Non stop chat and....

[fandango75]

Constant requests for play are driving me slightly bonkers

My son is 3.5 and I have a 5 week old DD. been on may leave since Christmas and had a c section.

So... My son is .... Kind, funny, gentle, enthusiastic, sensitive, energetic, polite, gorgeous (of course) and I adore his tiny being with all my heart.

BUT....

His incessant chat, constant demands for play (literally all day long) are driving me slightly nuts. My husband and I play a lot but we cannot play all... Day.... Long....

We need to encourage independent play more (he goes to pre school 12 hrs a week) and child care for us is also a nanny when I am working which is wonderful but means a lot (possibly too much) one on one play resulting in a gorgeous boy who just needs constant chat and play and I would appreciate some tips on how to encourage more independence. I feel so bad that he irritates me sometimesalthough i do very well at hiding it (most of the time)

I also fel bad for the people who can't have kids and desperately want them and here I am getting irritated by a scrumptious 3 year old who just wants 100% of me / us all the time.

Any advice greatly appreciated

can you disappear from playing with him and slowly increase the time you are away.

used to do this with ds around this age. would get out all his dinosaurs/drawing stuff and start playing with him together, then would say I need to do something that would take just 2-3 minutes, suggest what he could do when I was gone and then would be back as promised and would join in playing again, then would need to do something that would take a bit longer and so on.

took a bit of time but eventually he played fine by himself for a bit. at that age it was still difficult to get more than 30 mins of him playing himself without being entertained.

He could be looking for reassurance due to the new arrival, in which case trying to get him to be more independent could be counter-productive.

I feel your pain. DD1 was very reliant on me 24/7 and it is wearing despite being a great privilege.

I would get him engaged and then tell him that you have a job to do but you will be back in 1 minute. Then go away but keep your promise. Once he's ok with it you can increase it gradually but remember that you'll blow it all out of the water if you get waylaid and don't come back when you said you would.

You could also try sitting down with him specifically to talk. Listen to him and ask lots of questions for a while. Having been properly listened to may reduce to need to chat constantly afterwards.

Thanks ladies have been trying the above and hopefully it will make a difference in time

He has always been like this so not attributable to the new one (although sure this won't help!)

Thanks again