Can’t Calm Them, Join Them

Posted under EXTERNAL USE ONLY

We’ve all (the royal WE) been there.

Your kid is screaming bloody murder and they just seem like they need a little compassion, a gentle caress or a calm voice. Do we cave? Do we succumb to their emotional demands?

Well, this father did and it proved to all of us doubters that sometimes things are EXACTLY the way we fear. And we get trapped under those fears for several awkward, cramped minutes. Or hours.

Have you taken one for the team? How far have you gone for your munchkins?

““

Follow us on Facebook and we’ll learn to self-soothe.

Learn Ya Stuff
We can teach you things about things with these things.
 

40 Comments

  • Julius says:

    Hi there,

    we don´t have this problem. Our little girl (6 months) sleeps with us in our bed.

    • Elspeth says:

      Same here. We cosleep and our little girl will be 3 soon. Currently expecting our second. Time to get a bigger bed to fit all 4 of us.

    • Everly says:

      LOL It’s not a problem til they’re 2! We started co-sleeping when my daughter was about 3 months, she’s about to be 2yo and still comes to our bed. Luckily she starts out in her own bed, which can be convenient. Now the trick is getting to stay in her bed…in her room.

  • Erica says:

    I LOVED this.

    I do not have children yet, but I’m marrying my fiance in October and my ovaries are already glowing on a nuclear level. I have ever certainty in the world that WE will give in sometimes–but not enough to make the kid wimpy. 🙂

  • Sarah says:

    This was hysterical! And why my daughter ends up in bed with us more often than not.

  • Tina Reher says:

    this very video served as a form of ‘cationary tale’ when my daugter was ‘learning’ how to fall asleep on her own. whenever i felt like caving in from the stress and tiredness of it all I would think; NO I’m NOT ending up in that CRIB WITH HER!

  • JeninCanada says:

    I think this video illustrates 2 things; how awesome cosleeping is, and how far we’ve come from it. It’s not normal to keep your kids away from you in a separate room and in a separate bed for hours at a time. Kids sleep better with their families; this is how it’s done in the large majority of the world. Facinating.

  • Sumi says:

    Our daughter demanded that she be velcro-ed to a body (usually mine) in order to sleep from the time she was born. We tried, and failed, to get her to sleep in her crib for more than 30 minutes at a time, and when she was two months old I took her to bed with me and never looked back. But now we know most of those co-sleeping positions listed on this site…

  • farheen says:

    Wow…..we have 2 boys and this is how my husband used to end up. Basically the boys sleep in our queen sized bed (they have beds of their own, oh but who needs those?) and more often than not, my husband and I are on the floor….

  • Mo says:

    I’ve TOTALLY climbed into the crib. I found co-sleeping a lot more comfortable!

  • Joyous says:

    You might be opening a can of worms with this post, guys. People are opinionated when it comes to the cry-it-out method and co-sleeping. I co-slept with both my babies. It certainly never damaged them, or made them “wimpy”. If anything, they were confident in our love, and felt secure and respected. Both my children transitioned to their own beds as toddlers, no problem.
    This video is very cute, and very funny!! I have been in that position myself for naptimes and I can totally relate lol.

  • MacKenzie says:

    We used the crib for storing clean laundry for the first year of our daughter’s life. Much more comfortable use of that thing. HA! Poor guy.

    For those wondering, she made an incredibly easy transition to her room at just over a year old.

  • Emily S. says:

    They’re only that little for a minute. Co-sleeping isn’t for every family or every kid, but looking back, I remember the co-sleeping moments in a much fonder and less guilty way than the smoking on the patio through the cry-it-out stage (don’t worry, I quit, we’re good). Live and learn. I’ll post back in 15 years to tell you which kids are better adjusted.

  • While I sorta want an adult-sized crib, I’m more concerned that this guy doesn’t understand the dangers of “bumper pads” in the crib. So dangerous that they were made illegal here in Illinois a couple years ago.

    • Katie says:

      Actually it’s only for the city of Chicago. Other cities can sell them. Parents have been using these pads forever to protect the kids arms and legs (and possibly head if they are that small) from getting stuck in between the rails. They actually make a mesh one now that you can put up for the same reason, but the baby can still breathe if they mash their face up against it.

  • Christina says:

    I’ve totally done this.

    Some nightmare comforting after we packed up our spare bed…

    My husband doesn’t sleep well with the kids in bed with him so on some rare occassions, I’ll respond to nightmares this way. Luckily, my son now has a real bed to climb into for nightmare comforting =p

  • Danielle says:

    My son (2) still sleeps with us. We’ve tried convincing him to sleep in his own bed. The problem is, he likes to cuddle, and I like to cuddle with him. So it’s not a very hard sell for him.
    The problem is I’m 8 months pregnant and I’m worried about what is going to happen when kiddo #2 arrives.

  • Melissa says:

    Go buy the sleep baby book by the family of doctors. One of the doctors is on the show called the Doctors.

  • Lea says:

    Lol. I thought I was the only one that ever crawled into the crib, as to avoid the “taking out of crib and getting into our bed” rule… lol

  • Annie says:

    I co-slept while I was breastfeeding, and I am thankful I did. She is a wild sleeper, so eventually she wanted her own bed. I was done getting kicked. Now I have a no kids in the bed at night rule. (unless she is really sick) She is welcome to come in and sleep on the floor next to my bed if she has a bad dream. I am not willing to get kicked all night anymore, and I am a light sleeper. I really think it is a great thing while they are infants, but in the end I am the adult and my sleep is important.

  • Annie says:

    I should mention this video made me laugh. That baby was NOT having it.

  • Katie says:

    I’ve done this before. We co-slept for 6 months and had to do this to transition my son to his crib. It worked and about 3 days later he slept alone.

  • Kristin says:

    I love this video! I’ve seen it before but it is so cute I watched it again.

    I haven’t gotten in the crib, but when my son had the stomach flu this winter I made a bed for us on the floor. Eventually I moved him to the crib late at night once he fell asleep and his stomach had settled.

    Usually we just hold hands through the bars of the crib for a couple of minutes then he lets go and rolls over.

  • Sara says:

    I was extremely tempted to climb into the crib, but I was worried that since they are built for little tiny baby people rather than big grown-up people that it would collapse. I realize that there is no reason that it shouldn’t be able to hold my weight, but once the thought entered my mind I could never get over the nagging fear. So our little girl still sleeps in our bed at 15 months! I really wish there were such a thing as queen or king sized cribs (there aren’t…I’ve looked) so I can stop worrying about her rolling out of the bed. Our current method to keep her from rolling out is that she sleeps between us until he wakes up to go to work, and then she sleeps between me and a guardrail until it’s time to get up. Most nights she ends up sleeping with her head jabbed in my husbands abdomen and her feet kicking me in the back (“H is for hell” on the sleep position chart).

  • Pianomom3 says:

    I am stunned at how many of you have caved. I know I’ll get flak for this, so bring it on. I never did this with my child and never would have. If he had a nightmare, he came in. If he wasn’t feeling good, he came in. But when he was little and I knew he was tired, I let him cry it out. I think he’s fine. He’s an A student, involved in more than one sport and more than one music program. I’d say he turned out more than exceptional. He’s also not a hugger or a cuddler. I don’t think this co-sleeping would have turned him into one either. As for co-sleeping, thank you, I’ll do that with my husband!

    • Meagan says:

      Love it Pianomom3 – no flak or judgement from this Mom… just a big high five for your line on ‘As for co-sleeping, thank you, I’ll do that with my husband!’

  • Meagan says:

    I found the video to be hilarious because I’m sure we have all be in an awkward parenting situation wondering, ‘How the hell are we going to get out of this one?’; however, co-sleeping and attachment parenting was/is not for every family – certainly not ours. We used the ‘cry-it-out’ method for our son and it worked well for us… that’s not to say we didn’t shed a few tears of our own as parents or sit in the basement with earplugs in (the baby monitor beside us of course) trying to drown out the cries, but he always fell asleep and continues to be a great sleeper to this day.

  • Kevin says:

    Funny enough, not in a hardy har har kind of way, but my recent post talks about our experiences of sleep deprivation and co-sleeping.

    http://kevin.kevandisa.com/2013/03/sleep-deprivation-and-co-sleeping/

  • Kevin says:

    And just reading through the other comments, I am sorry but for those who don’t have any kids say they won’t ever co-sleep when they have children… HA!

    Come back when you have a child and we’ll talk.

  • Kristie says:

    I’m currently trying to teach my 6 month old to fall asleep on her own, and after hours of her screaming on and off the only thing stopping me from getting into the crib with her is the fear I’ll break it. I love co-sleeping but I’ve been struggling with the self-settling for almost a week now so I don’t want to cave and have to start again.

  • Rafie says:

    Yeah, I remember when I was a kid and bulding the fortress and tent inside the house especially during raining season. I love to invite my mom and dad to join the adventure.

    You as a kid feel appreciated if they (parents) join in the adventure. Because you just want to share the happiness.

    But going insidemthe baby coat is beyond my imagination 🙂 Now I know if my baby went on rage! Cheers people.

  • mjschmidt says:

    When my son was a few months old, he would, occasionally, only sleep if he was swaddled, and then cradled in my lap, which meant I had to sit crosslegged on our bed with him in my lap til he was soundly asleep enough to move him to his crib. My knees ached by that point.

    Now he’s 2, and in his big boy bed for a while now. Occasionally he wants me to lie down beside him. Often i can get away with saying “Daddy has to go pee, and I will be right back.” and by the time I come to check on him, he’s asleep. However, I tried this trick a couple of weeks ago deep into the time we were potty training, and when I told him I had to go pee and would be right back he said “Oh! Me go pee also!”. So much for that trick.

  • Cheryl says:

    Very cute video. To those who said.. This is why we co-sleep… this child was used to co-sleeping. My son was in his crib at two weeks old and the times we pulled him into bed… He did not fall asleep that quickly.

  • Mimi says:

    Co-slept most nights for 1 year with the first and currently doing it with the second while we’re breastfeeding. I’ve taken TWO for the older one’s team by sleeping on his floor while pregnant and then after a back injury recently. ((my hubby travels a lot for work))

  • Ryan says:

    I plan to have my little girl’s future husband turn over on the honeymoon bed to still find me sleeping next to her. deal with it future husband.

  • nicole says:

    I’m sorrry but co sleeping is for lazy parents who don’t want to take the time to have their baby adjust at an early age. My children have NEVER slept in my bed with me. On nights where they were like this video I would sit with them in the room and hold their hand till they fell asleep. Co sleeping is dangerous. I’m sure I’ll be readinf about one of you rolling ontoand suffocatinf your children soon enough.

  • kirsten says:

    Oh, the ire on both sides. It’s funny how sanctimonious everyone gets about their own parenting style. This video really made me laugh as I am co-sleeping with my 6 mos. old right now and we started when she got sick at 4 mos. I was also sick and work full time, hence my “lazy” decision to bring her to bed to make breastfeeding easier. We co-slept with our first until he was 10 mos then transitioned him to his crib and he had no interest in coming back to our bed (until morning to read a book with us when he could walk). All babies are different, as are parents. Do what works for you and your child so that you both can sleep and function for each other. If you’re not happy with your sleep situation, I highly recommend the blog Troublesome Tots. It’s excellent. We’ll be working on transitioning this one a little sooner. Til then, sweet dreams. Ha ha.

  • Andrew says:

    Of course its lazy, whats your point? We get so much more sleep with our 3 month old in bed with us. Mum and DD dont even fully wake up to feed, and I dont even notice. The girls then usually sleep in till 8 or 9

  • Chris says:

    I haven’t had to go to this extreme (yet), but our 15 month old is starting to get more clingy around nap time. This past weekend she fell asleep on my chest as we were sitting in our living room. I had to sit still for about an hour and let her rest. At one point I dragged our coffee table over with my foot (skillfully avoiding a wake up) so I could grab a magazine.

  • lw says:

    I’m preggo now, and waiting eagerly for my baby but I don’t like the idea of co sleeping. I’ll have the baby in a bassinet next to me for the first little while, but as soon as it’s old enough, mummy and daddy’s room is going to be a no go zone. We were never allowed in my mums room when we were kids and it was good for our boundaries. Plus I want to defend my privacy with my husband

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *