It feels totally wrong!!!

[Mindfulness123]

My little girl (2 yrs) started nursery this September. I had a great 1st session with her. She really enjoyed her time there. My plan was to stay with her until she became familiar and happy with staff (and the nursery setting as a whole), standing back, being present but not involved. I made my wishes clear to the nursery but on our 2nd session I was asked to stay out! It was not my choice but I felt I had no choice. The door quickly closed on my little girl who immediately started to cry. I stood outside the room in mental distress thinking this is not what I wanted. Hearing her cry when there was no need ripped through me. What distressed me even more was as soon as the door was closed my little girl was picked up and held tightly in distress for 20mins until she exhausted herself to sleep. If the nursery staff had said, as soon as we close this door, we are going to use restrictive practice, I would have walked out! I feel so distressed and I have not been back to the nursery cancelling a number of sessions. But my daughter is supposed to be there this week. I feel as though I can't go back. Does anyone know if this is normal practice? I feel as though my wishes were completely ignored! I also get the feeling that I am not welcome to stay.

[OlennasWimple]

How do you know about "restrictive practices"? Holding a crying child isn't necessarily restraining them. And surely if you were that concerned you would have gone in, not stood outside the door for 20 mins?

Settling in normally involves you leaving your DC for longer and longer, because staying in the room with them can be unsettling for them and the other children, so I'm not surprised that they didn't want you to stay inside - but this should have been explained to you beforehand.

[Dlah]

I think the issue here is that you requested something and felt that had been accepted but changed last minute.

I work in a nursery and we've had lots of new starters - always hard and they will cry, we do recommend parents to just leave though as it honestly does settle them quicker generally but always say maybe come back a little sooner to start with, so just leave for a shorter period until child is reassured you've not just abandoned them and will always return.

Unfortunately for example we had a child start 2 weeks ago and albeit a slight language barrier - her parents lasted 5 minutes (no joke!) before taking her home as she was crying - This happened 3 days in a row and they just gave up and left! Now it's completely a parents choice but that child is just going to learn to cry to get what they want, really not productive for anyone.

We would always ring and let a parent know if a child was continually distressed aswell, it's rare but some occasions.

I think you need to go back and speak to nursery and explain you feel a bit taken aback by their change of plan. Advise you'd like to stay with your child, but maybe limit this to say 30 mins rather than a whole session and over the next few sessions reduce by 5 minutes etc

At some point you probably have just got to bite the bullet and let her get on with it but I'm positive she'll settle and you'll come back to a happy little girl

Good luck

[GreyKittyMakesWarms]

My 15m old cried similarly to you daughter at her first settling in session. The Nursery have viewing windows so I watched through the window and they said if they felt she needed me they signal for me to come into the room. She was held by a staff member for 20mins or so, then fell asleep on them, they passed her too me and we went home with her asleep.

Could you see what was happening to your daughter? I mean are you sure they restrained her? My DDs nursery won't restrain a child unless absolutely necessary, and I don't think crying is one of them.

The second session DD remembered the staff member who held her, and so went to her. DD stayed playing with her and a few other children for the entire session (again I watched from the window). If the SM went to get up DD followed her.

Third session as long as said SM was nearby she would happily play.

Then after that she went for full days as Nursery and I felt she'd cope. She did, and the SM she was first held by is her Key Worker, DD still loves her so much, and often falls asleep on her when she's tired etc. They give lots of cuddles at DDs Nursery, everytime I pick her up at the end of the day at least one of the children is either being held by a SM, sometimes on an armchair, other times just standing up. I think it's lovely the children can have cuddles whenever they want them.

[PatriciaHolm]

It's entirely normal for settling in to require you to leave, and you are making the assumption they were being "restrictive" - they were just giving her a cuddle while she calmed down.

She is never going to settle if you hover around, really.

[MrsA2]

Dlah I would also take my child out if she was continually crying for 5 minutes without starting to calm - particularly aged one or under. The beauty of tinies (unless overtired, ill or teething is that they are wonderfully easy to distract - ooh look at those fairy lights. I would have massive reservations about a nursery that just expected a child to have to cry to learn to settle in because they believed they were 'just going to cry to get what they want'.