To be angry at DM over 2yo's bedtime?

[squishymamma]

I'm originally from the UK, but we don't live here. However we are currently over visiting family. We have 2 DC aged 2 years and 4 months.

It was recently DH's birthday and as a present DM bought him a cookery class we could do as a couple while we were over. She said she could babysit DC while we were gone. For context, DM has been to visit us as much as she could pandemic permitting, and we've been here once or twice. We also do regular video calls. So DS1 kind of knows who she is but isn't super familiar with her.

DM has always been very vocal in how she views our parenting. DS1 is pretty easy to deal with and laid back (as much as a toddler can be!) but he's always been difficult in the sleep department. He always fights bedtime, like most toddlers, and it takes a while to get him to sleep. Some nights we have to sit with him a while and go back in multiple times because he wakes up and cries. Very, very occasionally we have to hold him until he falls asleep, if he's feeling particularly insecure/unsafe. DM has always rolled her eyes at this and implied that we're being dramatic about it.

So we went to our class and had a lovely time. Got back around 11.45pm and DS1 was sat on DM's knee watching TV!! DM got all defensive saying he refused to sleep, woke up "screaming" every 5 minutes, they'd sat with him for an hour etc.

Now I know how difficult DS1 can be which is why I'd told her our routine, given her warnings of how he can be and what we usually do to deal with it etc. We haven't been here so long so he's still a bit insecure, getting used to being in a new place etc so I assumed he'd probably be extra difficult, and said so. However, he's been to stay with PIL before, who he also hasn't seen much, and they managed to give him a normal bedtime despite him also fighting it there.

I'm absolutely fuming because it then took us over an hour to actually get him to sleep since he was overtired and overstimulated from presumably watching TV all evening (he does get screen time usually but we try to avoid before bed) and it kind of put a damper on the end of our lovely evening. He also doesn't do lie ins so he'll probably be up in an hour and be tired and cranky all day, and of course it's us that have to deal with it and not DM...

AIBU to think that DM (& DF) should have tried harder to put him to bed, or would you also have given up and let him watch TV until we came home?

Oh I totally get it OP. My eldest was like that, bedtime was an hour of screaming every day at that age and we were just ground down by it.

We didn't leave her with anyone because of it, but if we had and we got home to find her still up, and then have to do the bedtime screaming on steroids because she was overstimulated, and then be up in the night with the baby, and at the crack of dawn with a tired toddler... Well I wouldn't be in a frame of mind to be reasonable.

However, if I was looking after someone else's child who did the same, I wouldn't be comfortable with the screaming because I wouldn't know when I was passing a threshold that the parents were ok with. So I probably would go with TV or playing as a one off. Don't judge your mum too harshly.

I bet the comments about bedtime will stop now though

(If it makes you feel any better, my toddler is now 4 and is excellent at going to bed, playing a little and then going to also by herself, and staying there. Things will improve.)

Look MIL did you a favour,Paid for an enjoyable Cookery Class ,and babysat to boot! Most toddlers are difficult to get to sleep TBH. With an unfamiliar person he will not have settled so well .MIL will take the best route for her. Unless you never go out(not recommended) then you have to suck it up!

I think a lot of people on this thread are conveniently (and somewhat obnoxiously ) forgetting the absolute relentlessness of the sleep deprivation stage (which you all damn well know happens at different stages ). I can understand your reaction (even if it is slightly unreasonable) , at some points sleep is at a premium. If you have a dc who is tricky with sleep it can absolutely take over your life.

It's really easy to feel incredibly angry if anyone ever messes with the system. All that said, it's understandable but not entirely reasonable.

Most people would have done what she did. It really is fine (if frustrating and feels bloody awful when you are tired and frustrated). Dc will struggle to settle in unfamiliar places sometimes and it's never the same doing the routine if you aren't their parent.

It also feels a hell kf a lot worse when it's someone who takes pot shots at you. So yeah I can absolutely understand the internal reaction but this is one of those moments however annoyed you are , it wouldn't be reasonable to do or say anything.

Hope the sleep improves soon (I had a non sleeper it was brutal you have my sympathy).

Oh and ignore the stupidity wittering that clearly you are causing the sleep problems. Know alls always like to listen to themselves pretend to superior. They never are, just ignorant and wouldn't last a week with a tricky sleeper child (they've never had one although they often think they have ).

Chin up, take the hit and move forward.

Oh and ignore the stupidity wittering that clearly you are causing the sleep problems. Know alls always like to listen to themselves pretend to superior. They never are, just ignorant and wouldn't last a week with a tricky sleeper child (they've never had one although they often think they have ).

Absolutely this. You see it on threads about non sleeping newborns too.

If anyone would have left my daughter to scream the way she did when we tried leaving the room, then I would judge a hell of a lot more than their sleep routine.

Echoing all the other posters, you're being both over dramatic and ungrateful.
And tbh your DM isn't wrong is she? The over-the-top bedtime routine is what caused this and you really need to get this under control before the baby starts being like this too and you spend the next 5 years doing it.

And really - what would you rather have had? that you got home to a screaming kid and your mum sitting there with her feet up and noise cancelling headphones on? or her sitting awkwardly holding child's hand trying desperately to get it to sleep?

Don't be surprised if she never offers to do that again. I know i wouldn't.

Ha I had the reverse - I babysat gif a friend and put the toddler to bed without too much fuss. When the parents came home around midnight the first thing they asked was where she was - I'm like 'in bed'! They couldn't believe it.
I think what your mil did was fine. While I'm a big advocate for routine and very regular bed times if it's not working for your child you may have to relax things a bit.

The thing is, you know your child inside out. Without even thinking about it, you adapt your gestures, your body, your voice, quite instinctively when you're going through the bedtime routine. You read your kid, he reads you.

Grandma has none of that to hand, even if you leave her a A4 close typed list of instructions. And your boy is in an unfamiliar bed, with someone who doesn't usually put him to bed. Your mum was never going to be able to manage the sleep routine like you do.

I'm a GM. I've been there. And when a sleep routine goes wrong, the baby/toddler's distress is really hard to listen to. More so than for a parent because you feel out of control, and the parental instincts you had with your own babies are no help. So you do what you can to calm the child. And it's very unlikely to be what their mum and dad would do. Because you're not them.

It was a one off. Have some empathy for her.

YABU

YABU, I thought you were going to say she had left him crying himself to sleep for hours or something but no he was being cuddled, wasn’t distressed and was safe with his nanny.

I agree with this.

I have six GC, their mums and dads (my sons) have left them with me many times. Ages from 17 down to 3. I have never reported an issue with them unless they were unwell (had six month old once who had the sniffles when he arrived and within 24 hrs was really unwell) but it doesn't mean they have never played up about bathtime or bedtime or what they would eat.

As a MIL I have a nice time with the children and what goes on at granny's stays at granny's.

Honestly I wouldn't be mad at this (and I have a really tough sleeper too). This is better than him screaming and being incredibly upset and it was one night.

I get why you're pissed off OP. She has been disparaging when you told her how tricky bedtime is, well now she bloody know doesn't she and she can quit with making you feel like "you're not doing it right" because she couldn't do it at all.

It's also annoying that your PIL managed to get him down OK so I'm guessing your mum didn't really try that hard.

I also get that you have a routine and you stick to it as i was strict with my babies on routine as it meant I could hold it together as long as they slept ok. SO now you have an over tired grumpy child who may not want to nap and will take all week to get back on track. But it will be OK.

This isn’t something I would get cross about for 1 night if someone was babysitting who hasn’t done it before. I’m about to babysit my sisters kids and I am sure bedtime will be challenging and not be the same as the way she does it. I would be miffed if she was mad at me when I did her a favour though 🤣

God I was expecting you saying you came home and he was hysterical after being left screaming. So he had a late night. He's 2. He can have a lie in.

I think if you trust someone enough to leave your dc with them, you have to trust them to get on with it. Your dc was safe and loved (even if he didn’t feel safe enough to go to sleep, he was safe from physical harm with someone who cares for him).

Sleep is often a tricky thing for dc in an unfamiliar place, so if he didn’t settle, it’s not surprising. Settling To sleep for a different relative is irrelevant, different day, different place, different circumstances.

id rather the dc sat watching tv calmly with a grandparent, rather than waking up screaming every 5 minutes In bed.

I think you’re very lucky to have a grandparent who will babysit until that late tbh. I have children aged 3,5 and 6 and we haven’t had an evening or even an afternoon out in 3 years because grandparents won’t babysit.

Obviously In an ideal world you would’ve come home to the children asleep but I think you’ve got to just suck it up and be thankful you had a lovely evening out.

Complete non issue. What a lovely DM you have.

The three hour nap in the day is probably what’s giving you grief. He’s just not tired and is understandably pissed at being put in bed.

Cap that nap at an hour and see how you get on. My nearly-two-year-old sleeps 1-1.5 hours tops and is in bed by 7, asleep by 7:30 and awake at 7:30.

Secondly, our sleep routine is not set in stone - his bedtime varies from 7pm to 9pm depending on how he is

I think that is probably a lot of your issue, get him in a proper routine with a set bed time, 9pm is far too late for a 2 year old.

There are a lot of woman who would absolutely love to be in the position where they could have an evening out but have absolutely no support what do ever, you have had a lovely evening out thank her for helping you out, put your child to bed and go to sleep thinking what a nice evening you have had.

He's already bad at bedtimes, and you already don't have a routine that works (I don't count having to hold him for an hour as a successful routine). So what harm is it honestly going to do that he stayed up late one time?

I opened this thinking you had a rigid routine that was working great and you were uptight about departing from it.

It was one night.
Your child had been crying , distressed and your mother stopped that in her own way.
No one was harmed, it is not going to alter your child’s life. Seems like a huge amount of fuss about nothing.

If this was me, like you I would be tired and (slightly unreasonably) frustrated, but I would also be secretly thrilled! Now, whenever your mum criticises your parenting or bedtime routine you can gently remind her of her experience of putting her DGS to bed.

I remember my mum telling me I ‘just needed to put down’ DD1 (high needs and I think undiagnosed silent reflux baby). The unsolicited advice didn’t stop till I left DD1 with her for half a day, after which she apologised and never criticised my parenting methods again.

I agree. My DC is a lot younger than OPs. We've had a few offers already from family to babysit but for several reasons I want to wait until they're a bit older... One of these being that whilst these offers are often positioned as giving me a break, the reality is they do opposite as I am the one who ends up having to settle an overstimulated baby who struggles to sleep at the best of times. Not exactly a break.

That said, I do think OP is being unreasonable to expect that this night would have gone any differently to how it did. If the alternative was for DM to leave DC crying all evening then coming home to find him happily watching TV at 11:45pm was the lesser of two evils.