Baby steps with bed transition

Dara

New Member
Well, the Elmo bed arrived on Friday and a friend put it together today since husband and I are idiots with tools! :hammer:
Sammy was so excited to get this bed. He picked it out himself! We thought that he would be excited until it was together and then freak out. Thankfully we were wrong. He pretended to sleep on the pillow and be covered in his blanket over and over. Then came nap time and he really wanted to give it a good try. :bravo:
I was listening on the monitor (he sleeps upstairs and we are downstairs) and he was talking and bouncing and then it got quiet so I thought wow! he did it. Then I heard some musical something. I go into his room and there Sammy is walking around with his hands in his pockets playing with toys. He decided he wanted to nap in his crib. Later on he played in his bed and explored and said he wanted to go to sleep in his bed. Bedtime: went through the normal routine and then he decided he wanted his crib. I had to go in his room to turn his air purifier on and he then decided to go in his bed. He lies down on his back I cover him up kiss him goodnight and close the door. I guess I should point out that we had told him he has to stay in the bed until mommy and daddy come in to get him. He is pretty quiet for 10 minutes and then we hear him whimpering what we think is "crib" so we go upstairs thinking he will be sitting up or out of the bed. There Sammy is in the exact same position I left him in. The poor kid was afraid to move! :rofl: Baby steps! He will get there eventually! This is only day 1
 
:bravo:

That is FANTASTIC!!

High 5 for difficult child, and for you as well! Baby steps, that's what will work. Good for you guys!!

:smile:
 

Dara

New Member
He was really cute with it. I just felt bad because he actually listened to us only too well! I will have to try and figure out another way to explain to him that he needs to stay in the bed but he can move while in the bed...
 

susiestar

Roll With It
How cute! This is a great first day. Reminds me of my nephew - sister in law told him that if he got out of bed monsters would get him. So instead of getting out of bed he just screamed bloody murder, LOL!!

Your little one had a great reaction to the new bed. Letting him pick it out was a great strategy. Probably a good strategy for other new things.

Susie
 

Marguerite

Active Member
Something to try - read him a naptime or bedtime story. Snuggle up in his BED, let him move around while you're there to get a comfy position. If he falls asleep while you're reading, tiptoe out but keep listening. If he wakes later on and wants his crib, put him in it, but keep up this routine until he realises wherever it is in his head that he NEEDS to realise, that it's safe and OK to sleep in his bed.

My mother used to read to her grandkids at naptime, on her bed. Sometimes she would stay and nap with them, sometimes she would ease herself off the bed and go and potter around the house. No monitors back then, she just had to keep an ear out for them. And quite a number of my nephews were difficult child, well and truly!

Something else my mother invented - probably illegal now. It was a harness which was made of soft calico. It was like a very wide belt which tied up with bows around the child's waist, but was stitched with a single line of vertical stitching, to a very wide band of calico which wrapped around the bed and underneath it. Putting a toddler to bed in a normal, 'big' bed can be dangerous, especially the old beds we had which were quite high. We used tis so they couldn't fall out of bed, but still had freedom to roll from one side to another. The cleverer ones could even undo the bow themselves when they woke up - generally if they could undo the bow, they no longer needed the belt because they were safe enough in the big bed now. We'd listen for them to wake and go in and untie them. Often they'd be sitting up in bed (it really did allow a lot of movement) and playing with the toy or book they'd taken to bed with them. They weren't upset, nor did they feel confined, because we only used it to keep them safe while asleep. It could be too easily abused, if it was something on the market. But they did feel very proud when they were permitted to nap without it, because they were now big enough to keep themselves safe.
I think my mother invented this because of difficult children - my oldest brother, and a lot of my nephews. She figured it was safer than a too-young child falling out of bed, or wandering around playing with stuff she hadn't been able to child-proof. Often she'd be in the next room with another child - she had 24 grandchildren! Thankfully, not all at the same age.

The harness also gave the toddlers the confidence and sense of safety. And looking back, I do wonder how many of them felt secure with that belt snugly round their waist - I think of difficult child 3's "hug vest", easy child 2/difficult child 2's preference for wearing tightly laced corsets ("It feels like wearing a hug") and consider other aspects of these kids, and wonder about Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) incidence in my family.

Marg
 
That's why these toddler beds are so great, you gotta get a rolling start to fall out of one of them, and even then, it is only a short drop to the ground.

When I was a kid, my younger brother (a poster child for difficult child-ism if there ever was one) used to climb out of his crib at age 2, sneak out of the house, and run up & down 41st St. in the middle of the night. I distinctly remember my mom tying his wrist to the crib with a shoelace. Boy that kid was a mess.
 

Marguerite

Active Member
We lived on a farm, and my mother still used the bed harness to stop the kids getting out and playing on the tractor.

Those toddler beds are great. I had the benefit of them with our kids, it was my parents who the old, high beds from a generation or two ago.

We couldn't stop difficult child 3 getting out of bed, out of the house or anywhere, so we had to put up a front fence to stop him wandering. We then had to tie it up with okky straps and rope - we didn't have visitors for months!

Marg
 

Dara

New Member
Sammy still hasnt slept in the bed but now I think he has a sinus infection and he had no nap today so I dont know that I am going to mess with it too much. He likes the bed as long as we are in the room with him. Like you guys said. It isnt like he has a long way down. He is really cute with it though
 
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