bedtime help

Christmasbaby18

DD used to be so easy to put to bed....she's still not terrible but she has gotten more difficult because she stalls so much.  It can take forever to get through bath, jammies, teeth, and books.  She loves the books so I'll tell her that if she doesn't get ready nicely we won't have time for books but it doesn't seem to work. She just get more and more upset.  She's fine once she's actually in bed but it seems if I want get her there without tears it takes over an hour to let her go at her pace.  If I hurry her, it's a nightmare.  Thoughts?

la79al

It's pretty much the same at our house, with DD1 anyhow.  I've given up and started bedtime routine an hour or so before I actually want her in bed.  The only thing that I can suggest is a chart of some kind that shows everything that gets done before bed and let her do them and cross them off.  Then when she asks for something 2 seconds before bed, you can show her that you already did that/got that. 

TiffanyBerry

My thought is - it takes her an hour to wind down. So give her that hour. You cannot make her wind downany faster.

TiffanyBerry

I should clarify. I don't mean "let her procrastinate the whole way". But don't try to rush her either. Have a VERY set routine that you follow TO THE LETTER every night. You may have to change it, but set those guidelines so she knows exactly how bedtime goes. If she needs, on average, 10minutes to brush her teeth without a meltdown, giver her 10minutes, and giver her lappeopriate countdown warnings as you get there. Ditto with getting dressed, a book, etc.

MammaBear81

Have you tried visual cues to help her move along?  I used to let the kids pick out two books right before we started the routine and lay them on the bed.  As we got ready for bed if they weren't "moving along" I would say, "DS1, I think you need to put your PJ's on faster so we have time for both books, or would you like me to put one of them away?" and started to get up to go get one of the books.  That would get them to hurry up a bit. Occasionally they would lose one book, but I would also give them a chance to "earn it back" if they did the next part of the routine extra fast.  Also you might try to keep your directions positive, "Lets keep moving so we have time for both books" rather than "if you don't hurry up you will lose book time". Focusing on the positive behavior usually bypasses the meltdown mode for us.

Now they are just in a routine, if we have bath the routine is about 30 min (45 if they play in the tub) and if we aren't doing bath, bedtime takes about 15 minutes start to finish for all 5 of them.