We have a neighbor a few houses down who's son is a year younger then my son (my son is 7) I know that this child has two younger siblings as well.

The issue is, he comes over our house knocking on our door every single day, sometimes multiple times a day asking to play. Now, my son does sometimes play with him, but most days he'd rather play by himself (he's an only child) he is also really close friends with a little girl who we are close friends with her parents.

We are not close at all with this kids parents, and while our children do play together occasionally at each other houses, we regulate how much our son is running off, and don't allow him to constantly knock on people's doors. I have no idea if these parents even realize how often their son is coming down to our house through out the day either.

My son, and my husband and I are growing tired of the constant knocking on our door asking to play. We've tried keeping the garage closed, but he'll just knock on the front door multiple times and stand there...I feel terrible sometimes telling him no, and I've gotten to the point I make my son make the decision and answer the door (sometimes he does say yes, and that's cool too). This kid at times have stood there and questioned/grilled my son, on why he is saying no but I wanna respect my child's wishes on who and when he wants to play with.

I don't want to be rude to this child and tell him to stop coming down to our house so often, but it's becoming excessive and tiresome.

This has nothing to do with how much you love your kids. Rather I see many videos talking about how you'll miss this age, even if you don't think you will.

Any parents out there not miss those first 5 years, meaning you may have fond memories, but would not go back to relive those times?

I have a 5-year-old and a 4-year-old, and bedtime has become absolutely atrocious lately.

No matter what we try, they constantly come out of their rooms after we’ve put them to bed. We’ve even tried letting them stay in their rooms and play quietly until they fall asleep, but they still come out.

The reason is always different:
“I have to tell you something.”
“I’m not tired.”
“I’m scared.”
Or some other excuse every single night.

We’ve tried sticker charts and reward systems, but they only seem to work for a couple of nights before the kids lose interest.

Our current approach is to calmly walk them back to their rooms every time they come out. The problem is that bedtime is really the only alone time my husband and I get together. Sometimes we’d like to relax upstairs and watch TV, but they just keep coming into our bedroom, making it incredibly frustrating and it’s no longer us calmly walking them back.

Other times, once they realize talking to us isn’t getting the reaction they want, they’ll sneak into each other’s rooms to play. That eventually turns into fighting, which means we have to separate them and basically restart the entire bedtime process all over again.
I’m at a loss. Has anyone dealt with something similar or found something that actually worked long-term?

Me and my wife are mentally MD physically exuasted from all the fighting between our two children. We have a boy and girl under 10 years old. I know alot of people say we should cherrish the moments. Oh time passes so fast! All that talk.

Honestly I’m ready for the kids to move out. I want to spend an evening with my wife alone without the kids. We tried leaving them at grandmas house but we are so tired and overstimulated it just becomes a time where you can rest and not actively do anything.

I get why people divorce. It’s for the every other week. Yes part of is it the relationship bla bla bla but it the kids that make us not enjoy eachother. We rarly fight over anything when it comes to our relationship. We had rough patches but solved them. It feels like we are just drifting towards old age together been (for the lack of better words) slaves to our kids. This summerbreak has been tough.

I'll preface this by saying I tend to lean on the anxious side and worry a lot. Maybe it's the knowing how many creeps exist in the world and all the true crime things I've watched but I'm cautious with my kids.

I have 2 kids, 5 years old and 9 months old. My niece is 14 and she's taken a babysitters course and is very interested in babysitting (maybe not diaper changing just yet though lol). Shes decently mature I would say.

My sister watches my kids once a week while my husband and I work. They live in a relatively safe area. Recently she let my niece and her friend take both kids up the street to a local park. I didn't love that but figured it probably didn't happen often and it's roughly a 5-7 minute walk. My husband sent me an article that someone tried snatching a 2 year old at that park so I shared it with my sister and said I don't think it's a good idea for her to take the kids places without an adult because I would hate for something horrible to happen and she's the one in charge. After all, she's a kid herself and might not realize to keep her head on a swivel when around other people. My sister said okay.

Then the other day I find out from my 5 year old that my brother in law dropped my niece and 5 year old (the baby stayed at home with my sister) at the local pool. I was a little surprised by that not only because they were by themselves but also my 5 year old has only done a handful of swimming lessons and can't swim independently. He said he wore a life jacket the whole time. But I don't mess around with water. Yes there was a lifeguard at the pool, but still. My sister always comments how crowded it is there and it just makes me nervous if she gets distracted or something. I told her how I felt and she said okay no problem.

No surprise, my 5 year old is upset because he can't do stuff just them 2 now and hid himself in his room. I know I have to make tough decisions and at the end of the day I'm the parent. Just curious what others think? I love my niece but we are living in different times now. If she was maybe 16 I would reconsider but 14 feels young still. (I also want to note I would absolutely trust her now to watch the kids inside the house by herself for a couple hours, just the leaving the house part I'm not OK with yet. )

We just added our third child to the mix at the end of June, and her birthdate is affecting our summer more than I had anticipated.

Parents with multiples who had kids during the summer .. what are we doing with the older ones?

I can't swim until after 6 weeks postpartum, so our swimming pool and beach days are out.

I can't bring the little one to anywhere crowed until her immune system is better.

I can't go on long drives with a newborn, so I'm surrently thinking of cancelling our yearly trips my girls look forward to.

What can we do? It's been too hot for the park. I'm 3 weeks postpartum, my house is in no condition for play dates.

I feel like I'm ruining my kids (6F, 2F) summer. I tried to explain why we were doing less this summer to my oldest, and she was like "well what do other people who have babies do with their older kids because they have to do *something*"

I was a loser before meeting my wife, once we got together i locked in and became closer to the man i wanted to befor her, went on with my career until i opened my own business

Now we have a beautiful daughter of 7 week when we were expecting her i was waiting for this lock-in to upgrade instead... i downgraded, i'm tired but everything i think of is her, i'm distracted at work, i just want to stay home and enjoy my baby girl with my wife, help her and everything.

i hate being away...

When does the "i have to work harder for her" locks in? it's not only her, i also have the responsabily of my employee, and i'm slacking, this is not right,

My sister in law had agreed to watch my 15 month old while my husband and I continue packing up our house to move. Then she mentioned she was going over to her mother in laws house so her kids could swim. I felt bad saying that I just simply can’t trust another adult to watch her around or in water. My husband felt a little offended and I tried my best to explain that accidents happen even to people who think “that would never happen to me” and that I’d rather have us as the accountable adults if anything. He said I was being paranoid but idk at this point!

I am a third time mom here, and as I sit here with my newborn, I am so amazed at his OBSESSION with the ceiling fan. He looks at it as if he is totally smitten, like it is his EVERYTHING. I know there are so many parents out there who know exactly what I’m talking about, it’s so cute, but I can’t help but wonder what they see. They have so many other things they look at during the day, but nothing lights them up quite like the good ol’ ceiling fan. What are your theories for why they adore them? I’m curious.

I’m completely depleted and defeated by my almost 3 year old. The negative behavior, the tantrums, the top of the lungs screaming, the defiance, the anger, the hitting, the flipping furniture, the hitting full cups of fluids on the ground for no reason, the head butting the newborn, the deliberate mess from throwing food, the 20 min sessions of trying to convince him to put his shoes on… then after finally getting them on he takes them off again right before we have to leave. He’s extremely emotionally dysregulated and has been coined a high feelings child and “ gifted” .My husband and are sad, mad, depressed, and completely detached from everything else in this world because all of our focus/ energy is being taken by parenting this kid.. I cry hard.. every day .. I cry from guilt, from exhaustion, from the fear that things will get worse and will follow him through puberty..

I’ve learned that small transitions are his triggers. But most of the time these intense ALL DAY tantrums will come out of nowhere.

We did an evaluation with an OT today, and I’m praying that we see some progress.

I need to know.. did any of you go through this with your toddler? And if so, did they eventually outgrow this behavior? How are they now as older children/ teens?

I just finished having a one-way battle with every kind of invisible gun/explosive you can think of against my teenaged son whilst he was ignoring me and doing his homework. After I tossed the last grenade at him and covered my ears, he looked up and made a "you got me" reaction as I yelled "fire in the hole!".

It dawned on me that while dads can maybe get away with that level of ridiculousness, it's just weird for moms. Will I ever grow up or is this just what my kids have to accept?

Side note: their dad is the more serious one, so I feel like someome needs to take over the role because kids who aren't embarrassed by their parents just end up with no adversities to overcome.

He is blessed (and sometimes cursed) with high degree of self-awareness. He appreciates his life as it is and is upset at the changes coming with puberty. I've been working with him to support coming to peace with change. But truth be told, it impacts me as well, and I am mourning the ending of his young childhood phase.

How have you engaged your child who has had these emotions?

Related to this, and one of the ways I have been engaging this is sharing about my experience with vipasana- the 10 day meditation experience during which we learn about the original buddha and his teachings about suffering. One of the mantras in the course is 'anicca'- all things will change. But what if change itself is the source of the suffering?

I feel like I might be doing something wrong and Im genuinely at my wits end.

My son is about to turn two this August and is due to start daycare, as I get ready to return to work. And we have A PROBLEM.

Whatever we do. However early we start our morning routine. We. Never. Can. Get. Out. Of. The. House. Before. 9. AM.

We have the mornign routine down: potty, teeth, breakfast. Fairly efficient. But then when it comes to the time to put on his clothes and start to leave, somehow he inevitably digs his heels and just won't budge. They're not usually meltdowns per se, it's more that he's a master at stalling. He will bring one toy after another to play with. Then he will want a snack. If I do try to just grab him and start putting on clothes, then he will actually have a tantrum/meltdown.

It is NOT a sensory issue about clothes. He likes the clothes. He is now learning to answer basic emotions questions and he's consistently indicated that he is worried/sad about leaving the house - even if it is for an activity that he enjoys, such as his favorite playground.

Usually around 9.30-10 he's magically ok to go wherever. But daycare needs him by 9am at the latest and my boss said I should ideally aim to already be at the office at that time. Which is perfectly reasonable. 9 am is NOT early. I just dont see it happening.

Will be grateful for any practical advice, especially from parents with emotionally sensitive kiddos.

What do you do with all the “stuff” your kids make at school, day care, camp, home, etc? We used to just quietly “disappear” things after a while when she was younger. But now she’s 8 and everything is very precious to her. All the crafts and pictures and everything are pilling up with no place to go. What is everyone else doing?

I'm going on a 5 day holiday soon with my 6, 4 and 18mo. 6yo is in lessons but can't swim independently (maybe around 5m with a noodle). Younger 2 have no swim experience.

It will be just the 2 parents with the kids, and we'll be staying in the splash pad area.

There's so much conflicting information out there and so many different aids! They will of course always be within arms reach, and we won't go beyond waist height with the younger 2 unless they are being carried. And no deeper than 6yo can reach for her.

Do we just use nothing? It feels wrong to have no backup but then I'm aware of the false sense of security too

We will absolutely always be in the pool and 100% focused on the kids.

Made a previous post about 12 month old crying all day at daycare and the consensus was to give her more time.

It's been 3 weeks of 3 days per week and they just emailed me to basically say that she's not adjusting. She often refuses to eat and doesn't play or participate. She needs to be held constantly in order to keep her from crying. She's not like that at home. They do their best but have to balance the needs of all the kids - of course. There's 3 teachers and 10 kids ages 10-18months. They are asking me what I recommend they do to help her.

I don't have any suggestions for them because the truth is that she just wants to be with her parents... she's always been a velcro baby. So, I'm tempted to just pull her out and try again when she's 18 months (this wouldn't be simple but we could make it work) and would be in the toddler room (January). Would this mess her up even more?

Only other thing I can think of is going all-in and doing 5 days per week and hoping that it forces an adjustment but this feels... cruel? I need the time away to keep our lives running smoothly, take care of our house, myself and eventually get back to work but I'm torn between that and knowing that she's struggling all day wanting to be home.

The kicker is that we have another baby on the way, arriving in January so I really need to get her settled into a good routine.

So my daughter is 5 years old and we have always cuddled till she falls asleep. Our routine is get ready for bed, 30 min of reading, and then cuddle with her till she falls asleep, then we leave. In the middle of the night if she gets up she walks over to our room and will tuck herself in bed with us. It has mostly worked for our family but is starting to feel like there is no end in sight, especially as we have another one on the way. I have zero clue where to begin with introducing independent sleep. I would love all your suggestions. I’m only interested in gentle approaches. I’d also love to hear if anyone has a similar situation and how it turned out.

Desperately need advice on how to get my 6 year old to sleep in their own room. I will start by saying I know I’ve created bad habits.
My son used to sleep great until we moved out of a crib around 3 years old. It started as bed time taking longer which is normal and progressed into him being in our room full time. He now has little floor mattresses he sleeps on beside the bed (as I said above. I know. Terrible idea). Honestly I didn’t mind it at first, but now we are 3 years in and I need space. We also now have a one year old and I don’t want them catching on to what’s going on (him being in our room).

I’ve tried incentives. I’ve tried staying with him until he falls asleep. I’ve tried almost everything. Nothing works. We get up there ( side note both the kids are upstairs and we are down) and he will lay with me, but when it’s time to go he cries and tells me he’s scared and wants to feel protected ( talk about pulling at heart strings). Anyway, I need advice if someone has any on how to transition him to his own room.
- signed an exhausted parent who needs help

My daughter has recently become very worried about being left alone to sleep. Until about 2 months ago, I would read to her and say goodnight, check on her after 5 minutes then that would be it. She was perfectly happy with this and had been since she was about 2 or 3.

She inexplicably started to worry about being left alone at bedtime, so I started staying in my room whilst she went to sleep in hers, just so we were on the same floor. This then went to needing me to be in her room.

I don't know what's triggering it, she's ok at school (as far as I know nothing beyond the usual issues that pop up from time to time) my husband and I split amicably back in October, so there's big change there that she's processing, but he sees the children often and is a positive in their lives. She's got worse since school finished for summer and we're out of routine, but I have kept bedtimes the same for 95% of the time.

I've tried to gradually leave her room again but she's not adjusting well at all. Full of anxiety, says her tummy hurts every night (nerves presumably, she's well the rest of the day) and takes significant time to settle, which affects my older daughters time with me.

Any tips? Should I persevere trying to get her confidence up again or just let her come into my bed while she's obviously so anxious about being alone. I want her to be resilient, but don't want to push her when she needs a hug.

I get so frustrated losing my time with my eldest daughter as well as time for me. Most of the time I'm calm and ok, but the longer it goes on of an evening, the more frustration builds and it helps nobody.

How are you Mums dealing with having long hair and a baby? I don’t want to have to cut it if I don’t have to but I’m constantly nervous about the baby getting it wrapped around their fingers and toes while she’s grabbing a playing with it while she’s feeding I am constantly trying to put it over my shoulder so she can’t reach it, but she always seems to find some here to play with.

My LO will be entering daycare soon at 4 months, just looking for some positive words from others who went through this transition.

Hi everyone,

I am a teacher currently on summer break with a toddler in daycare. We have to pay for his spot throughout the summer, which is fine. What I’m struggling with is deciding each day to send him or not.

My thinking is this: he does well on routine, he loves his teachers and his friends there, he eats and naps well there, he learns a lot, etc etc. it’s a great daycare.

But, I also want to hang out with him all day! But I do feel guilty keeping him home. I worry if I don’t send him consistently over the summer he’ll be a wreck every time he does go. I know the teachers want me to send him consistently as it’s easier for them when he’s used to the routine, which also creates some guilt.

What would you do? I want to be able to just send him if I have errands or something one day, and other days just keep him home so we can hang out and enjoy summer. But the inconsistency def isn’t great.

Help me feel better about this 😊

We have three kids (6, 9 and 11). The way we handle chores is that we have 10 minutes of "cleaning time" every evening, where we pick tasks for them based on what needs doing at the moment. Picking up stuff around the house, folding laundry, etc. They also each have a separate task they have to do around once a week that takes a bit more time (unpacking this weeks groceries, vacuuming the bottom floor, etc). Aside from this, they don't really do anything else aside from putting away their dishes, cleaning their own rooms when needed, and cleaning up if they spill or break something. We've tried other systems and this one at least works better than those, although sometimes "cleaning time" starts with 10 minutes of whining in addition to the 10 minutes of actual doing.

I'm curious as to what you expect from your children, if you differentiate based on age (this can be a sensitive topic for us as the 9-year old will crash out if the 6-year old gets a pass for being younger), and how long your kids spend doing chores on average.

My almost four year old is having a tantrum day. Screaming tantrums over little things like screaming at me for milk as I’m literally pouring it.

I don’t usually do this but I had her take a break in her room, with the door not locked. I’ve been researching tantrums and cannot be followed around the house by a screaming child several times a day. It gets to the point where I need to have boundaries.

Well my sister (who is not a mom) decides she wants to go in after two minutes to coddle my child and I had to set a firm boundary that tantrums do not get attention from now on because I need the behavior to stop getting coddled by the family I live with, which is why they aren’t getting better.

I’d appreciate any advice. I feel bad having to set boundaries around family and basically parent them too about this age group and normal parenting strategies.

Edit: I went into the room after ten minutes with snacks and no judgement. We talked about how screaming hurts our ears, and if she’s screaming she can go take a break in her room to calm down.

My first just turned 2, and he's an amazing sleeper. He's always been high sleep needs. He didn't drop his 2nd nap until around 16 months. When he was on 2 nap schedule, it was around 15 hours of total daily sleep (two 1.5 hr naps and 12 hrs overnight). Now, he takes one 2-hour nap, and still sleeps 7pm-7am. Sometimes, he's tired by 6:30pm and that's when he goes to bed (earlier bedtime doesn't result in earlier waking). He's only had a couple sleep regressions that lasted 2-3 days. We did sleep train at 4.5 months old, but I'm told by multiple people and reddit posts that him being an amazing sleeper had nothing to do with us, it was all just in his nature to be a good sleeper.

We have another one coming in about a month. What are the chances that she will also be a good sleeper like her brother? I see so many posts from parents of amazing sleepers that got humbled by their second child. I'm kind of getting scared.