To have abruptly limited DD screen time

[shaniahoo]

DD7 has had her own tablet since she was 3. Covid seemed like a good excuse for a lot of screen time because we were hanging around the house so much. Before tablet she was never capable of playing alone for any stretch of time, so it gave us some respite. This turned into dependency over time, because if nobody was available to play, she'd ask for tablet or TV and we would say yes.

Her brother was born last year and we relied on it even more heavily because someone always needed to be with him and if the other parent was at work or cooking or cleaning or whatever then there was nobody available to play, so screen time it was. Now she's getting older we could see her as a phone addicted teen, and we didn't like it, so we put a 45min a day limit on the tablet and only occasionally offering TV as an alternative.

We're all struggling with this change. DD just doesn't know what to do with herself. She wants to play with someone really but in the 3-6 period between school finish and dinner when she would normally have a straight run of screen time, I'm watching DS while waiting for DH to come home from work and then one of us cooks dinner and the other is still with DS. I think screen time was masking how upsetting it is for her that nobody can play with her after school. They are very different ages and can't play together properly and he can't be left. He grabs whatever she's playing with so we can't play together near him, and she's so rough with him when she tries to play with him. Most of her play with him is moving his body parts around roughly and trapping him or slapping him on the head and calling it "patting". I can't say how much of each afternoon is me saying "he doesn't like that" or "let him go". I try to teach her how to play with him in a nice way but she finds it boring.

She's an excellent reader and I suggest things like, well, reading, or puzzle books or art etc and she always says naaah, naaah, to every idea. She ends up either bothering her brother, rolling around on the sofa making noises or deciding she's going to do something elaborate that it's impossible for me to help her with, like junk modelling. The after school period is now a nightmare. Weekends and after dinner are good because there's usually one parent to play. We fit in playdates where we can and making the best of the quality time together we do have. But I'm wondering if we've made the wrong decision. She's struggling so much with having to entertain herself it's making all our lives so difficult. Should we just give the screen time back? Or is there a chance she could learn and adapt and become good at finding her own fun?

Also I think a lot of posters on this thread must have had more placid toddlers than mine! If he’s not getting my undivided attention then he screams, it’s impossible to play with my 7 year old without the baby just throwing things, screaming and trashing the house, he has more toys than Smyths but he doesn’t want them, he wants to empty the cupboards, play with the bin and climb me repeatedly!

I apologise to her, I promise we'll do xyz another time, cry about it myself sometimes.

Yes thank you. I think some people have forgotten what 14 months is and are thinking of a toddler closer to 2?

No, all toddlers are like this. We just toddler-proof the room they play in and let them at it. And tidy up when they're in bed (or just...not tidy up).

I do think some posters have either totally forgotten what 14 month olds are like or had very easy ones.

I think you need to break it up a bit - hanging round the house all the time sounds like it's driving you all nuts.

Get out of the house after school at least once or twice a week - playground, library, etc

Once a week, after school a movie is fine

Try and think of some games/activities they can do together - I think play doh works well. Or she reads a book out loud and you and DS act it out, we did this obsessively for ages with the Tiger who came to tea and our tea set

Have a look at some subscription boxes - mud and bloom does nature themed ones, or a comic subscription

Thank you. The best solution in my mind is longer hours in nursery for him at least 1 day a week, but have to work out if we can afford it first

Since she was 3! You have really set your daughter up to fail here. You need to support her.

Kind of ironic- a 14mo can't act out a book while it's being read aloud so I think maybe you've forgotten too!

Some of the suggestions are too grown up yes, but most have been "let him mess with the duplo on the floor". My ds has been capable of that from 9mo right to 2yo.

Throwing it, chewing it, are all just as legitimate as building it.

So you don’t redirect him? At 14 months you can gently say no, remove him from the play and go back to playing with your daughter. Of course he continues to do it when you’ve taught him it gets him what he wants. Meanwhile your daughter gets plonked in front of a tablet and left alone. Poor girl.

I appreciate it’s difficult but you are making a lot of excuses here.
So your son disrupts what you’re doing with your daughter, he has a tantrum and then you stop playing with your daughter and presumably focus on your son. That’s why he keeps doing it!
Whatever you do, don’t give your son a tablet because you’ll just repeat the situation. Why people give three year olds tablets I’ll never know.
Having said that, I don’t have as much of an issue putting the tv on for a short time. There’s lots of educational programmes, or put something on with songs etc. As long as it’s not on for hours!

Best thing I did for my sanity was let go of my ideas of what play is and just let play be whatever my daughter wants to do with a toy.

My kids play by themselves brilliantly. But if they think there is any chance of TV then my son can act like this, i.e. not knowing what to do, hanging around, etc.

We've had a no TV (and have never let them have tablets) during the week rule for years. I realised in 2022 when they were 1, 4 & 5 that we'd relied on it far too much to survive COVID and then building an extension. It makes things so much easier because they know it's not an option so they come home from school and play without there even being a discussion. They spend as much time playing alone as they do together, though my 4 year old generally wants someone to play with her.

Could that be an easier option for you all, you might find less of the lingering?

Another option would be toy rotation. Kids get overwhelmed when they have too much choice. Can you put a lot of stuff away and have one box of toys. Change them every couple of weeks to increase the excitement/interest?

I have 4 children and a very similar age gap between my second and third, things that work well for both ages -

Playdough
Duplo Lego
Floor is lava
Dancing
Getting the older one to blow bubbles
We have a sandpit in the garden
Taking them both for a walk
Reading books together
Tea party
Building a tent

I think you need to work on supporting the relationship between your children, if she doesn't want him to touch anything she's doing and she won't let him in her room. I wonder if she feels so mad at him because she is jealous of how much he takes the attention from her. I'm fortunate that my daughter absolutely adores her little brothers, I always included her when they were little and then as they grew found ways that they could play together, rather than trying to keep the younger ones out of her play. I actually think having younger siblings can keep them playing longer because they continue on the games with the little ones.

Yes absolutely. Op says "he's too young to pretend to cook" but that's not the only point of a toy kitchen - there are buttons to press, cupboards to open and shut with a banging noise, use the ladle as a hammer to bash the floor, etc.

We have videos of us doing that at 14m! Admittedly the 14 month old was basically just roaring like a tiger while I acted it out and the older one read but he still enjoyed it.

Honestly, I’m doing what I need to do to survive right now. Yes my 7 year old has too much screen time and it’s not ideal but 14 months is a tough age, by the time he is 2, it will be better and I’ll be able to focus on my older one more equally

No doubt I’ll get some stick but I think just cut yourself some slack, maybe cut her to 2 hours instead of 3 and try and focus on her for the other hour? This is my plan, I just can’t handle 3 hours of screaming from the baby and whinging for screens from the 7 year old! I’m autistic and it is an overwhelming sensory overload

There is a middle ground between “You have my full attention and we are playing together” and “I am completely ignoring you because your brother has my full attention” and you need to find it.

Your parenting has been pretty awful for many years, I have to say, and it will take time to undo it. I would kill the tablet permanently and only allow TV as good family movies once a week, not mindless scrolling through countless episodes. Let her be bored - if books and toys are within reach, she will pick them up eventually. Give her praise and chat to her while cooking dinner. And for gods’ sake teach your other kid these skills. You speak like ideally you’d need 3 adults in the house to cope with 2 kids and dinner.

Also, we often cook double one day so that getting dinner together is much easier the next day- like cook a big pot of mince and one day it's taco and the next with pasta. Then you save cooking time and have more time to spend with your children.

What toys does she have to play with?

My daughter and son have a 6 year age gap and we honestly went through the same thing, no family help and did rely on tablet/screen time but I hated that, plus my son would try and grab it off her and then want the tablet himself, so I got rid of the iPad all together.

You may have to research toys/activities that are engaging enough for independent play. My daughter liked slime, colouring, jewellery making.

I remember the time after school to around 6pm also being the hardest, waiting for my husband to come home so I do feel your pain!

I would get rid of the tablet all together and let her watch a bit of tv only and then fill that time with some activities, make the ideation exciting, perhaps ask her what exciting things she would to do.

Don’t go back on it, you’re already partway through the hardest bit! I went through similar with my DS, albeit without a new baby. It wasn’t a screen issue with him, he just couldn’t entertain himself and wanted someone to actively do something with him all the time. He’s six now and it’s got a lot better.

Some kids will naturally learn to entertain themselves. Others (like my DS) will be resistant and you have to actively teach it as a skill I reckon. I have a few tips:

1. try to explain to her why she needs to learn to entertain herself without screens in a way that frames it in terms of the benefits to her- I suspect at the moment she sees going off and entertaining herself as her basically handing all the attention to her brother, as the bothering him and making noises etc sounds like attention seeking to me (not a criticism, totally normal kid impulse). With my DS, I said something like ‘I bet it’s not a nice feeling not knowing what to do with yourself, and I know you want my attention all the time. I love giving you attention, but sometimes I need to do other things. No mummy in the world can play with their children all the time (insert humorous examples of what would go wrong if you actually did) and every child has to learn to keep themselves busy for a bit on their own. I’m going to help you learn how, and it’ll be great for you because you won’t feel bored and frustrated any more.’

2. treat entertaining herself as an ‘above and beyond’ behaviour that you reward until she’s got the hang of it as this is clearly difficult for her. Something like a star whenever she entertains herself when you ask her to/does it spontaneously and something she really wants when she gets a certain number. Have it separate from any reward system you already use so she is motivated to focus on that specifically (I found if I incorporate a skill I want to teach into a general reward system, DS just thinks ‘ah well, doesn’t matter if I don’t do it, I’ll do xyz different thing later and get the star then.’) Absolutely gush with praise when she does it.

3. create a ‘menu’ of things she can do to entertain herself, ideally with her input. Put all the things she needs for these activities in one place so she can easily go to her cupboard/wherever, with things organised into boxes so they’re easy for her to take out and tidy away to reduce friction. Hopefully that might reduce the impossible-to-achieve requests like junk modelling- you can explain why that’s not on the menu for independent play when you make the list so that she knows it’s not an option during that particular time from the get-go. Direct her to choose from her menu as soon as you see the difficult behaviour starting. ‘Rolling around making noises/bothering your brother isn’t an option. It’s independent time now. You have lots of choices of things to do in your cupboard and you need to go and choose one.’ And a suitable consequence if she continues bothering brother or whatever it is you’ve told her to stop.

4. ensure she gets plenty of time built into every day where she has your 100% attention to play or do something else together. When she asks for something like junk modelling that you just can’t do right now, write it down on a to-do list somewhere prominent for you to do later on during your special time together, so that she can see that doing stuff she wants to do is important to you and will definitely happen, just not right this second. Be really enthusiastic about it and tell her how much you’re looking forward to it, so she understands that the reason you’re not doing it right this second isn’t because you don’t want to. We also always sit down and play board/card games or something similar for about half an hour before bed, maybe that’s something she would like?

5. try to have options that she can do sitting and chatting to you if she wants company. I taught my DS to cross stitch (and also how to use a needle rethreader 😆) but it could be anything that keeps her hands busy and that isn’t messy. If he just wants to be with me, he’ll get his cross stitch project and sit and sew while I do chores or sit and have a cup of tea and a rest on the sofa or whatever. Sometimes doing something alongside me is as good as doing something with me if you see what I mean.

6. start really small, just five minutes at a time.

Sorry this was so long, I hope some of it was useful. All kids are different but this is what worked for our DS. As you can probably tell, independent play was NOT something he wanted to do 😆 I’m afraid it took quite a while but it worked in the end, with a concerted effort to teach him. One day, you’ll suddenly realise it’s a bit quiet and found she’s taken herself off to play Lego or something without your suggestion. It’ll be worth it, being able to entertain herself without screens is an essential skill and she’ll be happier being able to do that instead of getting herself and you frustrated trying to get you to entertain her.

Don't give her screentime back. You're doing a good and important thing.

Children need to be bored. It's essential for developing their resilience and ability to manage their emotions. The instant gratification of screens to alleviate boredom is crushing our kids' ability to focus, to be creative, and to try new things. I've read articles from teachers saying that kids who are raised without excessive screentime have a superpower compared to their peers in terms of their ability to focus and think for themselves.

She will adapt. She's had most of her life so far with the easy solution of a screen to save her from finding her own fun. It will take time for her to strengthen her skills in playing and entertaining herself.

Can your DS be in a pen or carrier at any point to free you up for play? Or his high chair with snacks for a bit? It will get easier to manage them playing together as they get older.

I did a lot of sitting between DC at that age and translating their body language to the other to try and mitigate "scream and clunk on head" type communication. Blocking the younger one from being able to reach the older one's creation directly and showing them their own stuff to do.

There is a great book called Siblings Without Rivalry I loved

OP, don't feel bad. I think it depends on what they're doing on screens; it can even be beneficial. I'm in my forties and I spent a lot of time with consoles, computers, and the GameBoy, plus I'm from a generation that woke up early and watched cartoons all morning, and I can tell you I turned out perfectly normal.

I also have two children now, very different ages, and I understand you. I don't want my daughter spending an hour watching stupid things on YouTube, but I don't mind if she's playing Toca Boca or watching a show on the tablet or playing Roblox on the computer. I don't think that just because we have young children we have to be constantly playing with them, or that it's pouring rain and you feel bad for not taking your kids outside when you don't feel like it. We all have things to learn and improve as parents.

Don't feel bad about what people say here, don't feel like a worse mother. Maybe they're not giving them screens, but maybe they're giving them donuts for dessert every day. The most important thing is that they feel loved and of course spend time with them, but without constantly overanalyzing ourselves as parents.

The issue isn’t the screen. The issue is OP neglecting her daughter’s needs in favour of her son.

Oh your poor daughter. This breaks my heart. You only have 2 children. You toddler can cry and tantrum, leave him too it. He can't refuse a high chair, make him go in it. You need to stop giving him all your attention, it is so unfair on your daughter and she will feel pushed out and unloved. I feel so sorry for her, this breaks my heart. You need to step up and parent properly.