Going downstairs!

[Pointlessfan]

Please can you tell me at what age your child was able to get downstairs and how you taught them to do so?
DD is almost 18 months. She has been able to get upstairs on all fours for a couple of months. She is now trying to come back down but can't figure it out and she's had one fall already (luckily only about 3 steps up from the bottom).
I've tried showing her how to get down on her bottom but she doesn't really get it.
Sorry if this is a stupid question!

Try holding her hand. It's what I do with my small 20 month old. (She's only just in 12-18 month clothes) she has realised she needs to hold on tight and step carefully and is now able to do get down my front door step alone (which is harder than it sounds as its basically two stair height steps.)

Thank you. She can get down the back door step and the step in the garden by holding the wall for support so that would probably work. I think I'm stressing about it because she fell the other day and was really upset, it took about half an hour for her to stop crying.

We taught DS to come down stairs feet first on his tummy- sort of reverse crawl. The advantage is that if they slip, they just sort of slither down. He was about 8 months I think.

She may fall a few more times yet. I remember my DS falling top to bottom at around that age (he had managed to open the safety gate) I shit myself. Luckily he didn't have a mark on him! Not even slight redness. They click it ecentually. I just hold hands until they are confident/stable enough to do it alone.

8 months!! Wow! I can see how that would be a bit safer, especially as she'd be going feet first if she slipped.

It really worries me as the design of our staircase means there is no way to attach a stairgate at the top. She's never upstairs alone but I'd like her to learn before she's big enough for a proper bed that she can get out of in the night!

Is she in her own room? If she is could you attatch a gate to her door?

And even when they can do stairs, they may still fall. I fall sometimes I'm very clumsy

Yes we could probably attach one to her door actually, or maybe across the landing but I can imagine forgetting about it and going head first over it in the middle of the night!

He was an early crawler and pretty much the first thing he did was make for the bloody stairs. He was obsessed with them. And you can't fit a stairgate at the top or bottom of our stairs (just doesn't work) so it was the only way to minimise the chances of a heart attack (mine!)

Isn't it strange how they are always attracted to the most dangerous thing in any space?!

I wouldn't teach her to go downstairs on her bum. As others have said, a backward crawl is safer until they can walk down.

DS is 16 months, can't walk , but has been doing stairs for a month or so.

furry my DS was the same. He took his first steps at 8 months. DD can get down how you describe but she hates doing it now and wants to walk.

Thanks. It sounds like I've been holding her back leaving it until now!!

My DC did it at about 8-9 months (dc1 crawled from 4 months, going up stairs from about 6 months).

Going down feet first on tummy is easiest. I spent a lot of time sitting a step or two below dc1 while he was learning up and down. We couldn't fit stair gates either and I was pregnant with dc2 by then. So anything to not have to carry two babies sounded very good to me.

Crawling from 4 months! That must have been exhausting. I really liked the time in between cluster feeding ending and DD becoming mobile - I could have a rest!!
It would really help my mum who looks after DD once a week but finds it really hard to carry her down the stairs. Going to give it a go tomorrow.

We taught my DD same technique as furry at about 9 months. She's now 16 months and really keen to walk down but she's fairly small, and our stairs are very steep so we are encouraging the crawl down.

I've left this really late haven't I?! I'm amazed to read about all these 8 month olds doing it.

DD was about 20 months, lots of near falls at my aunt's house as we didn't have stairs at home DS was nearly 3, he's got hypermobility so he was a late walker. Again no stairs to practise on at home, we practised on steps when we were out, the preschool encouraged him to play on the slide.

You haven't left it late at all. You're just responding to your baby. I don't think 'teach baby to go down stairs safely' is on anyone's radar until they try and crawl down head first! Presumably your DD has been finding her mischief (and developing your grey hairs) elsewhere

Exactly what furry said.
They are all different and get into trouble differently.
DS never tried to climb on the TV for example. DD attempted it numerous times until she slipped on the unit and bumped her head on the floor.
DS used to try and climb into the bath head first. DD doesn't.
DD and DS have both jumped off sofas though

No you haven't left it late at all, mine is 8 months and there's no way he is anywhere near going down stairs by himself. These examples are very much the exception, not the rule.

It's not leaving it late - it is just responding to your own situation.

For me it was important that the DC learned early and reliably. Both were early movers and we couldn't have stair gates at either the top or bottom. They are only 12 months apart, so I physically couldn't easily carry 12m old DS1 when 9 months pregnant, or newborn DS2 and 1yo DS1 all the time. So I taught them when they made the early and luckily they were both pretty quick at it. I wouldn't have encouraged DC1 to learn that early except if I hadn't, he'd have done it anyway.

They still had some good heart-stopping tumbles down those stairs though. Came out with nothing worse than bruises.

Thanks for all the advice. I think now the time has come though so I'm going to try and teach her this week and yes she does give me grey hairs in other ways!