Climbing baby!

[BornSicky]

My DS is 16 months and today he climbed on a chair and then onto the dining table. utterly terrified!

what can i do to stop him?

Telling him no just provokes a grin.

Moving him provokes a tantrum.

Distracting him away just finds him back trying again as soon as I turn my back.

any advice welcome!

Unfortunately nothing :( Teach him to climb safely, if possible take him places where is it safe to climb - soft play, baby gym etc.

My DD2 is a climber, we found her climbing (safely) out of the front room window, when she was told off she sobbed said 'playing side' and as soon as our back were turned tried climbing out agin. All our dining chairs were tied together with bungee chords for a while so she has given up on that. Now at 2 she has a better understanding of us saying 'no, dangerous' but she still likes to scare us so we keep all windows locked unless we are in the room with her, we took all stair gates off (she just climbed over them and fell down stairs!) and showed her how to climb stairs and come down backwards. No step stool/ladders are left where she can used them.

You could resign yourself to removing and saying No repeatedly. Or remove chairs for a while.

I just let him do it a few times (sturdy table and chairs, me standing by unimpressedly) and the novelty wore off quickly.

thanks both!

blueberry the window story is what i'm scared of most! eek.

I've been following him up and downstairs for months now helping him climb safely, but he's scared of going down outdoor steps the same way and has a bad habit of just trying to launch himself off them face first! trying very hard to get him to kneel and crawl backwards down them, but i think he doesn't like the hard surface on his knees.

cleverclogs i think moving chairs out might be one solution! i might buy him his own toddler chair too and teach him to sit nicely on that.

I have a climber too, and she's also coming up to 16 months. She's up on the dining table all the time and I'm getting sick of telling her off, but I'm hoping I'm going to win the battle of the wills. I just take her down and say calmly, no, we don't climb on tables. *Cue massive back arching tantrum and head banging. Will she ever get the message? Who knows...

DD pulled the same trick today at the age of 13 months. My response was to look totally unimpressed and she got bored pretty quick... Annoying though - she still holds my finger to walk but will scale Everest behind my back.

DD2 was a climber - top of the climbing frame at 18 months, waving with both hands, up bookcases as though they were ladders, on chairs, work tops, tables etc. Just had to be very vigilant. Luckily she was and is very sure footed and became very good at sport. Falling off surfaces did not deter her (determination is another of her qualities).

Yes to determination! Flipping Nora! He's so sneaky as well... waits til I'm on phone or occupied and then goes for it again. Attention seeking?

Born - My DD fell off a table at 17mo and needed a trip to A&E to have her head looked at, they sent us to the children's area to wait for the doctor. We walked into the room and she headed straight for the bookshelf and was up it before I could catch her. The doctor walked in to see her climbing and offered me a regular slot and his direct number - he saw us the next week when she ran head first into the corner of the table and 6 weeks later when she jumped off a slide at the park with the CM and they called an ambulance because her head was pouring blood, a bit of glue and she was climbing on and off chairs in the hospital bay!

DD1 could get on the dinning table before she could walk.

Climbing was her addiction. She would climb anything and everything. Furniture, book cases, trees. She'd give her nursery teacher the slip and climb the main hall wall bars. Any steps or ladder left anywhere by anyone was fair game.

No was a waste of breath, you just had to follow her everywhere and lift her down.

In the end we just bought a climbing frame and spent our time at parks, clamber club and soft play. Anywhere were she could climb.

When she was older she used to frighten the primary mums witless by going to the top of a tree in the park.

I'd long since given up worrying because I had also long since learnt that she climbed because she was good at it, never once did she fall.

DD2 climbs much less, frequently gets in a pickle and breaks her arm falling off a perfectly safe wide dead tree.

OP I think climbing truly is a compulsion for some children, all you can do is keep them safe-ish. Climbing gave DD confidence because she could do things other DCs couldn't. It would have been wrong to stop her.

She didn't grow up to join the climbing club, but has a different dangerous hobby.

BlueBerry what you've described is my absolute worst nightmare! I can't tell you the number of times a day my heart is in my throat with DD's climbing. Touch wood, she's only had minor bangs on the head (albeit LOTS) but I'm just waiting for that first A&E trip. God, it's so stressful!

But despite all that your DD is OK? That's reassuring I guess, even if it does take a year off our lives with worry! x

Babydoll - yes she is perfectly fine, still climbs like mad but at just 2 she is much safer about it . We have taught her to climb properly and to get down backwards. She yells if she is stuck now instead of jumping off!

There's hope then!