Bedtime is a problem brought up more frequently than any other issue by parents who come to see me. They are confused because they are getting conflicting information from magazines, books, and family. They feel like they've tried everything and often are not only discouraged, but feel embarrassed that they can't manage something that seems easy. Some parents are so overwhelmed that they have just given up, letting their children sleep with them or stay up until they fall asleep on the sofa. One woman who came in told me her five-year-old simply wouldn't go to sleep. She tore the sheets off her bed, pulled all her books and toys off her shelf, and then finished with a flourish by pulling her curtains down.
Then there is the child who is otherwise afraid of the dark but who walks in abject darkness through the entire house, alone, and then stands like a ghost next to the parent's bed. The parent, sensing an unnatural presence in the room, opens one eye and finds herself 10 inches away from another eyeball -- her child's.
Another family couldn't make it out of the bedroom. The mother would sleep on the floor next to the crib because the child would scream if she tried to leave. Sleeping on the floor is actually very common, along with playing musical beds. This is why I call it the bedtime circus -- there are all kinds of acts going on under a single roof. Unfortunately, these situations are dysfunctional for the children as well as the parents.
Not only do children sense that they are running the show, but the parents' relationship suffers. The family structure is out-of-whack and the ones who seem to know it best are the children because they don't want to have as much power as the parents have given them. They want the parents to be strong and in control. It makes children feel insecure when their own parents can't handle them.
The common denominator in all of these scenarios is this: the children engaged in this behavior once and nothing happened. In other words, no one corrected them. There was a scientist named Skinner that made a very important discovery with experiments he did with rats. The rats had to press a pedal to get a pellet of food. Some rats got food on a regular basis, say after 10 taps. Other rats were given food intermittently. When they stopped giving the rats food when they pressed on the pedal, the ones that were rewarded regularly gave up sooner. The ones that were rewarded intermittently pressed the pedal over and over before they finally gave up.
In other words, if you try to control bedtime on an irregular basis, your kids will keep on with their behavior. And believe me, kids usually can outlast parents.
However, if you are consistent with your routine and do not give in to the power struggle you are having, the behavior will extinguish faster.
You will hear me say this over and over in my articles, presentations, and CDs: children sense they can get their way, they become insecure and engage in acting-out behaviors. The more they win, the worse they feel, because there's not a strong person to protect them, in this case from themselves.
So what are parents to do? The technique the Nanny on TV uses is pretty good.
Her method is to basically put the kids in their beds after their routine, kiss them goodnight, and then leave. If the children come out of their rooms, you silently pick them back up and put them in their beds. No talking, no scolding, no cajoling. You just put them back to bed. You do this until the children finally give up and go to sleep. This can take up to a couple of hours if you give your children vitamins. If done properly, it shouldn't take more than one to two nights to completely break the habit.
There are variations on this, but that is basically it. But what caused it in the first place? Because mom and dad were unsure of themselves. Maybe mom and dad thought it was cute or they didn't like scenes or mom and dad were fighting and the children cut into the uncomfortable silence between them. But basically, the parents let them do it. Babies and small children may not be able to express themselves well, but they can smell a chicken from all the way upstairs.
Here are the things I hear from parents who don't want to do the hard thing: "I can't stand to hear him cry, I'm afraid she will be scared, staying up later isn't going to make a difference in the long run, they've always slept with us/me." Parents, these are excuses! They are your own fears and beliefs -- not the child's! Sometimes mothers, especially, are unhealthily attached to their youngest and literally hold onto them at night by allowing them to keep getting up or by sleeping with them. Sometimes it is a way to avoid having sex and emotional intimacy. Sometimes it is because mom and dad are having problems and they each think the other isn't doing their share. Whatever the reason, I can tell you that it is not healthy for the child. It is also a breeding ground for future power struggles.
The one thing you absolutely must have to get your kids into a healthy nightly routine is the understanding that you are in charge. Being in charge means the buck stops with you. As a parent, you have to do hard things. You cannot worry that by not giving in to them you are somehow damaging them. They will not always like you, but they will love you and respect you for being a good parent. Your job is to protect them from their own ignorance; they are using the primitive part of their brains because their prefrontal cortex (the decision-making area) is not developed. You need to set boundaries and enforce them.
Children learn from you. They take their cues from you. If you are unsure of yourself, they will know it. If you give in one night, they don't understand why you enforce the rule the next night. Children who have no consistency in their lives will never take rules seriously. Why should they? The people in charge of them don't. They have no sense of consequences yet.
The hard part is being consistent when you are tired or discouraged. If you watch any of the shows on TV about parents who need help, you will notice they often give up and pretend to ignore what their children are doing. They make a lot of threats but don't back them up. They have lost confidence in themselves because they know what they're doing isn't working.
Here are some basic guidelines every parent should follow: (both parents need to agree -- if they don't, it will be confusing to the kids and will undermine the structure you are trying to establish):
- Be very clear about bedtime expectations. Children like to know what to expect. Making a chart of your routine helps.
- Never threaten something you can't or won't follow through on. Think about it first -- don't react out of anger. Can I manage this and for how long? Am I willing to take my time to enforce this? If the answer is no, then come up with something else.
- As far as staying in bed, that is absolute. Putting them back each time with no comment is the quickest and fastest way to extinguish behavior.4. You can't make a child go to sleep but eventually, they will. If they play or sing or read if they are older, that may be what they need to complete their routines. If they are not coming out of their rooms, that is the most important thing.
So, what does this mean for parents? It means you're in charge which comes with a lot of responsibility. All the way up to the industrial age, people believed that children were basically little adults. Thankfully, we know differently now. But knowing differently also widens the role of the parent.
Parenting is about teaching, guiding and giving the gift of stability, safety and predictability. Establishing a good bedtime routine that hardly ever varies gives children a sense that their world is orderly and secure. They go to bed knowing they are safe and that their parents are loving and strong. All will be right in their world, and you will have some uninterrupted time in yours.
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