Weekly overnight stay at GPs

[Goostacean]

In the middle of an ongoing negotiation with DH re childcare. PFB so we don't know what we're doing

How will a toddler (15 months +) be affected by sleeping at grandparents', once a week?

Hypothetical situation: Monday daytime with DM (and DF when he's back from work around 6pm), overnight at GPs, Tuesday dropped back at home in the afternoon, and DM/MIL stay until we get home from work. So toddler would see a parent on Monday morning, and Tuesday evening/night. Nursery Weds-Fri.

We don't see eye-to-eye, and neither do parents/in-laws. AIBU to ask for your views? Not posting mine yet as don't want to sway the responses!

I was the same as bibbidybobbidyboo thinking wow, that would be great, no waiting for hours at the A&E if the problem wasn't too serious

OP, my DPs adored looking after my DSis's children (as did I) but they did find it very tiring as they got older. Maybe have a trial run?

We did similar when DD was that sort of age. We lived 45 mins away from DM who had DD for us on Mondays and Tuesdays. DM would come to ours first thing on Monday morning, I'd go to work, at some point during the day DM would take DD back to her house where she would stay overnight and DM would bring her home at some point on Tuesday. The exact times varied as DM would take her to playgroups etc near our house but when she started nursery at 2, the nursery was near DMs so she was at nursery for a session so DM got a break. It saved DM rushing out and driving in rush hour to get to our house on Monday AND Tuesday. And DD has a wonderful relationship with DM because of all the time they spent together. She was basically just an extension of me!

The key to this kind of arrangement is communication and expectation.

Know, and be honest, about what you expect.

So for me they could feed the kids what they like, they had their rules in their house, but they followed our discipline routines (naughty step) and they followed bedtime.

Also be very clear at what point you want them to call you if there’s a problem. I had a ‘if you feel dd’s need me or I should know’ policy whereas SIL felt more comfortable with a much stricter policy. For example if mine were grumbly and Gran thought it was teething I was happy for her to give calpol and then call me if it didn’t get better.

Agreements like this usually don’t work because someone is unclear about something. Sometimes that’s what a parent expects and sometimes it’s what a grandparent is prepared to do.

Oh also - make sure your parenting styles are at least similar. It will definitely drive a wedge between you if you say one thing but they do the other. Make sure it's clear that even though it's their house, if he doesn't eat chocolate on a weekday then he isn't to have chocolate there (just as an example!)

When my parents started taking DD for a night a week there were one or two hiccups, namely me always wanting DD in bed for 7.30pm at the latest (she's a shit sleeper and going down early is the only way she gets any more than 4 hours sleep a night), but ringing to see if everything was okay at around 10pm and DD still being up playing with her granddad! Once that was all sorted, the arrangement was perfect!

Seems fine to me

Not a chance I’d do it though!

Afaik it is unanimous and standard teaching across the board,. Excepting only a small group of psychologists in America who thought it was parents and not children who feel separation anxiety, I think. Penelope Leach raised it as a concern in the context of divorce, but it is equally relevant to any separation from main care giver ie usually mother, apparently. It is not so much to do with attachment for toddlers who already have secure attachments, more to do with that fact that children of that age are not developmentally able to understand when the caregiver is coming back, in terms of time and in terms of feelings, and this produces anxiety which often does not show itself immediately until a child is much older, eg a teenager, affecting studying, work, self esteem, etc. I wouldn't be able to produce links without googling. I would be really interested to know about research to the contrary.

@tessica2 I am really surprised that you aren't aware of the research around this issue, one way or the other. Is it not something you covered? When you say you are a child psychologist, what does that mean exactly, what qualifications and experience do you have? (I am genuinely interested not being arsy!) Do you have a degree and postgrad qualifications in psychology? And you now work with children, in what capacity?

Goostacean personally, I'd not feel happy with this. How much it would be a negative for a child, I do not know. In theory it would not.

I have occasional nights away from my kids but they have their dad when I am away, and vice versa. I think you do need to do what works for you and your son, your husband's work sounds very demanding and so does your work. Could your husband scale his work back or work from home sometimes so he gets time with your son?

Also "An added complication is that we're currently living abroad, so DC barely sees all GPs. We'll have about 3 weeks once we're back before I return to work, so will see them lots in that time obviously. We can definitely do eg. six weeks of only day times, then moving to overnight, for example."

I think I would like to see how things pan out. Presumably your parents have not had your child overnight yet? Have they looked after him all day on their own yet?

Aren't you lucky OP to have such an amazing family

I would see how it goes, hopefully DS will be fine and you'll all cope with it.

@BlaaBlaaBlaa you say I was referring to @oneoff's ridiculous, incorrect claims that psychologists don't recommend overnight stays for under 5's bloody charming, it wasn't a claim, it was what i had been told. Moving on.... Obviously that needs to be taken into consideration but the concept itself isn't a damaging one and what is your source for this?

Goostacean of I should qualify that I don't think it is a bad idea and I think your son may love it! But I was speaking for myself.

I think the only real issue here is how well your child knows his grandparents.

My parents looked after my nephew and did brilliantly, as did his other grandparents. But there was a point at which they could not do it anymore and so the reviews thing is a good idea, if they find it hard to cope. It also depends how old they are. My inlaws are in their 80s and still look after my kids sometimes, (they are 8 and 13).

@GreatDuck very lucky, the only drama is caused by everyone loving DS so much!

@Italiangreyhound Actually my parents had him for a full day and put him to bed, although we got back around midnight, when we attended a wedding back in July (he was just under 6mo). So DS had only seen them on and off for the proceeding week (during our trip back to the UK), and he was completely fine. As a pp mentioned, I was almost offended at how little he needed me!

"Actually my parents had him for a full day and put him to bed, although we got back around midnight, when we attended a wedding back in July (he was just under 6mo)."

That's good, although he won't remember it (I expect).

"... he was completely fine." I think little babies are, my dd was 8 months when I left her for the first time nursery and she did not cry (but I did!). At 15 months he may find it hard, just be prepared, it's not necessarily a bad thing, just he may act different at 15 months.

"As a pp mentioned, I was almost offended at how little he needed me!" That's it for me, really, I had my kids late in life and wanted to there a lot. I still worked but not full time. It's really how you feel and also how your parents and inlaws cope etc.

Hope it goes well.

@theoneoffnamechange I have a doctorate in educational and child psychology (as well as degree and teacher training) and work with school age children (I'm qualified for 0-25 but the children I generallynsee are typically early years, school and then up to 19)

I have done quite a lot of attachment work throughout my training and still now and have never come across anything that suggests no overnights, so will chat to my colleagues to make sure I'm not missing anything

The article posted below was American Researcher I believe so maybe advice differs in US to (UK)

OP, this is how we operate as a family and its nothing but good.

@tessica2 thanks- if your studies are in the context of education that might be it. I had understood that peer reviewed research in the US forms part of studies and practice in the UK. Penelope Leach is based in the UK. As I said though, it isn't to do with attachment disorders. It is to do with anxiety. I think.

The issue DH has is with the overnight, whereas that's the exact break and breathing space I want

He's being unfair. He gets breathing space when he's away.

@theoneoffnamechange I think @tessica2 has just handed you your arse on a plate with more grace than the rest of us would probably care to muster.

@morningseleven I think not, if you read my reply...if she had had expertise in the area she would have been able to trip off the research for and against what I said.

I couldn't do that on a regular basis but have friends who do it and the child is fine. I cut my days back at work and DH flexes his hours on my working day. We both come from broken homes and long periods spent in the care of grandparents and whilst we both adored our grandparents we don't have close relationships with our parents

@theoneoff I teach on a childhood studies degree programme and have not come across any academically rigourous research that suggests what you posted. There is research on the benefits of relationships with wider family members and some specifically on relationship with grandparents. I'd had have to look up the specific studies as its not my specialist area which I'll do the next time I'm at my pc.

If I sounded harsh it's because I find it incredibly frustrating when people post inaccurate information which has apparently been suggested by 'experts' when the real experts know different. It can be dangerous.

Working days... I don't just work one day that would make childcare a doddle

@theoneoffnamechange thanks I'll definitly look up Penelope Leach

My doctoral studies although based within education settings covered a lot of social and emotional and mental health needs as sadly those needs often form the basis of the children and families we work with. I would say the majority of my work is with children who have semh needs and a lot of the work with schools is around how thea can support anger/anxiety/attachment etc etc

Will def look up penelope leach though thanks :)

@theoneoff @tessica clearly is an expert. It's not that easy to list specific research as you think. Have you any idea how many articles, books and research papers you read if you are a specialist or researcher?

@BlaaBlaaBlaa no worries. I wrote "afaik" in my first post so it was hopefully clear to people that I wasn't making claims as an expert. It is something i have heard from decent sources more than once so it is worth looking at. I don't think it is dangerous raising these issues, it is raising things which someone who wants to do it might want to look at, and then form an informed judgement.

I wouldn't, one day a week overnight is too much. That's my opinion.

Will def look up penelope leach though thanks smile

I once threw one of her books out of the bedroom window after resisting the temptation to hit my husband over the head with it.