getting ds to go to bed for someone other than myself and dp

[queenrollo]

not sure if anyone has any pearls of wisdom on this one but it never hurts to ask.

ds is 23 months.....has never stayed away from home over night. we have bought a cotbed to put at the in laws because we have a concert to go to in November and ds will have to stay at theirs.(also to start getting our social life back).

the biggest problem we face is getting ds to go to bed for nanny(mil)...and also when he wakes in the night he gets quite distressed if it is not me or dp who goes in to him.

he loves his nanny, he sees her nearly every day so is familiar with her.

we are going to start by staying over a few nights so ds gets used to sleeping in an unfamiliar room.

has anyone got any advice on how to get him to settle for his nanny? i really am not sure how to approach this problem.

do you think if they had a tshirt or blanket that smelt of you, it may help? I'd also make sure his bedding was 'used', not fresh, so it smells and feels familiar to him.

also, when you stay over, perhaps Nanny could come in with you too if he wakes, and help you?

Have you tried letting his nanny settle him? You may be worrying unnecessarily. As he knows her well anyway, I'd just go for it - take him there and let them get on with it!
Presumably, as he sees her every day, you live close enough that if he got really distressed you could be called, but I bet it won't come to that.
He'll be spoilt rotten and love every minute, you'll see !

we're going to have to sleep down there and let nanny deal with him unless he really won't settle. the main problem is that he loves being with nanny so much he is too excited to go to sleep!

we went out a few weeks ago and ds woke....mil tried to settle him but he became hysterical asking for daddy so we had to come home. i just can't go to this concert knowing it's a two hour drive away if he gets unsettled. it's a good suggestion about the bedding.....i never would have thought of that.

i have friends who can't believe we've never had a night away from ds, and now i wish i'd tackled this sooner.

Toothyboy.......yes we live about a 5 minute drive.

i'm sure i'm worrying unecessarily........i guess worse case when we're away is that they'll have to put him in the car and take him for a drive until he falls asleep.

fortunately mil follows all our wishes on how to deal with ds, and she won't pander to crying if it's for attention seeking purposes.

The way I see it with the grandparents, is that whatever happens while the children are in their care, they are loved and the gps will do whatever it takes to settle them.

My mum and mil always said to me words to the effect of "well if I have to sit up with him for 2 hours until he goes back to sleep, then I will".

You say your mil won't pander to crying for attention seeking purposes, but she'll know if he's genuinely distressed and she'll comfort him.

Go on, do it, you know it makes sense !!!

you know...when i decided to become a mummy i never imagined i'd worry so much about stuff like this!

mil is a godsend.......my mum is usless. she loves ds but she can't stand to hear him cry, and can't tell the difference between real distress and attention seeking, so ds has her wrapped round his little finger. and my dad is a big kid which is fine when ds needs entertaining but not when i'm trying to get him settled before we are so late for a restaurant booking we're having breakfast instead of dinner!!!

honestly there are some aspects of parenting where i can 'switch off' my emotions (tantrums etc) but other aspects where i just want to phone every five minutes to make sure he's ok.