a full 1.5 hour nap, only ending because I woke her up. Nothing to complain about. When she was about 9 months old, I decided to start to work with her on dropping the nap. With my daughter, she does better with a “weaning” from naps than a “dropping” of naps. I first gradually shortened the naps down to the 45-60 minutes. My daughter also doesn’t display sleep cues; I have always had to just put her down when it is time to sleep without help from cues. I started keeping her up rather than putting her down unless she was fussy. For her, fussiness is a late sleep cue (for my son, fussiness was his nap cue, for my daughter, it means she is very overly tired). The days she got fussy, the nap was then knocked down to 30 minutes. She slowly started eliminating the evening nap. Some days she needed it, some days she didn’t. At first, days she didn’t nap, we needed to put her down for the night a little earlier than normal. To make a long story a little shorter, she didn’t fully drop the nap until she was 11 months old.

Shortly after the nap was dropped, she got very sick (as did my son and I). We all lost a lot of weight. My daughter has always been a smaller girl. A small girl got even smaller—down to 18.1 pounds as an 11 month old. Once she finally got better and got her appetite back, it came back with a vengeance as I hoped it would. She pretty much ate for a couple of hours straight in the evening (eating finger foods while I cooked dinner, eating finger foods and sharing with me while we ate dinner, then nursing and eating her dinner). This went on for a couple of weeks. I am happy to say she gained her weight back and then some.

She is currently back to a normal appetite and normal meal schedule. My realization about her schedule has come in the form of her eating schedule in the evening. When she was taking the evening nap, her afternoon schedule looked like this:

3:30—nurse

3:45—independent play

4:30—eat finger foods while I made dinner

5:00—free play

5:30—nap

7:00—wake her up and nurse her followed by her dinner

I came to realize I was keeping that snack at the same time, then having her sit and eat dinner with the family at 5:30 instead of taking a nap. During her weight gain marathon, she needed to eat that often. However it hit me that she no longer needs that schedule. She now doesn’t eat finger foods while I make dinner. She waits for that until we are all eating dinner.

I tell you all of that to illustrate that you need to change your strategies with your children on a pretty regular basis. You start with a plan, but then life changes circumstances and your fellow family members might do things that block your path for accomplishing your goal in the way you originally planned.

This is really just another way to focus on why vs. how as discussed in the chapter titled “The Land of Good Reason” in On Becoming Toddlerwise and beyond (incidentally, I love this chapter and think it is very beneficial for parents with newborns on up to read it, understand it, and apply it). Your goals pretty much stay the same (though they are subject to evaluation and change as time goes by). To continue with my game analogy, your goal (the why) is to win the game. The most obvious way to win (the how) is to build settlements and cities, but there are other ways to win. Often times your path gets blocked by other players, making it much more difficult to build. Or perhaps you simply don’t have to resources to build what you need to. If you insist on winning by building settlements and cities, you are likely to lose. But if you change your strategy and build what you can and focus on other, less-obvious methods to win, you have greater chance of doing so.

Your goal is what is important, not your methods to do so. Yes, you keep your methods within the parameters of your moral goals (you want to win but you don’t want to cheat to do so). But there are a lot ways to accomplish the same goal. Don’t put your blinders on and stubbornly insist that your method is the best way to accomplish your goal. Focus on your goal and not your methods, and all of your parenting goals should be easier to accomplish. There are many different strategies available to reach your goals. Each situation is different. Each child is different. You need to be flexible and be ready to change your strategy as situations and people differ. It is impossible to take a “stock” method and apply it to every child.

As Anne Marie Ezzo once shared with me, “The other thing to keep in mind for all - is the proverbial ‘bell curve’ there will always be those on either end of that curve and of course it would be impossible to deal with all of that in one book and is why a blog site like yours is helpful.” Learn the principles and theories (the “why”) of the Babywise series so you can confidently decide what is best for your children. Don’t get caught up in the specific examples in the books. They are there to illustrate principles to you, not to cover every possible scenario that may arise in your child’s life. Understanding the theory will help you to focus on your ultimate goal rather than your methods to achieve that goal. Remember to periodically step back and evaluate your current schedule, goals, and methods of implementation. Make changes where necessary and move forward. Happy parenting!

http://babywisemom.blogspot.com/

Question:

My husband and I are about to take on the task of potty training with our 2 ½ year old son, but we’re both a bit concerned that bedwetting may be a problem since both of us had issues with bedwetting as children. My Toddlerwise book has a chapter on this subject, but is there more you can give us before we get started?
Answer:

Yes! There is more and frankly I think it should be an essential part of every young parent’s library. This little book is an amazing gem. It’s called Potty Training 1-2-3, by Gary and Anne Marie Ezzo. Even if your children are beyond the potty training stage, you’ll want to have this one handy to lone to friends.

But back to your question about bedwetting. I’ll just pull this first part right out of Potty Training 1-2-3, and then include some additional comments below:

Bedwetting, or enuresis, refers to children wetting their beds at an age when most children are dry at night. It’s important to remember the last part of that sentence. Children grow at different rates, which mean they achieve nighttime dryness at different ages. Night dryness doesn’t always follow closely on the heels of day dryness. Even if that’s the case for months, it doesn’t mean your child is struggling with the medical condition of bedwetting. Some experts suggest that as many as 50 percent of children under three years of age will battle night time bedwetting to some extent.
In the medical world, bedwetting in not considered a problem until a child is about 4 or 5 years old. However, if your toddler is having reoccurring nightly accidents and you are concerned about it, consult your pediatrician. Your doctor can discover or rule out any health problems that might be part of the cause. Meanwhile, here are some practical things you can do to try to remedy this problem:
Encourage your child to wait as long as possible when it’s time to urinate. This technique can help stretch the bladder so it can hold more urine.
As your child is urinating, have her stop and start a few times. This helps strengthen the sphincter muscles that hold in the urine.
Encourage your child to take responsibility for her wet bedding, but never shame her because of it.
Consider rewarding your child for waking up dry, but do not punish her for nighttime accidents.
Consider buying a bedwetting alarm that will awaken your child as soon as she begins to wet. You can find manufacturers and descriptions of various models on the internet.
As you move through this process, encourage and support your child while holding her accountable.

One of my four fit this description to a tee. We were doing all the “at home” suggestions above, and each year that went by, we (and he) were hopeful he’d “outgrow” it, but he was still wetting nearly every night by his 9th birthday. Money was a bit tight and I assumed the alarms were beyond our budget….until I actually looked for one! We bought the SleepDry alarm from Starchild Labs. I purchased it through a healthcare supply store on-line for about $60.00. There are others out there for similar prices, and many that are much higher, but this one worked perfectly. In his case, he was staying dry every night, within 2 weeks! No matter which brand you purchase, be sure to follow the instructions exactly. Success depends as much on parental involvement and pre-activity training, as it does on the alarm itself.

My daughter Isabelle is a little over 2 yrs old now and an amazing joy to us. Just recently she has been giving us trouble going down for naps. We have our routine of book reading and rocking before nap. But recently she has been singing and playing in her crib for extended periods (up to an hour!) before lying down to sleep. This frustrated me as I began to try and evaluate what I was doing wrong. I found out that when my Mother-in-law keeps her she doesn’t do this. I started to think…was I spending too much time with her prior to her nap? Was I putting her down too late?

I started being much stricter on getting her to nap in a timely manner. I cut short our sweet pre-nap cuddle routine. I talked with her about going straight to sleep. But to no avail…the playing continued, and I felt trapped every afternoon…praying and waiting on the nap to begin and uncertain if she would even sleep on some days. Of course then being frustrated with a grumpy toddler and soon to be grumpy husband as he arrived home to the tired Mommy and child.

It was clear something had to be done so at our GEMS^® meeting I asked the most experienced and wise Mom I know if she had any thoughts on the matter. She simply said ” Have you gone in and established boundaries on what she is not allowed to do in her crib at nap?” Feeling a little silly I gave an excuse of why I felt like I hadn’t gone in and went home.

Upon discussion with my husband and further thinking I realized I was subconsciously paralyzed with fear of my toddler during naptime. Here’s why… many months ago whenever we went into her room if she woke early the nap would be over as she would not go back down. So we had informally established a “no entering” rule until we were ready for the nap to be over. I thought I was in control, but actually I had allowed too many freedoms and her crib funnel was too big.

For the past week we have set up boundaries of no singing or playing in her crib before napping. Then we have gone in when we see she is enjoying these freedoms again and verbally instructed her. She has responded well as we have pulled the funnel in again.

Here’s what I am learning…this parenting thing is ever changing as she grows and what was important before (not going in to her room until we say nap is over) is now an area she can respond to with verbal instruction. Is there an area in your parenting your child has outgrown?

That’s the beauty of being in this like minded community, I am almost embarrassed to say it but I really don’t think I would have thought of this on my own. This is my first try at parenting though…maybe I’ll remember next time!

Questions:

My friend gave me a copy of Babywise before our son was born and it has been so helpful and working well for our family. But I do have a question about “blanket time.” My friend was asking me if we had started this with our 4 month old, but I’m not sure how this is really different from playpen time and how I’d even begin to teach this to him.

Answers:

• Blanket time provides an opportunity to teach a child to remain in a designated place without the ‘visible’ boundaries the sides of a playpen offer. As you would with ‘playpen time,’ start by placing a few toys on the blanket for play. When first introducing blanket time, it may only be for 3-5 minutes. You can either be sitting near your child or you may even be on the blanket with the child, playing. When he starts to make his way off the blanket, simply bring him back saying something like: “Johnny, you need to stay on the blanket and play with your toys.” Make sure to use a timer. When the timer goes off, make a big deal, “blanket time is over” and move on to the next activity. In the early training phase it usually works best to do short increments of blanket time, 3-4 times a day. Gradually increase the time as your child stays on the blanket, eventually working up to 30 minutes. Realistically, this could take several months.
• When to start? Ideally, before the child starts to crawl is a great time to start and after he is familiar to the playpen. [For some who are lacking space for a playpen, they actually begin with blanket time out of necessity.] The first 5 min. of ‘playpen’ time can be used for Blanket time training. Set the timer for 5 min, when it goes off, blanket time is over, and the remainder of the time can be playpen time. Even if a child is crawling, blanket time can be introduced. It will take a bit more work on Mommy’s part - but with consistency the child will learn.
• How long? Start with five minutes. Be consistent. When your child is able to stay on the blanket until the timer goes off, begin to add an extra minute or two at a time until your reach your goal.
• The beauty of a blanket is that it easily moves all over the house with you. I have personally found it helpful during these early boundary training years to have a small basket of toys in rooms that you spend a good deal of time in. That way, when you have your pre-toddler or toddler using ‘blanket time’ you will also have different toys to entertain him. Plus at these young ages it will help prevent your child from wandering, getting into things, and having to discipline more than necessary. Better yet, the blanket is portable for trips away from home! 30 minutes in a doctor’s office waiting room are much less stressful when your child can play happily on a clean blanket from home with toys from home! And visits to Great Aunt Mary’s house will be much more peaceful as well.
• For a 2 year old who is doing blanket time, Mom will still be making most of the choices regarding which toys will be appropriate. Be wise in those choices. An example for a little boy: give him some blocks and cars together to provide an opportunity for his imagination, allowing him to build bridges and roads to drive his cars over. Don’t worry about having to change out toys frequently - certainly the same toys for a week will help a child learn to play with what has been given him.

Hope this is helpful. Be patient remembering it is ‘a process’.

Related Post: Playpen/Room time Re-training

Question:

We are expecting our first baby soon and are so excited to put into practice what we’ve been learning in our Preparation for Parenting class. My dilemma has to do with the pacifier - after a couple of baby showers, we seem to be swimming in them! My friends tell me they are absolutely essential, but I’m a little worried we may be creating a real problem if we use them.

Answer:

Pacifier or no pacifier is the question, so what is a parent to do? Let’s take birth to 8 months. As we all know, babies really do have a “need” to suck, it is just that some babies have a greater need than others and for most that sucking need lasts through the first 6 months. Depending on whether baby is breastfed or bottle fed can also make a difference in the amount of sucking needed. With a bottle, baby usually receives his nourishment faster; therefore, may have a greater need for additional sucking. In either case, you may sense that baby wants additional sucking by looking for his fist to suck or, if on the bottle, by wanting to continue sucking even when all the formula is gone. With breastfeeding, if he still wants to stay on the breast after you have given both sides and it’s already been about 30 minutes, it could be a good indicator that a pacifier will help satisfy that additional need to suck. If you are seeing that this is true for your baby, then by all means, use the pacifier as a tool to meet that need. But instead of meeting the need at nap and bed time, offer it just after the feeding for an extra 5 to 10 minutes. Or even during those 5 to 10 minutes or so of cuddling and snuggling time just before nap time.

Usually the biggest concern about the use of the pacifier is it becoming a ‘sleep prop’. To help minimize that situation, it is best to decide ahead of time what the game plan will be. Also remember, using the pacifier is neither a right nor wrong issue; often it comes down to preference and what each parent is able to handle regarding the issue of baby’s cry. One other fact to consider is the reality that a ‘habit’ may develop of needing the pacifier to fall asleep. As parents, you’ll want to give thought to how long you will allow pacifier use to continue when you will remove the pacifier.

There are a couple of ‘game plan’ options to choose from.

You may begin putting baby down for her nap without the pacifier, giving her 10 to 15 minutes to settle herself, falling asleep without the pacifier. If she continues to fuss after 10 minutes, you may decide to allow her to suck on the pacifier for a few minutes, remove it and give her another 10 minutes. If she still has not fallen asleep, then you may want to allow her the pacifier for the remainder of her nap.

Or you may decide that baby will go down with the pacifier from the start of the nap or night time sleep. The next decision will come when baby ‘looses’ the pacifier after falling asleep. How many times will Dad or Mom go in and replace the ‘lost’ pacifier?

Another option, and one that is often tempting for parents, is to put baby down for nap or night sleep with the pacifier, thinking, if baby wakes early we will allow baby to fuss for as long as it takes for him to get back to sleep. Unfortunately, the problem with this thought, is that once baby has had a 20 to 40 minute “power nap” he is likely to be recharged enough to fuss for hours! He’ll have a better chance of learning to fall asleep without the pacifier if after having had a good feeding and an appropriate amount of wake time, he is put down without it.

Either way, wisdom would dictate that if the pacifier is to be used, it remain in the crib when baby wakes up and is not ‘attached’ to baby to be used as a ‘plug’. Context and wisdom would also say that if you are taking a long trip via air or land, which will include nap times, if baby needs pacifier to fall asleep, then pacifier travels as well.

Since the ‘need’ for additional suckling diminishes around 6 months and if the pacifier has been limited to crib for naps and bedtime, many parents decide to ‘wean’ baby from the use of the pacifier at this time as well. That can be accomplished in several ways:

· Using a needle, prick a hole in the nipple of the pacifier removing the ‘air’ so that there really is nothing to suck on.

· Put baby down for nap without the pacifier, having pre-determined how long you will allow baby to fuss before settling in for sleep, and see how long it takes for baby to settle himself before you will intervene.

· Or decide to go ‘cold turkey’ - meaning no pacifier for naps and nights, but that can play havoc on a parent’s emotion, depending on how long and loud baby may cry. As a general guideline, three days and it is usually over.

The point is, it really doesn’t matter. There is no “right” or perfect way. As long as you have a goal of helping him drop the habit and you are slowly (or quickly) working toward that goal.

8 months and older:

If by 8 months the pacifier is being used, you will find your baby has matured to a place where he is able to find the pacifier and put it back in his mouth when it falls out during naps and night time. At this point, the pacifier really isn’t as much of a sleep prop as it was before….unless it falls out of his crib, or worse, it gets lost or left at home! That can really be a nightmare! So while you may choose to wait a bit longer to eliminate the use of the pacifier completely, it remains a good idea to limit its use to nap time and bedtime.

Once you decide it’s time for the pacifier to go, you have the same options as listed above. Realistically, expect from 1 to 3 days of crying and poor sleep with the ‘cold turkey’ approach. Because habits are hard to break and the older the baby/toddler is, the longer it can take; you may choose to continue to allow the pacifier for naps while you work on removing it at night time when babies sleep deeper. Again, if you choose to work on naps and night time at the same time, many parents find that poking a small hole in the end of the pacifier helps to make them less appealing and speeds the weaning process along. If the hole doesn’t seem to bother your little one, try snipping off a bit every couple of days until your little one gives up.